The Georgenfelder Hochmoor is a

raised bog Raised bogs, also called ombrotrophic bogs, are acidic, wet habitats that are poor in mineral salts and are home to flora and fauna that can cope with such extreme conditions. Raised bogs, unlike fens, are exclusively fed by precipitation ( ombro ...

(''Hochmoor'') in the German Ore Mountains of central Europe, not far from Zinnwald-Georgenfeld. It is part of a larger bog or moor complex, that lies to the south, mainly on the far side of the Germany's national border in the

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...

and which, since time immemorial, has been known simply as "The Lake" (''Die See''). The Georgenfelder Hochmoor is one of the oldest

nature reserves A nature reserve (also known as a wildlife refuge, wildlife sanctuary, biosphere reserve or bioreserve, natural or nature preserve, or nature conservation area) is a protected area of importance for flora, fauna, or features of geological or o ...

Saxony Saxony (german: Sachsen ; Upper Saxon: ''Saggsn''; hsb, Sakska), officially the Free State of Saxony (german: Freistaat Sachsen, links=no ; Upper Saxon: ''Freischdaad Saggsn''; hsb, Swobodny stat Sakska, links=no), is a landlocked state of ...

Geography

Location

Zinnwald-Georgenfeld, which lies right on the German-Czech border, is about 45 kilometres south of

Dresden Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label=Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth larg ...

and four kilometres south of Altenberg. This

dispersed settlement A dispersed settlement, also known as a scattered settlement, is one of the main types of settlement patterns used by landscape historians to classify rural settlements found in England and other parts of the world. Typically, there are a numb ...

, on the plateau at the crest of the

eastern Ore Mountains The Eastern Ore Mountains (german: Osterzgebirge) form a natural region of Saxony that covers the eastern part (in area almost the eastern half) of the Saxon Ore Mountains range. Together with the Western and Central Ore Mountains, it is part of ...

, lies at an elevation of 780 to 880 metres above sea level (NN) and is the highest village in the eastern Ore Mountains. The Georgenfelder Hochmoor is part of this municipality.

Creation

The formation of the raised bog goes back to the

Elster glaciation The Elster glaciation (german: Elster-Kaltzeit, ''Elster-Glazial'' or ''Elster-Zeit'') or, less commonly, the Elsterian glaciation, in the older and popular scientific literature also called the Elster Ice Age (''Elster-Eiszeit''), is the oldest k ...

. The maximum extent of the inland ice mass at that time reached as far as the so-called flint line (''Feuersteinlinie''), which, in the district of

Sächsische Schweiz-Osterzgebirge Saxon Switzerland-Eastern Ore Mountains (german: Sächsische Schweiz-Osterzgebirge) is a district (''Districts of Germany, Kreis'') in Saxony, Germany. It is named after the mountain ranges Saxon Switzerland and Eastern Ore Mountains. History Th ...

runs roughly along the line

Tharandt Tharandt () is a municipality in Saxony, Germany, situated on the Weißeritz, 9 miles southwest of Dresden. It has a Protestant Church and the oldest academy of forestry in Germany, founded as the Royal Saxon Academy of Forestry by Heinrich Cotta ...

– Rabenau –

Freital Freital is a town in the district of Sächsische Schweiz-Osterzgebirge in Saxony, Germany. The town is situated on a small river, the Weißeritz, and is southwest of Dresden. Geography Freital is located southwest of Dresden in the Döhlen Ba ...

–

Kreischa Kreischa is a municipality in the Sächsische Schweiz-Osterzgebirge district, Saxony, Germany. It directly borders the Saxon capital Dresden and consists of 14 districts. Kreischa was first mentioned in 1282 in the name ''Heinricus de Kryschowe'' ...

– Weesenstein – Cottaer Spitzberg. The ridgeline in this area had a permanent covering or cap of

firn __NOTOC__ Firn (; from Swiss German "last year's", cognate with ''before'') is partially compacted névé, a type of snow that has been left over from past seasons and has been recrystallized into a substance denser than névé. It is ice that ...

. When this firn cap melted, it formed small lakes in the hollows which had no drainage. In the warm period that followed the glacial period, vegetation grew on the shores of these waters. Reeds and

horsetails ''Equisetum'' (; horsetail, snake grass, puzzlegrass) is the only living genus in Equisetaceae, a family of ferns, which reproduce by spores rather than seeds. ''Equisetum'' is a "living fossil", the only living genus of the entire subclass Eq ...

produced the first

humus In classical soil science, humus is the dark organic matter in soil that is formed by the decomposition of plant and animal matter. It is a kind of soil organic matter. It is rich in nutrients and retains moisture in the soil. Humus is the Lati ...

and initiated the formation of peat. Meanwhile, falling deciduous leaves,

pollen Pollen is a powdery substance produced by seed plants. It consists of pollen grains (highly reduced microgametophytes), which produce male gametes (sperm cells). Pollen grains have a hard coat made of sporopollenin that protects the gametophyt ...

and

grass Poaceae () or Gramineae () is a large and nearly ubiquitous family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos and the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivated in lawns an ...

collected in the waters. The pollen trapped in the

fen A fen is a type of peat-accumulating wetland fed by mineral-rich ground or surface water. It is one of the main types of wetlands along with marshes, swamps, and bogs. Bogs and fens, both peat-forming ecosystems, are also known as mires. T ...

still enables today, after thousands of years, an accurate determination of the then prevailing

vegetation Vegetation is an assemblage of plant species and the ground cover they provide. It is a general term, without specific reference to particular taxa, life forms, structure, spatial extent, or any other specific botanical or geographic character ...

and the

climate Climate is the long-term weather pattern in an area, typically averaged over 30 years. More rigorously, it is the mean and variability of meteorological variables over a time spanning from months to millions of years. Some of the meteorologic ...

