Varangerhalvøya National Park (Norwegian: Varangerhalvøya nasjonalpark) is located on the Varanger Peninsula in Finnmark county, Norway. It is found in the municipalities of Båtsfjord, Nesseby, Vadsø, and Vardø, which are in the northeasternmost part of Norway. The peninsula was once the largest area in Norway's Arctic climate zone, but based on climate data from 1991 to 2020, much of the area is now classified as boreal climate instead of Arctic. Much of the region still has alpine tundra.

Flora and fauna

The Varanger Peninsula is home to species from the Arctic, eastern Siberia, and more southern regions, creating a unique mix of plant life. The small deciduous woodlands in the area are among the northernmost in the world.

Lime-rich bedrock and soil in the north support areas with rare plant species, such as Papaver dahlianum (a poppy), field fleawort, Svalbard snow cinquefoil, and Arenaria pseudofrigida (a sandwort).

The peninsula has a complete alpine ecosystem that includes domesticated reindeer, wolverines, and Arctic foxes. The Arctic fox is the most endangered mammal species in Norway. A program that reduces the number of red foxes has helped the Arctic fox population grow, as of 2008.

Approximately 200,000 hectares (770 mi) of the peninsula, mostly within the national park, has been designated an Important Bird Area (IBA) by BirdLife International. This area supports breeding populations of many bird species, including lesser white-fronted geese, long-tailed ducks, common scoters, greater scaups, Eurasian golden plovers, bar-tailed godwits, ruddy turnstones, Temminck's stints, dunlins, purple sandpipers, little stints, red-necked phalaropes, spotted redshanks, long-tailed jaegers, Arctic jaegers, pomarine jaegers, short-eared owls, snowy owls, rough-legged buzzards, gyrfalcons, red-throated pipits, lapland longspurs, and snow buntings.

Name

The final part of the word is the finite form of the Norwegian word halvøy, which means "peninsula." The first part of the name originally referred to the name of a local fjord now called Varangerfjorden (Old Norse: Verangr or Verjanger). The first element is verja, which is the plural form of a word meaning "fishing village." The last element is angr, which means "bay" or "small fjord."