BR Pfälzerwald
Germany's largest connected forest area in a range of low mountains.
The Palatinate Forest Biosphere Reserve is in the south-west of Germany, in the south of the Land Rhineland-Palatinate.
Its southern border also constitutes a border with France and the Biosphere Reserve of the Northern Vosges. To the west lie the Westrich Uplands, to the north the hills of Northern Palatinate, and to the east the Palatinate Plain of the Rhine.
The Palatinate Forest Biosphere Reserve is the biggest homogeneous forest in Germany in a range of low mountains. It covers 1,798 km2, 75% of this being forest.
The unique landscape of the Biosphere Reserve draws its character essentially from its extensive woodlands, mountain slopes and outcrops of new red sandstone.
The original composition of tree species, with a predominance of oak and beech, has given way to pine and spruce over the last 150 years of economic activity.
Due to the biogeographical situation of the reserve and the impact of human intervention, there are incomparably more species and forms of fauna than there are of flora.
The greatest risks are posed to animal life from the abandonment of sustainable land use methods by vintners and farmers, coupled with boundary realignments which encourage more intensive wine-growing on plots which permit access to mechanical vehicles.
This represents a particular threat to species and communities living in the open and semi-open landscape.
The Palatinate Forest Biosphere Reserve embraces a broad spectrum of habitats worthy of protection, notably expanses of rock or dry grass, as well as wetlands and siltings around bodies of standing water.
UNESCO declared the Palatinate Forest a Biosphere Reserve in 1992.
The Palatinate Forest was selected for sampling by the Environmental Specimen Bank as an example of a forestry ecosystem in a low mountain region.
Search data
Sub-areas
| WEG Moosbachtal | Landscape in the Dahner Felsenland, the touristy heart in the southwestern Palatinate. |
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Specimen
| Common spruce | A major primary producer in semi-natural and anthropogenic affected ecosystems. |
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| Beech | As the most dominant deciduous tree species in Central Europe, it plays a significant role in most nearly natural and also anthropogenically influenced forest ecosystems up to an altitude of 1100 m. |
| Roe deer, one-year-old | The roe deer is the most common of the larger herbivores (first order-consumer) to be found in the wild in Europe. |
| Soil | Soil is livelihood and biosphere for humans, animals, plants and soil organisms. All the substances brought in are transported, transformed and/or accumulated in the soil. |
Analytes
| Metals | Eighty percent of all elements on earth are metals |
|---|---|
| Nonmetals | Only eighteen elements in the periodic table |
| Chlorohydrocarbons | Group of organic compounds with at least one covalently bonded chlorine atom |
| Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons | Group of organic compounds with at least three condensed six-membered rings |
| Supplementary parameters | Additional information for the interpretation of contamination data |
Sampling period
2001 - 2011