In this article, the author raises the question of what now, more than twenty years later, the ''stay'' (pobyt, as it was offi cially called), of the Soviet Army in Czechoslovakia means to the inhabitants of the country. How, she asks, is it recalled in the public space and the mass media, and what images are most frequently evoked in this connection? Whereas the Soviet-led intervention by troops of the Warsaw Pact countries in August 1968 holds a lasting place in Czech memory and historiography, the subsequent stay of Soviet troops in the country has far fuzzier contours. Though in this connection the term ''occupation'' (okupace) is regularly used today, there is no simple agreement about its political meaning. In the article, the author seeks to indentify the changes in the communicated meanings of the occupation, when the original nation-wide consensus of its rejection was squeezed out by the reality of offi cially imposed friendship and the ''twinning'' (družba) of Czechoslovak and Soviet towns. Under its façade, by contrast, people developed variously accented and motivated attitudes, such as keeping their distance or being accommodating, the plurality of which has largely survived in the collective memory unchallenged to this day. The author, however, points mainly to the fundamental shift in the perception of the stay of the Soviet Army, which took place after the Changes beginning in mid-November 1989, when, the degradation of the buildings occupied by the Soviets and the land that they stand on, and the gradual rectifi cation of this, have become the main topics, rather than related aspects of political power.
In Slovakia, Cobitis elongatoides (Bacescu et Mayer, 1969), Sabanejewia balcanica (Karaman, 1922), and Misgurnus fossilis (Linnaeus, 1758) are protected by national legislative, and localities of European importance have been delimited for these species within the Natura 2000 system. In Slovakia, the three species only occur in the Black Sea river system (the Danube and Tisza R. basin). Of them, C. elongatoides is the most widely distributed and most numerous both in its pure form and its hybrid, diploid-polyploid complexes (C. elongatoides x C. tanaitica). It occurs in proper streams and in natural as well as in artificial aquatic habitats, above all, in lowland regions. Comparing data on this species from 1955–1965, no major changes have been found. S. balcanica occurs chiefly in the middle reaches of rivers, first of all, in the Bodrog drainage area (the Laborec, Ondava, Topľa R.) in eastern Slovakia. In the western part of Slovakia (the Danube river system) the occurrence of this species is distinctly less frequent and insular. The distribution of the species has been markedly affected by water pollution, construction of dams and reservoirs, and river bed modifications. The occurrence of M. fossilis is almost exclusively limited to the lowland regions of eastern Slovakia and the Danube Lowland. In those regions, the amelioration measures taken during the second part of the 20th century caused the original natural wetlands to vanish – together with the occurrence of this species. However, M. fossilis found a secondary suitable environment in man-made hydro-amelioration channels, earth pits, and fishponds.
Anaerobic gut fungi of the class Neocallimastigomycetes are of great importance for herbivorous animals. Their immediate colonization and mechanical breakdown of plant particles pave the way for highly efficient enzymatic fermentation of complex plant polysaccharides. Neocallimastigomycetes are found in a variety of herbivores, yet so far studies almost exclusively investigated domestic or captive animals. Here, the occurrence and diversity of Neocallimastigomycetes in two different populations of sympatric, wild African forest elephants and forest buffaloes were determined. In both hosts together, a total of 16 species-equivalent Operational Taxonomic Units (OTUs) (0.05 cut-off level) were generated. Buffaloes harboured four and elephants five anaerobic fungi genera or genus-equivalent taxa, respectively, with four genera occurring in both hosts. In elephants the majority of gut fungi group within a cluster of yet unknown Neocallimastigomycetes. Similarly, some anaerobic fungi found in buffaloes form a genus-equivalent cluster with likewise undescribed gut fungi. Sequences grouping in these two clusters could potentially qualify as representatives of new anaerobic fungi genera. Further, three sequences have not yet been encountered in any study and cannot be assigned to any genus or genus-equivalent Neocallimastigomycetes taxon. Whether these sequences also represent putative new lineages needs further investigation.