The project D-STRESS-CH aims at generating an integrated, tree-level understanding of how water deficit affects the hydraulic xylem architecture, plant-water relations, and carbon allocation.

Available languages: English

The implementation of local growth management measures seems to have reached its limits, which can be ascribed to the strong federal structure of the Swiss political system and strong municipal autonomy. The result of some recent popular referendums at the national and cantonal levels has demonstrated the need for counter measures.

Available languages: German English

Disturbances through increased recreation activities have an impact on wildlife populations, especially in winter. The nation-wide campaign “Respektiere deine Grenzen” tries to minimize the conflict between winter sports and wildlife populations in the Swiss Alps. This project analyses the outcome of the campaign.

Available languages: German English

To bundle scientific and practical knowledge, a research project in conservation biology should involve practitioners from the onset. In GeneMig, practitioners and researchers first identified important topics and species of conservation concern in the context of environmental change. From this, a project of practical relevance will now be developed.

Available languages: German English

Die Studie untersucht, wie die Touristen im Grimselgebiet die Landschaft wahrnehmen und beurteilen. Ausserdem wird untersucht, welche künftige Entwicklung der Grimsellandschaft (u.a. Erweiterung der Kraftwerksanlagen) von den Touristen akzeptiert werden würde. Für die Analyse werden Werthaltungen, soziodemographische Merkmale und Besuchercharakteristiken berücksichtigt.

Available languages: German

The project "Monitoring the effectiveness of habitat conservation in Switzerland" has been initiated by the Federal Office for the Environment FOEN to study whether habitats of national importance (dry meadows and pastures, bogs and fens, alluvial zones, amphibian spawning areas) are developing according to conservation targets. For this, a long-term monitoring project is established.

Available languages: German English French

Für viele Kantone in der Schweiz existieren lange Zeitreihen von Luftbildern unterschiedlicher Art und Qualität. Meist wurden die Bilder nur für die Erstellung von Orthobildern als Hintergrund für andere geographische Informationen verwendet. Das Potential in den Stereo-Luftbildern ist allerdings viel grösser und soll im Rahmen des Projektes aufgezeigt werden.

Available languages: German

The return of large carnivores such as wolf and lynx in the Alps leads to conflicts with the local population. The goal of this project is to present practical conservation and management options for wolf and lynx in the Alps.

Available languages: German English

The aim of this project is to evaluate the Wildernesspark Zürich from the visitors' perspective. We are particularly interested in what visitors do during their stay and how they perceive the park. Moreover, we also analyse in how far people report feelings of restoration after their visit, and how this self-reported restoration is associated with environmental and psychological factors of the park visit.

Available languages: German English

Au cours du vingtième siècle, la Suisse s’est réchauffée environ deux fois plus rapidement qu’en moyenne globale. L’augmentation de la température pourrait atteindre 2.0-5.5 °C en Europe occidentale à l’horizon 2100.

Available languages: French

Renewable energy production (wind power, hydropower, solar power, geothermal energy, and biomass) is a landscape service with growing importance and high political relevance in Switzerland. The expansion of energy production will have a strong impact on competing landscape services such as agricultural production, recreation, tourism, biodiversity conservation and aesthetics.

Available languages: German English French

Das Projekt "Biodiversität und Raumentwicklung" untersucht Zusammenhänge zwischen Biodiversität und Raumentwicklung auf Landschaftsebene. Dafür analysieren wir Daten des Schweizer Mittelands im Allgemeinen sowie der Kantone Aargau und Luzern im Speziellen für möglichst verschiedene Organismengruppen und unterschiedliche Aspekte der Biodiversität. Die Resultate werden kartographisch dargestellt und können zur Visualisierung von Szenarien der Landschaftsentwicklung eingesetzt werden.

Available languages: German

The research project spatial demands of society investigates the needs and requirements towards landscape use and future spatial development among the general population, in order to provide a base for land use planning in (Swiss) sub- and peri-urban regions experiencing a high level of building and development pressure.

