Documentation of natural processes in the Gesäuse National Park Part 3: Dynamic habitats in the Murgraben Kühgraben and at the Enns (areas of gravel banks, dark trench and smoked soil)

IUCN Category II National Parks are specifically designated to ensure long-term large-scale ecological processes with their characteristic dynamism and species configuration. The methodological foundations for a national park-wide natural process inventory were developed in a pilot study on avalanche dynamics in 2014. Due to extraordinary relief energies, many natural processes in the Gesäuse National Park are characterised by complex disturbance dynamics, which determine life forms, growth forms and species sets. In 2016, the dynamic habitats in the Murgraben Kühgraben and the gravel banks in the area of dark trench and smoked soil on the Enns were selected and investigated for these disturbance dynamics as research areas. Building on the theoretical concept developed in the pilot project, a vegetation ecology survey in combination with UAV aerial images and an analysis of the data collected sought to describe these fault systems. The patterns of vegetation societies occurring in the system can be represented in a spatial and temporal context with the disturbance regime. Abstracted, a fault regime can be characterised by the parameters intensity and frequency. The intensity is measured by the effects on growth and life forms and, subsequently, on species sets. The relationships between disturbance and plant society can be represented in a spatial and a temporal dynamogram. The aim of the investigations is to systematically record the natural processes throughout the national park area. It remains to be hoped that this inventory can be continued.