The lakes of Tihany - National Parks - Tihany

Three lakes each play important roles in the beauty of the Tihany landscape: the Balaton, the Outer lake and the Inner lake. The list however is not complete, since a fourth lake also appears in wet years: the Ratai-csava. All three internal lakes of the peninsula are located in what were once volcanic craters, simply through the collection of rainwater.
There are no springs or streams supplying them, this explains their periodic drying out, as has happened to all three lakes at some point during past centuries.

The Inner lake is situated directly under the village, it is almost perfectly roundwith the clear water surface. It lies 26 m above the level of the Lake Balaton in the sunken caldera following volcanic eruption. Once it was famous for its rich flora and fauna. The Inner Lake today is a favourite fishing spot.

The Outher lake, once formed in the main crater of the peninsula's volcano is a heavily filled up shallow lake 116 m above sea level.
Insect life relying onwater is diverse, several rare dragonflies have found suitable conditions for survival here. Of the large number of amphibians and reptiles living in the lak, there is an outstanding abundance of swamp terrapin.
Of the birds the summer goose and the brown meadow hawk hatch their eggs here, in later years there has been evidence of red heron nests too.
This is an important autumn meeting place for heron species since the shallow water is ideally migration 20-25 large heron can frequently be seen together on the lake.