Available languages: German English

Different spatial claims may lead to conflicts between different usages. Our project explores, how such land use conflicts emerge and how they can be resolved or avoided. Out of that, we derive strategies and measures for conflict management and we will develop a guideline for the praxis.

Available languages: German English

Richtplancontrollings überprüfen laufend die Zielerreichung und den Mitteleinsatz der Richtplanung. Dazu braucht es ein Set an Indikatoren, welche den integralen Charakter von Landschaften zu erfassen vermögen. Das Projekt "Richtplancontrolling Landschaft" soll ein solches Set an Indikatoren definieren und Grundlagen für einen kantonalen Vergleich erarbeiten.

Available languages: German

C3-Alps synthesizes, transfers and implements in policy and practice results of previous Alpine Space Programme projects on climate change adaptation. In Work Package 4 we will assess the performance and governance, strengths and weaknesses as well as the science-policy interface of existing adaptation policies in Alpine countries.

Available languages: German English

One of the most challenging tasks for European urban areas is to deal with demographic, economic and physical contraction processes and to plan for the future of cities worth living in. The project aims at fostering knowledge on shrinking cities and urban regeneration strategies in Switzerland.

Available languages: German English

At the WSL in Bellinzona we started developing a new monoplotting interface with the aim of offering an intuitive platform for georeferencing and orthorectifying ordinary individual photographs in order to produce georeferenced vector data by drawing them directly on the pictures and exchanging them with traditional GIS-Systems.

Available languages: German English French Italian

Dieses Pilotprojekt zeigt auf welche Indikatoren im Richtplan-Controlling zum Thema Landschaft existieren, identifiziert Lücken und schätzt die Einsatzmöglichkeiten der nationalen LABES-Indikatoren auf dieser räumlichen Skala ab.

Available languages: German

Die WSL hat im Auftrag des Forum Landschaft den Stand der Landschaftsforschung in der Schweiz untersucht. Es wurden aktuelle und zukünftige Herausforderungen der Schweizerischen Landschaftsentwicklung ermittelt sowie ihre Handlungsrelevanz beurteilt.

Available languages: German

Lötschental offers an ideal setting to study the influence of global warming on tree-growth

Available languages: German English

Since as early as the 16th century, botanists have been collecting data and recording the flora on summits in the Alps with the purpose of documenting the limits of plant life in association with permanent snowfields and glaciers. How has summit vegetation changed since these early records? Based on new vegetation surveys on 150 peaks and passes, the SLF examines whether and how the climate has shaped high-alpine plant life during the last century.

Available languages: German English French Italian

Der Kleine Rohrkolben ist eine typische, bedrohte Auenpflanzenart. Dieses Projekt untersucht die Verwandschaftsbeziehungen der noch vorhandenen Populationen in der Schweiz und in unseren Nachbarländern.

Available languages: German

Das Projekt hat zum Ziel ein bestehendes GIS basiertes Prognosemodell der Naherholungsnutzung inhaltlich zu verfeinern und den räumlichen Geltungsbereich zu erweitern.

Available languages: German

The main topic of this project is restoration and integration by means of intercultural gardens. An explorative case study of the cooperation project „Seebrache“ in Zürich analyses these aspects over 1.5 years. The project has been initiated by Grün Stadt Zürich, Megaphon! and by Gemeinwesenarbeit Zürich Nord.

Available languages: German English

The new WSL research programme Room for People and Nature is examining the future development of intensively exploited regions, and intends to formulate basic principles for managing them in a sustainable way. It is being established and implemented in close collaboration with practitioners.

Available languages: German English French

The aim of the research project WaMos 2 is to assess the attitudes of the population towards forest and wood related topics. In doing so, the project revisits and builds upon work that was done in 1997. The results of WaMos 2 will serve as a basis for forest related policy, and the forest- and environment-related reporting of FOEN.