. The dry and warm climate period that followed allowed this reed bog to dry out. Individual trees, especially

birch A birch is a thin-leaved deciduous hardwood tree of the genus ''Betula'' (), in the family Betulaceae, which also includes alders, hazels, and hornbeams. It is closely related to the beech-oak family Fagaceae. The genus ''Betula'' contains 30 ...

, colonised these nutrient-rich areas. After this period followed a cool and wet period with low levels of sunshine. The enormous rainfall raised water levels immensely, which is why

peat moss ''Sphagnum'' is a genus of approximately 380 accepted species of mosses, commonly known as sphagnum moss, peat moss, also bog moss and quacker moss (although that term is also sometimes used for peat). Accumulations of ''Sphagnum'' can store wa ...

species colonised very quickly and, due to their rapid growth, threatened and eventually entirely displaced the trees. Dead trees were covered in an airtight fashion by the moss. This layer is also referred to today as old forest peat (''Waldtorf''). The peat moss died underneath but continued to grow upwards indefinitely. This formed a thick layer of peat. The surface of this vegetation is strongly curved towards the centre, which is why it is called a raised bog. The geographic elevation of the bog has thus nothing to do with the term "raised bog", because they also occur in the lowlands. The subsequent moderately dry climatic period triggered off a new tree growth in the area and bog pines colonised the terrain. The peat mosses formed the older moss peat (''Moostorf''). Subsequently, the climate became cold and wet again, and mosses threatened the woodland cover. These dead trees are now referred to as the younger layer of forest peat. In our current moderately dry climate, bog pine is taking hold again. On the bare plateaux of the Ore Mountain ridgeline several bogs have formed over the course of time. These are usually also watersheds. Another bog region in the immediate vicinity is the Fürstenau Heath Nature Reserve.

Climate

Zinnwald-Georgenfeld has a

humid continental climate A humid continental climate is a climatic region defined by Russo-German climatologist Wladimir Köppen in 1900, typified by four distinct seasons and large seasonal temperature differences, with warm to hot (and often humid) summers and freezing ...

(

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...

Age and profile

Half mature moss peat forms a layer about 8 cm thick over 100 years. Mature moss peat forms a layer of 2 to 3 centimetres in the same time. The Georgenfelder Hochmoor has a thickness of about 5 meters and is thus about 10,000 years old.

Extent

The nature reserve covers about 11 hectares and is located at an elevation of 875 metres above sea level (NN). It is only the small western tip of an extensive region of bog between the mountains known as the German and Czech Lugsteins.

Conservation and research

On the initiative of the State Association for Saxon Conservation (''Landesverein Sächsischer Heimatschutz''), the region was purchased in 1926 and declared a nature reserve. A school headmaster, Marschner, was especially prominent in the purchase and the botanical research of the reserve. The Saxon botanist, Court Councillor (''Hofrat'') A. Naumann, associate Professor of Botany at the Dresden Veterinary CollegeA. Naumann
(PDF) also undertook extensive research of the Georgenfelder Hochmoor.

Access

The bog was made accessible on foot by the construction of a

board walk A boardwalk (alternatively board walk, boarded path, or promenade) is an elevated footpath, walkway, or causeway built with wooden planks that enables pedestrians to cross wet, fragile, or marshy land. They are also in effect a low type of bridge ...

Present vegetation

Due to intensive peat cutting, the water balance of the area was disturbed, resulting in the death of some plant species. Today,

cranberry Cranberries are a group of evergreen dwarf shrubs or trailing vines in the subgenus ''Oxycoccus'' of the genus ''Vaccinium''. In Britain, cranberry may refer to the native species ''Vaccinium oxycoccos'', while in North America, cranberry ...

and

bog bilberry ''Vaccinium uliginosum'' (bog bilberry, bog blueberry, northern bilberry or western blueberry) is a Eurasian and North American flowering plant in the genus ''Vaccinium'' within the heath family. Distribution ''Vaccinium uliginosum'' is native ...

from the North European tundra still colonise the bog. The predominant species, however, is bog pine, but some silver birch and spruce trees have also established themselves. The bog pine stems from the

mountain pine ''Pinus mugo'', known as bog pine, creeping pine, dwarf mountain pine, mugo pine, mountain pine, scrub mountain pine, or Swiss mountain pine, is a species of conifer, native to high elevation habitats from southwestern to Central Europe and Sou ...

of the high mountains. In the Georgenfelder Hochmoor it is usually found as a knee-high shrub, a mountain pine or a crooked pine. These forms of growth are perfectly adapted to the harsh climate of this mountain range. Blueberries, heathers and cranberries can be found on the dry terrain. The sheath cottongrass, by contrast, has colonized the wet spots. The following plants may also be found in the reserve: sedges, peat moss, cottongrass, sundew and butterwort.

