Swiss Mountains Research Articles

Natural forest regrowth as a proxy variable for agricultural land abandonment in the Swiss mountains: a spatial statistical model based on geophysical and socio-economic variables

In many European mountain regions, natural forest regrowth on abandoned agricultural land and the related consequences for the environment are issues of increasing concern. We developed a spatial statistical model based on multiple geophysical and socio-economic variables to investigate the pattern of natural forest regrowth in the Swiss mountain area between the 1980s and 1990s. Results show that forest regrowth occurred primarily in areas with low temperature sum, intermediate steepness and soil stoniness as well as close to forest edges and relatively close to roads. Model results suggest that regions with weak labor markets are favored in terms of land abandonment and forest regrowth. We could not find an effect of population change on land abandonment and forest regrowth. Therefore, we conclude that decision makers should consider non-linearities in the pattern of forest regrowth and the fact that labor markets have an effect on land abandonment and forest regrowth when designing measures to prevent agricultural land abandonment and natural forest regrowth in the Swiss mountains.

Eva Hesse and Color

John Ruskin recalled in his autobiography how on trip Italy he painted scale of cobalt blues to measure the blue of the sky with. Ever keen measure and calibrate, he called his handmade scale cyanometer1 as if color would be systematically gauged according its gradation of tones. For all the elaborate theories that have been developed systematize color, I know of no more concise example of the historical drive control its effects than this brief image of Ruskin, planning his painting trip the Swiss mountains, mixing his own colors correspond with the exact blue on his strip of blues, which he matched against the intense blues of an alpine sky. Yet it is an image with double edge, which both illustrates positivistic belief in the possibility of measuring color and hints at what is really at stake in the desire calculate it. Ultimately what is most interesting about Ruskin's would-be purely technical instrument is precisely that which escapes the system of external and verifiable equivalence that he ostensibly wishes fix in place, the sheer pleasure that overwhelms the measure. Revealed in the process is Ruskin's own agitated, almost nervous, hypersensitivity color. In Modern Painters (1843), he would devote long sections the painting of the sky, which however pure and blue, he writes, is never flat and dead but trembling transparency and a deep, quivering, transparent body of penetrable air.2 What trembles but the optical sensation of perception? An instrument intended measure the color of the sky is instead an instrument calibrate levels of affect and sensation. That is say, rather than system of objective measurement, this scale of gradated color reflects back on the subject betray body, like color swatch gauging sensual encounter of rising and falling intensities. Even though Ruskin's pictorial sensibility is admittedly as far removed from Eva Hesse's world and, more generally, the American art world of the 1960s as is possible imagine, the anecdote provides useful image think ivith: graded color sample. Imagine an array of color swatches, for instance, little pieces of fabric

Agricultural land abandonment and natural forest re-growth in the Swiss mountains: A spatially explicit economic analysis

Natural forest re-growth reflects a decline in traditional agricultural practices that can be observed worldwide. Over the last few decades, natural forest re-growth has replaced much of the agricultural land in the Swiss mountains. This is a region where forms of traditional cultivation have preserved unique landscapes and habitats of high ecological value. This study aimed to characterise the locations in the Swiss mountainswhere agricultural land hasbeen abandoned and overgrown bytrees andbushes.Therefore, multivariate statistical models based on geo-physical and socio-economic variables were developed. Land-use change data were taken from two nationwide land-use surveys carried out in the 1980s and 1990s. In order to obtain reliable models, neighbourhood effects and the group structure in our data were accounted for. For the latter a robust estimation technique known as cluster-adjustment was used. Results show that forest re-growth is largely restricted to former alpine pastures, land with grass and scrub vegetation and agricultural land with groups of trees at mid to high altitudes, steep slopes, stony ground and a low temperature sum. Some relationships were not as expected, e.g. many of the new forest areas were found to be relatively close to roads. A new finding from this study was that forest re-growth is largely restricted to regions with immigration, higher proportions of part-time farms as opposed to full-time farms and high farm abandonment rates. By accounting forneighbourhood effects, themodelfit was improved. The considerable residual deviance of themodels was interpreted asthe result of undetected local characteristics, such as poor water availability, small-scaled topographic peculiarities (e.g. small trenches, stonewalls, soil damages by cattle) and the individual’s motivation to abandon or maintain cultivation. The conclusion made was that general policy measures for the whole mountain area are not suitable for the prevention of land abandonment and forest re-growth, and that policy measures must pay more attention to local characteristics and needs. # 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Investigating the regional-scale pattern of agricultural land abandonment in the Swiss mountains: A spatial statistical modelling approach