Available languages: German English French

HILACOS Historical Land Cover Switzerland

Available languages: German English

History of wetlands in Switzerland since 1700

Available languages: German English

EcoChange case study Aarau: Landnutzungsmodllierung der Region Kölliken-Herznach bis ins Jahr 2050 mit Methoden der Agentenbasierten Modllierung (ABM) und des Integrated Sustainability Assessment (ISA)

Available languages: German English

Energy infrastructures are important for understanding land use dynamics. Most frequently they are not considered in quantitative approaches. Quantification rationales for power networks are deduced from two conceptualizations: contextualism and technological determinism.

Available languages: German English

The objective of this study is to create a methodological framework to detect geographical hot-spots of conflicting landscape services before they erupt into land use conflicts.

Available languages: German English

With data of the Swiss dry grassland inventory I investigate how the quality of the reserve network can be maintained under global change, how connectivity between biotopes can be optimised and how threatened species can be protected better.

Available languages: German English

This research identifies the driving forces that changed the Limmattal from a traditional agricultural valley in 1930 to a periurban region in 2000. We linked 2746 changes with driving forces and aggregated the data to estimate the contribution of driving forces groups and administrative levels.

Available languages: German English

Spatially explicit data about the everyday landscape: small landscape object

Available languages: German English

Politische driving forces der Urbanisierung in der Region „Agglomeration Obersee“ (oberer Zürichsee, Schweiz)

Available languages: German English

The research project contributes to the scientific development of a Transferable development rights (TDR) research program, explores the possible impacts of a TDR program in Switzerland and hence provides pro- and contra-arguments to the political discussion about their implementation in Switzerland.

Available languages: German English

As part of the EC-funded project EcoChange and its activities on niche stability, the objective of this study is to investigate genomic processes related to adaptation and ecological niche evolution by comparing the genomes of closely related species along the same environmental gradient.

Available languages: German English

The dispersal of several insect species occurring in fragmented habitats in the agricultural Swiss plateau will be investigated by using genetic methods and mark-recapture studies.

Available languages: German English

Städte sind sowohl für Klimaschutz als auch für Klimaanpassung sensible Bereiche. Einerseits wird hier ein Grossteil der Klima schädigenden Emissionen produziert, andererseits gelten Stadtregionen als besonders vulnerabel für die Auswirkungen des Klimawandels.

Available languages: German

In the scientific part of the project "Landscape Monitoring Switzerland", basic knowledge for new indicators of landscape quality is developed. This includes both landscape ecological and social scientific approaches.

Available languages: German English

ENNIS is a project that seeks to understand how the evolutionary history of the ecological niche can influence whether species become invasive in regions to which they are introduced.

Available languages: English

This is an interdisciplenary project, financed by the SNF Sinergia program, to investigate niche evolution. We seek to understand how niche evolution will contribute to patterns of biodiversity under altered climates.

Available languages: English

Projekte zur Ausweisung von Grossschutzgebieten haben oft mit Akzeptanzproblemen zu kämpfen. Dieses Forschungs- und Umsetzungsprojekt thematisiert die Problematik der fehlenden gegenseitigen Akzeptanz von Interessengruppen.

Available languages: German

Im Rahmen des Projekts zur Bildung eines Regionalen Naturparks „Pfyn-Finges“ wurde untersucht, wie die lokale Bevölkerung dem Parkprojekt gegenüber eingestellt ist.

Available languages: German

A recent study on Scots pine and pubescent oak in Valais indicated that both species might not have the potential for long-term establishment and performance under an expected drier climate. We want to find out if non-endemic species can contribute to the tree-species portfolio for a drier future climate.

Available languages: German English

The study investigates how fiscal instruments and incentives affect land consumption and urban sprawl in Switzerland. An inventory lists those taxes and subsidies that are directly or indirectly linked to the possession and transfer of property and land, which comprise incentives that affect the location and density of private, business and industrial properties.