Protected plants

Longleaf pine The longleaf pine (''Pinus palustris'') is a pine species native to the Southeastern United States, found along the coastal plain from East Texas to southern Virginia, extending into northern and central Florida. In this area it is also known as ...

(''Pinus palustris'') *

Downy birch ''Betula pubescens'' (syn. ''Betula alba''), commonly known as downy birch and also as moor birch, white birch, European white birch or hairy birch, is a species of deciduous tree, native and abundant throughout northern Europe and northern Asia ...

(''Betula pubescens'') *

Dwarf birch ''Betula nana'', the dwarf birch, is a species of birch in the family Betulaceae, found mainly in the tundra of the Arctic region. Description It is a monoecious, deciduous shrub growing up to high. The bark is non-peeling and shiny red-copper ...

(''Betula nana'') *

Peat moss ''Sphagnum'' is a genus of approximately 380 accepted species of mosses, commonly known as sphagnum moss, peat moss, also bog moss and quacker moss (although that term is also sometimes used for peat). Accumulations of ''Sphagnum'' can store wa ...

(''Sphagnidae'') *

Bilberry Bilberries (), or sometimes European blueberries, are a primarily Eurasian species of low-growing shrubs in the genus ''Vaccinium'' (family Ericaceae), bearing edible, dark blue berries. The species most often referred to is ''Vaccinium myrtillus ...

(''Vaccinium'') *

Wild rosemary Wild rosemary is a common name for several plants and may refer to: *Wild growing forms of the cultivated rosemary *''Andromeda polifolia'' (Bog rosemary) is known as wild rosemary, found in North America and Eurasia *Wild relatives of cultivated ...

(''Rhododendron tomentosum'') * Sheathed cottonsedge (''Eriophorum vaginatum'') *

Common cottongrass Common may refer to: Places * Common, a townland in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland * Boston Common, a central public park in Boston, Massachusetts * Cambridge Common, common land area in Cambridge, Massachusetts * Clapham Common, originally com ...

(''Eriophorum angustifolium'') *

Round-leaved sundew ''Drosera rotundifolia'', the round-leaved sundew, roundleaf sundew, or common sundew, is a carnivorous species of flowering plant that grows in bogs, marshes and fens. One of the most widespread sundew species, it has a circumboreal distribution ...

(''Drosera rotundifolia'') * Moorland spotted orchid (''Dactylorhiza maculata'') * Cowberry (''Vaccinium vitis-idaea'') *

Bog bilberry ''Vaccinium uliginosum'' (bog bilberry, bog blueberry, northern bilberry or western blueberry) is a Eurasian and North American flowering plant in the genus ''Vaccinium'' within the heath family. Distribution ''Vaccinium uliginosum'' is native ...

(''Vaccinium uliginosum'') *

Cranberry Cranberries are a group of evergreen dwarf shrubs or trailing vines in the subgenus ''Oxycoccus'' of the genus ''Vaccinium''. In Britain, cranberry may refer to the native species ''Vaccinium oxycoccos'', while in North America, cranberry ...

* Heather *

Marsh violet ''Viola palustris'' (marsh violet, or alpine marsh violet) is a perennial forb of the genus ''Viola''. It inhabits moist meadows, marshes, and stream banks in northern parts of North America and Eurasia. The species epithet ''palustris'' is Lat ...

, (''Viola palustris'') *

Moor grass ''Molinia'', or moor grass, is a genus of two species of flowering plants in the grass family, native to damp moorland in Eurasia and northern Africa. They are both herbaceous perennial grasses. The genus is named after Juan Ignacio Molina, a ...

(''Molinia'') * Arctic starflower (''Trientalis europaea'') *

Few-flowered sedge ''Carex pauciflora'', known as few-flowered sedge, is a perennial species of Carex, sedge in the family Cyperaceae native to Holarctic Kingdom, Holarctic wetlands. The Botanical name#Binary name, specific epithet ''pauciflora'', refers to the La ...

(''Carex pauciflora'')

Literature

* A. Naumann: ''Aus der Geschichte unserer Moore''. In: ''Mitteilungen des Landesvereins Sächsischer Heimatschutz''. Heft 1/2, 1927 * Karl Tröger: ''Schutz unserem Georgenfelder Hochmoor''. Kreiskommision Natur- und Heimatfreunde im Deutschen Kulturbund, Kreis Dippoldiswalde {{Coord, 50, 43, 47.08, N, 13, 44, 46.60, E, type:landmark_region:DE-SN

External links

Raised bog information

References

Geography of the Ore Mountains Sächsische Schweiz-Osterzgebirge Altenberg, Saxony