In many European mountain regions, agricultural land abandonment and the related consequences for the environment are issues of increasing concern. During the last few decades, natural forest re-growth has steadily replaced agricultural land in the Swiss mountains. This is a region where forms of traditional cultivation have preserved unique landscapes and habitats of high ecological value. The aim of this study was to investigate the recent regional-scale pattern of agricultural land abandonment, as indicated by forest re-growth, in the Swiss mountains. For this, we developed multivariate spatial statistical models on the basis of mountain-wide land-use change data, evaluated between the 1980s and 1990s, and selected geo-physical and socio-economic variables. Results show that regions with shallow soils, steep slopes and under-developed road infrastructure were favoured in terms of land abandonment and forest re-growth. These regions were also characterised by low proportions of full-time farms. In some regions, strong labour markets were related to higher abandonment rates, but this is not a general trend in Swiss mountainous regions. We found no relationship between land abandonment and migration, which contrasts with findings in other European mountain regions. One model suggests a spatial ‘spillover’ effect, causing similar abandonment rates in adjacent regions, although this could not be proven in this study. We conclude that decision-makers should consider non-linearity in the pattern of land abandonment and the fact that part-time farming is related to land abandonment when designing measures to react to land abandonment and its consequences.

Auf dem Weg zum Gebirgsplenterwald: Kurzzeiteffekte von Durchforstungen auf die Struktur subalpiner Fichtenwälder | On the way to a mountain selection forest:Short-term effects of thinning on the structure of subalpine spruce forests (reviewed paper)

Stand structures and stand stability in unmanaged Norway spruce forests in the Swiss mountains may decline and their protective function against natural hazards will thus be put at risk. They are being subjected to thinning operations to improve stability and, in the long-term, to transform them into mountain selection forests. On pairs of research plots – thinned and not thinned – we will closely follow the stand development. Preliminary results indicate that the best variables to describe the effectiveness of the applied treatment to the stand structures are the h/d ratio,the spatial distribution and the stand density index.

Ein auto-iatrogenes Leiden

A 55-year-old practitioner from an island in the northern sea felt an increasing hypersensitivity of his entire body to various ambient and nutritional allergens and toxics. He started to treat himself with increasing doses of glucocorticoids and moved to a southern climate in Lanzarote and later on to the Swiss mountains in the grisons. On admission to our hospital in December he was in a disastrous psychotic condition, trying to cool down his body by laying naked on his bed at ambient temperatures around the freezing point. He had consumed on average 250 mg prednisone daily over weeks. As we found out later his personal assistant travelling with him was giving him glucocorticoids through the infusion during his hospital stay. He developed a necrotizing septic phlebitis at the infusion site followed by a Pseudomonas aeruginosa sepsis with fatal multiorgan failure. This case illustrates the dangers of self-treatment by doctors and the difficulties in treating a physician.

Effectiveness of structure improvement thinning on stand structure in subalpine Norway spruce ( Picea abies (L.) Karst.) stands

In the Swiss mountains there are numerous Norway spruce stands which have never or have not received silvicultural treatment for a long time. It is feared that the stand structures and, therefore, stand stability, i.e. resistance against storms and snow loads, will decline to such a degree that their protective function against natural hazards will be reduced. In this study, such stands, which local forest services consider having unsatisfactory structures and being unstable and with little regeneration, were subjected to a first thinning operation. Selected silvicultural treatments to maintain and improve the mechanical stability of the stands with the long-term goal of transforming them into mountain selection forests are presented. The subsequent development of the stands will be monitored and analysed. The effects of the treatments on structure and stand stability will be examined in the long-term by comparisons to adjacent stands with similar structures and similar stability which have received no treatment. First results concerning the effectiveness of the applied silvicultural measures regarding stand structure are analysed. It seems that the variables h/ d ratio, spatial distribution and the stand density index (SDI) are the best indicators of the effectiveness of the silvicultural treatment.

Microbially induced cementation of carbonate sands: are micritic meniscus cements good indicators of vadose diagenesis?