Available languages: German English

Freiwilliges Engagement für die Zivilgesellschaft hat einen hohen Stellenwert in der ländlichen Entwicklung. In diesem Projekt werden daher Ziele und Tätigkeiten von Freiwilligenorganisationen im ländlichen Raum der Schweiz untersucht.

Available languages: German

The project analyses the influence of a stay in differently managed agricultural zones on human well-being. This allows to draw conclusions concering the optimal design of natural areas.

Available languages: German English

The ENHANCE project tests and evaluates ecosystem connectivity with state-of-the art molecular genetic experiments and population-dynamic analysis in terrestrial and riparian habitats, prior and after connectivity is enhanced.

Available languages: German English

This project is supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation. It belongs to the group of projects aiming to improve the TreeMig forest landscape model for climate change impact assessments on regional to continental scales.

Available languages: English

Auf Basis von Expertenbefragungen wurden verschiedene Entwicklungsoptionen für die Landschaftsräume der Schweiz formuliert. Die Entwicklungen wurden anschliessend in Zusammenarbeit mit der Zürcher Hochschule der Künste visualisiert und dienten als Diskussionsgrundlage im Rahmen der Erarbeitung des Raumkonzepts Schweiz.

Available languages: German

AlpFUTUR aims at identifying prospects regarding the use of the Swiss alpine pasturing area in the short and medium term (10 to 40 years).

Available languages: German English French Italian

Erfolgskontrollen und der Umweltprüfbericht der OECD zeigen, dass die Schweiz zu wenig investiert, um Biotope von nationaler Bedeutung uneingeschränkt zu erhalten. Darum werden in diesem Projekt anhand von Pflegekostenbeispielen, Inventaren und Expertenbefragungen die notwendigen Ausgaben für einen gesetzeskonformen Schutz der Biotope von nationaler Bedeutung errechnet.

Available languages: German French

Tree species migration can considerably slow down biome boundary shifts. We develop methods to simulate migration reliably and efficiently with coarse resolution.

Available languages: English

A landscape scale forest population dynamics model is extended with ecophysiology, and particularly the mechanisms of drought effects on trees.

Available languages: English

A forest ecosystem model, extended with an avalanche module, is used to study the feedback between climate change driven ecosystem and land use dynamics.

Available languages: German English

Greenhouse gases emitted from vegetation feed back on the atmospheric chemistry and climate. We aim to simulate such vegetation produced greenhouse gases and to provide information on emissions from other sources.

Available languages: English

Die "S5-Stadt" bezeichnet einen Ausschnitt aus der Metropolitanregion Zürich. Sie steht für Dynamik und Wandel und repräsentiert einen Lebensraum von morgen. Das Forschungsprojekt untersucht Fragen einer nachhaltigen Regionalentwicklung.

Available languages: German

Entrepreneurship in terms of the will and ability of persons to undertake something is an important engine for rural development. In this project, the characteristics of rural entrepreneurship and their spatial distribution are studied within the rural regions of Switzerland.

Available languages: German English

Recreation is one of several services forests provide to society. The research project analyses the regional economic impact of the recreational use of forests.

Available languages: German English

The purpose of the project DNL is to integrate existing national biotope inventories (bogs, flood plains, meadows, etc.) into a database and connect it to further datasources of the FOEN.

Available languages: German English French Italian

The main goal of the project is to understand the relationship between urban diversity, built environment and the acceptance of the human population, in order to identify initial measures for integrating findings on how to enhance urban biodiversity and the acceptance of the residents into urban development processes.

Available languages: German English French Italian

Modelle der WSL zeigen, welche Landschaften in der Schweiz besonders artenreich sind und welche Einflussgrössen die Artenvielfalt unterschiedlicher Organismengruppen bestimmen. Die Arbeiten liefern Grundlagen für ein besseres Verständnis und den Schutz von Artenvielfalt auf Landschaftsebene.

