On the trails of Josias Braun-Blanquet II : first results from the 12th EDGG Field Workshop studying the dry grasslands of the inneralpine dry valleys of Switzerland

Abstract

The 12th EDGG Field Workshop took place from 11 to 19 May 2019, organised by the Vegetation Ecology Group of the Institute of Natural Resource Sciences (IUNR) of the Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW). Like in the 11th Field Workshop in Austria, the main target was the "Inneralpine Trockenvegetation" (Festuco-Brometea and Sedo-Scleranthetea), which was first extensively sampled by Josias Braun-Blanquet and collaborators during the 1950s. We visited the Rhône valley in the cantons of Vaud and Valais, one of the most ex-treme xerothermic islands of the Alps and the Rhine and Inn valleys in the canton of Grison. In total, 30 nested-plot series (EDGG biodi-versity plots) of 0.0001 to 100 m² and 82 plots of 10 m² were sampled in meso-xeric, xeric and rocky grasslands of 25 different sites, rang-ing from 500 to 1,656 m a.s.l., under different topographic, bedrock and landuse conditions. All vascular plants, bryophytes and lichens were recorded in each plot, along with their cover values. We found on average 28.9 vascular plants on 10 m²; which was the lowest mean species richness of any previous EDGG Field Workshop. These values are comparable to the average species richness values of dry grasslands of the Aosta valley in Italy. The data sampled will be used to understand the biodiversity patterns regionally and in the Palae-arctic context as well as to place the Swiss dry grasslands in the modern European syntaxonomic system