Characteristic fabrics such as micrite envelopes, calcified filaments and micritic grain‐to‐grain bridges are observed in a modern subtidal firmground (Wood Cay, Bahamas) and in a variety of firm‐ and hardgrounds of Lower Cretaceous and Upper Jurassic platform carbonates (Swiss and French Jura Mountains). Their similarity to microbial fabrics described in grapestones and in intertidal to continental vadose environments suggests that microbial activity played an important role in the initial stabilization and cementation of carbonate sands. ‘Meniscus‐type cements’ (to distinguish them from vadose meniscus cements), which clearly formed in subtidal environments, are related to filament calcification, trapping of percolating micrite and microbially induced carbonate formation. Such meniscus‐type cements are commonly micritic, but meniscus‐shaped precipitation of fibrous aragonite or sparitic calcite around organic filaments is also observed. Therefore, an interpretation of vadose early diagenesis should not be based on meniscus cements alone. Similarly, subtidally formed filamentous structures can strongly resemble alveolar septal structures and be interpreted incorrectly as related to subaerial exposure.

Guido Pontecorvo 1907-1999

"Ponte", as he was known, even to his family, died in September 1999, aged 91, of complications following a fall whilst collecting mushrooms in his beloved Swiss mountains. He was the founder of the genetics of Aspergillus nidulans, and as a result of the discovery of the parasexual cycle, the originator of genetical studies in many other fungi. He made significant contributions to modern genetics in elucidating the divisibility of the gene by recombination, and in his later years in the application of parasexual techniques to mammalian cell cultures. He was also an irascible yet genial friend and adviser who attracted the great admiration of colleagues and students worldwide.

The Jura Mountains — an active foreland fold-and-thrust belt?

Recently completed in situ stress measurements using the borehole slotter at 33 new test sites within the Swiss and French Jura Mountains, combined with previously published stress data, allow a detailed description of the contemporary state of stress in this fold-and-thrust belt and the adjacent foreland. Five stress provinces can be recognized, with two different general orientations of maximum horizontal stress S H: (1) the Central and Southwest Provinces with a NNW–SSE to NNE–SSW orientation; (2) the East, Northwest and Southeast Provinces with an E–W to NW–SE orientation. Stress magnitudes are in general higher in the southern than in the northern Jura Mountains. Characteristic of the northern Jura is an E–W-trending zone of low stress magnitudes which can be traced from the Bresse Depression south of Besançon to the eastern end of the Jura northwest of Zurich. Boundaries of stress provinces show poor agreement with boundaries of tectonic units in the Jura. In addition, stress provinces extend beyond the boundaries of the Jura Mountains into their foreland. Furthermore, palaeo-stress orientations show large discrepancies with respect to the contemporary stress orientation. These findings are considered to indicate a termination of Jura thin-skinned foreland tectonics, which probably took place some time between 9 and 4 Ma according to palaeontological and tectonic evidence. It is suggested that a new style of tectonics has commenced in the Jura Mountains, deforming both the basement directly below the Jura fold-and-thrust belt and the cover rocks in a similar mode.

Guido Pontecorvo ("Ponte"), 1907-1999.

GUIDO Pontecorvo died on September 25, 1999, age 91, of complications following a fall while collecting mushrooms in his beloved Swiss mountains; he was a significant contributor to modern genetics. He was also an irascible yet genial friend and advisor who attracted the great affection and

Flood Forecasting and Warning on the River Rhine

The River Rhine has its source in the glaciers of the Swiss mountains and eventually flows to the flat-lands of The Netherlands. The course of the river can be split into six major morphological sections within different climatological regions. This heterogeneity (in the hydrological sense) is reflected in twenty-five flood-warning centres along the Rhine and its tributaries. There is one flood-warning centre in Switzerland, one in France, three in Germany and one in The Netherlands. This paper describes the organisation and responsibilities of the German flood-warning centres. The Federal Institute of Hydrology provides the German centres at Mainz and Duisburg with forecast results. These results were obtained by a statistical multichannel filtering model between 1980 and 1997. Commencing in 1998, a new forecasting system has been in use, which is built up by hydrodynamic models for the most important river reaches, coupled with statistical approaches for some input gauges. The implementation and data usage of this new system is discussed and forecast results for the 1993, 1995 and the 1998 floods are presented. Finally, the paper provides an outlook on the linking with precipitation-runoff models.

