Belchen - Gipfel.JPG

The Belchen, , or Black Forest Belchen (german: Schwarzwälder Belchen) is the fourth-highest summit of the Black Forest after Feldberg, Seebuck and Herzogenhorn. The municipalities of Münstertal, Schönenberg and Kleines Wiesental meet on the summit dome of Belchen which is located in the southwest German state of Baden-Württemberg.

Geography

The Belchen, with its furrowed, unbroken rock faces, rises 1,000 metres out of the Münstertal valley. Its north face is thus the area of highest relief energy in the German Central Uplands. Even towards the south the mountain drops steeply, its ''schrofen'' slopes descending 800 metres into the valley bowl of the Little Wiese near Neuenweg.

The large expanse of rolling plateau in the eastern Black Forest has only survived in small places at the Belchen. Towards the Rhine Plain and the Blauen mountain the western main crest of the southern Black Forest has been cut into narrow ridges as a result of the marked uplift of the range during the Pleistocene and the erosive work of its streams. The ice age glaciation of the Belchen region did not leave traces as clear as those on Feldberg. To the north and south, small avalanche bowl glaciers formed, whose maximum extent reached the edge of the Black Forest.

The domed '' kuppe'' consists of granite, whereas the surrounding mountainsides are mostly formed of gneisses. The area around Belchen was a mining region, at times an important one, between 900 and 1975.

A chain of well-preserved boundary stones from 1790 runs over the summit of the Belchen. These mark the old border between the Habsburg territory of Further Austria to the north and the Margraviate of Baden to the south of the mountain.

Belchen Triangle

The domed, treeless summit has a striking profile that, seen from the Upper Rhine Plain, is almost symmetrical. ''Belchen'' (Celtic: ''the radiant'') is a name also used for other high points in the neighbouring mountains, including two that are especially striking when covered with snow. Together with the Black Forest Belchen, they form the so-called Belchen Triangle: to the west on the French side of the Upper Rhine Plain is the Alsatian Belchen (''Elsässer Belchen'') or ''Ballon d'Alsace'' in the Vosges; to the south on the southern side of the Upper Rhine is the " Swiss Belchen", known as Belchenflue. Also visible from Alsace are Great Belchen (''Großer'') and Little Belchen (''Kleiner Belchen''), or ''Grand'' and ''Petit Ballon'' which, together with the others belong to the so-called Belchen System.

The panorama from the top covers large parts of the Black Forest to the Hornisgrinde, the Vosges, the Jura and, in good weather, the Alps from the Zugspitze to Mont Blanc. Belchen also has far-reaching views across the Upper Rhine Plain to Alsace.

Belchen Nature Reserve

Because of its rare flora and fauna, Belchen was declared a nature reserve in 1949. The area was extended to 1600 hectares in 1993, and is now part of the Southern Black Forest Nature Park.

Many species of rare butterflies, beetles, and birds are found in the highland areas of Belchen. Typical birds include the raven, song thrush, citril finch and water pipit, as well as peregrine falcons, capercaillie, and hazel grouse.

Among the plants are relicts from the last ice age that are otherwise only found in the Alps. These include the Swiss bellflower, Alpine rose, Swiss hawkbit and lichen

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