In situ stress data from the Jura Mountains — new results and interpretation

Recently completed in situ stress measurements using the borehole slotter at 33 new test sites within the Swiss and French Jura Mountains are presented. When combined with previously published stress data, these new measurements allow a detailed description of the contemporary state of stress in this fold‐and‐thrust belt and the adjacent foreland. The data now allow the recognition of five stress provinces, within which two general and different orientations of maximum horizontal stress SH can be distinguished: the Central and the Southwest Provinces, with a NNW–SSE to NNE–SSW orientation, and the East, Northwest and Southeast Provinces, orientated E–W to NW–SE. Each province has its own characteristic orientation. Measurements in three study areas are presented for comparison with already published acoustic anisotropy measurements, borehole breakout data, overcoring tests and triangulation measurements. The results show a generally good agreement with the new borehole slotter measurements. The tectonic implications of these stress data are discussed in terms of a large‐scale stress reorientation of the NW–SE orientated contemporary Central European stress field in the foreland of the western Alpine arc.

Subaerial exposure and deposition of shallowing upward sequences: evidence from stable isotopes of Purbeckian peritidal carbonates (basal Cretaceous), Swiss and French Jura Mountains

ABSTRACTPurbeckian (lowermost Cretaceous) peritidal carbonates are characterized by open marine, lagoonal, intertidal and lacustrine facies arranged in Milankovitch‐type shallowing upward sequences. Shallowing upward sequences typically consist of 2–6 individual beds. The sequences may be (i) complete, (ii) incomplete or (ii) pedogenetically overprinted, reflecting the duration of subaerial exposure and/or the extent of erosion and pedogenetic modification at the cycle tops.The stable isotopic composition of the peritidal micrites reveals homogenous δ18O values attributed to diagenetic stabilization in a meteoric, water‐buffered system. Carbon isotopes show three distinctly different carbon isotope patterns dependent on the completeness of the shallowing upward sequences. Complete shallowing upward sequences consist of 4–6 individual carbonate beds. The carbon isotope values show a facies‐dependent pattern: open marine carbonate muds record enriched δ13C values of +0·28‰ while lagoonal (−0·82‰), intertidal (−2·46‰) and lacustrine micrites (−2·96‰) are increasingly depleted. This distinct pattern is explained by carbonate mud deposition in environments of differing salinity and marine influence. Incomplete sequences (2–5 carbonate beds) are characterized by depleted δ13C values below subaerial exposure surfaces that become progressively enriched in 13C with increasing depth. Pedogenetically overprinted sequences (1–3 carbonate beds) show strong 13C depletion throughout the sequence with little variation in the carbon isotopic composition. The depleted values (−4·5‰) of the pedogenetically altered micrites suggest that modification during subaerial exposure was associated with equilibration with meteoric solutions enriched in isotopically light soil gas CO2.The duration of subaerial exposure is the most crucial factor determining the extent of pedogenetic alterations, the completeness of the shallowing upward sequences and the carbon isotope pattern. The recorded patterns clearly illustrate that micrites have a good potential for the preservation of their primary carbon isotopic composition if the duration of subaerial exposure is rather brief. Otherwise, the recorded carbon isotope patterns may support sequence stratigraphic analysis by providing a refinement of the time‐stratigraphic interpretation.

Sunshape and Its Influence on the Flux Distribution in Imaging Solar Concentrators

Imaging solar concentrators, such as a parabolic dish, image the sun to their focal plane. Thus, the flux distribution is basically an image of the angular distribution of the direct incident solar radiation. This distribution, referred to as sunshape, is determined by solar limb darkening and by small angle scattering in the atmosphere. In this paper we present measurements of the sunshape and investigate its influence on the flux distribution in the solar furnace at Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) and in parabolic concentrators, both experimentally and by a ray tracing procedure. Analyzing the influence of the spectral dependence of the sunshape we find that the characteristic width of the focal spot increases with longer wavelengths. In contrary, the mean concentration ratio is higher at shorter wavelengths. Although these effects are rather small, they can be important in radiometric measurement techniques to determine the emissivity and the temperature distribution of an irradiated sample as well as in designing solar pumped lasers. Comparing various sunshapes with the corresponding flux distributions in the two-stage solar furnace at PSI, we show that the influence of the circumsolar radiation on the flux distribution is usually negligible as compared to the distortion due to astigmatism. However, in more accurate optical systems, such as highly concentrating parabolic dishes, the flux distribution is a fairly accurate image of the sunshape. We find, that due to sunshape, the mean concentration ratio in a parabolic dish is decreased by about ten percent. As an example we subsequently estimate the mean annual conversion efficiency of an ideal solar converter operated in the Swiss mountains.

Formation of illitic minerals at surface temperatures in Purbeckian sediments (Lower Berriasian, Swiss and French Jura)

AbstractThe clay-mineralogical assemblages of Purbeckian carbonate sediments of the Swiss and French Jura Mountains are often composed of illite and interstratified illite-smectite. These illitic minerals occur mainly in thin layers of green marls which show evidence of subaerial exposure and mark the top of shallowing-upward sequences. X-ray diffraction, chemical and thermal analyses coupled with transmission electron microscopy suggest that the Purbeckian illitic minerals replaced smectite in intermediate continental-marine environments. The transition from smectite to illite and interstratified illite-smectite probably resulted from repeated cycles of wetting by marine waters and subsequent drying in hypersaline environments, under a hot Purbeckian climate.

Shallowing‐upward sequences in Purbeckian peritidal carbonates (lowermost Cretaceous, Swiss and French Jura Mountains)

ABSTRACTPurbeckian carbonates in the Swiss and French Jura (Goldberg Formation, lower Berriasian) comprise shallow‐subtidal, intertidal, supratidal, low‐energy, high‐energy, marine, brackish, freshwater, and hypersaline facies. These facies are arranged in small (0–2–1.5 m thick) sequences which display a dominant shallowing‐upward component, and which form the fundamental units of the highly structured Purbeckian sedimentary record.Six types of small‐scale sequences can be recognized. A: intertidal to supratidal overprinting of shallow lagoonal facies; B: algal‐marsh sequence with frequent dolomitization; C: sabkha sequence, often associated with collapse breccia; D: tidal‐flat sequence with desiccation features; E: lacustrine sequence; F: terrestrial overprinting of subtidal or intertidal facies. Episodic event deposits such as tempestites are superimposed] Thin transgressive beds which rework elements of the underlying facies are frequently found at the base of the sequences. Green marls and black pebbles are common at the top and indicate long subaerial exposure. The sequences are often incomplete, as subtidal facies may be absent, or their upper part can be eroded. Lateral facies changes are common, which is due to the very shallow and partly emergent Purbeckian platform where various depositional environments were juxtaposed. However, many sequence boundaries are well developed and can be correlated over large parts of the study area.The Purbeckian shallowing‐upward sequences were generated by climatically controlled sea‐level changes. Autocyclic processes occurred locally, but were overprinted by drops of sea‐level affecting the entire platform. The small‐scale sequences are most probably related to the 20 000‐year cycle of the precession of the equinoxes. Larger sequences with usually well‐developed emersion surfaces are attributed to the 100 000 and 400 000‐year eccentricity cycles of the Earth's orbit. Identification and correlation of sequence boundaries makes it possible to set up a framework of isochronous surfaces (which often cut across facies boundaries), and thus to interpret in detail the palaeogeographic, sedimentological and diagenetic evolution of the Purbeckian peritidal carbonate environments.

The Future of ASTIN

My assistants at ETH have a wall calendar—not with the usual pictures of Swiss mountains, hills and lakes, but with “quotations for intelligent people”. Recently, the quotation for the week read as follows: “Even the future is no longer what it used to be in the past”.Observe that also in this supposedly intelligent approach it seems impossible to speak about the future without referring to the past. I shall not deviate from this rule. Of course, my task is greatly simplified by the fact that Paul Johansen has just entertained you in a charming way about the past 25 years of ASTIN and the earlier endeavors leading to the foundation of ASTIN.In the year 1693, Edmond Halley constructed the first mortality table based on mortality data from Breslau which he had obtained through the intervention of Leibniz. This can be regarded as the starting point of actuarial science. In my opinion it can however not be considered as the starting point of the actuarial profession. Why? Yes, Halley's table was used for some eighty years because subsequent information coincided with his estimate of mortality. Yes, De Moivre, in his classic textbook of 1725, performed ingenious calculations of annuities, based on the same table. Yes, Süssmilch published the first basic and substantial work of demography in 1741 but—here comes the big but—no government (and nobody else sold annuity insurance at that time) made use of the available scientific method to calculate annuities. Perhaps the first statistical results to be taken seriously were the Northampton tables of 1780, devised by Richard Price. Incidentally, this date coincides reasonably well with the first valuation by William Morgan in 1786. Hence, I think that either of these dates may be taken, at the earliest, as the start of the actuarial profession, a profession being by definition a dedicated group of people accepted by society for the performance of a particular skill. Let me make my point explicit: We have historical evidence of the existence of actuarial science about 90 years prior to the emergence of the actuarial profession.

Book Review: I.—Practical Theology: Chel: A Story of the Swiss Mountains

Book Review: I.—Practical Theology: Chel: A Story of the Swiss Mountains

Geographical Notes

Geographical Notes