Available languages: German

Über mehrere Jahre ist die Wirkung von Lawinen auf die Biodiversität untersucht worden. Die Zerstörungskraft der Lawinen weist für die Natur auch positive Aspekte auf. Sie schafft Standortbedingungen, die einer ganzen Reihe von Pflanzen überhaupt erst das Überleben ermöglichen.

Available languages: German

Today the development of space and Mobility is far away from the principle of sustainability. New ways of spatial planning are required. This project aims at establishing a basis for a more sustainable spatial planning and mobility.

Available languages: German English

The research project assesses the regional economic impact of nature-based tourism in Swiss forests using the Simmental and Diemtigtal in the Bernese Oberland as case study areas. Possibilities for enhancing the added value are identified. Both demand and supply of tourism services are analysed.

Available languages: German English

Dispersal of individuals (and gene flow) among remnant populations within fragmented landscapes is essential for the long-term survival of endangered species. The goal of this project is to test the effect of habitat connectivity projects for the European Treefrog.

Available languages: German English

"Alpmon" bedeutet Alpines Monitoringsystem. Ziel dieses EU-Projektes war es, mittels hochauflösender Satellitendaten ein Inventar zu erstellen, worin alle relevanten Parameter, die auf den Alpenraum Einfluss haben, beschrieben sind. Das schweizerische Untersuchungsgebiet lag im Nationalpark.

Available languages: German

Inwiefern eignen sich Fernerkundungsdaten und Bearbeitungsverfahren für die flächendeckende Erfassung von Sturmschäden? In diesem Projekt ging es darum, mögliche Alternativen zur traditionellen Luftbildauswertung aufzuzeigen.

National digital surface models are often characterized by global and therefore coarse spatial accuracy and density estimates, which are insufficient for local analysis of nation-wide forest or landscape inventories. Local triangulation allows a robust estimate of spatial point distribution of national LiDAR datasets compared to simple local point density calculation.

Available languages: English

HELM initiates a move that will make European land monitoring more productive by increasing the alignment of national and sub-national land monitoring endeavours and by enabling their integration to a coherent European data system. HELM receives funding through the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Commission.

Available languages: German English

First, this research focuses on the development of new methods for semi-automated extraction of forest parameters such as tree area and species based on airborne remote sensing data and logistic regression models. Second, new image-matching algorithms for the generation of high-resolution digital surface models for the extraction of forest parameters are tested: canopy height models, forest stand structure, degree of composition, forest border, timber volume estimation, tree growth, tree species etc. Third, new methods are developed to detect and simulate changes (forest growth, shrub encroachment) in forested mire vegetation using remotely sensed variables. The project reveals that is possible to estimate and quantify vegetation growth from the past to the future in mire environments.

Available languages: English

The Hyper-Swiss-Net project aims at developing and supporting the scientific expertise and infrastructure in Switzerland for the exploitation of imaging spectrometry technology for different Earth observation applications. Within the framework of the HyperSwissNet project WSL primarily aims at calibrating statistical models for estimating canopy biochemistry for different forest habitat types using APEX data. Furthermore we aim at scaling canopy biochemistry from high resolution hyperspectral data (APEX) to space-borne multi- and hyperspectral sensors and running larger scale modeling experiments to explore the effect of using spatially distributed input of canopy chemistry data into biogeochemistry models to estimate habitat productivity.

Available languages: English

Since the mid 80-ies digital satellite images are uniformly mapped and interpreted within the European CORINE program (mapping landcover/landuse). Becoming a member of the European Environment Agency (EEA) this dataset is also done for Switzerland. The derivation of the CLC maps 2000 /2006 was supported and evaluated as well as preparing the new update map for 2012.

Available languages: German English

Tree cover is one of the important forest parameters for sustainable forest management. Therefore, automatic tree cover detection is of practical interest for the objective research of National Forest Inventory (NFI). Instead of manual interpretation which may be labor intensive, this project focuses on computer-based image processing methods designed to analyze high resolution remote sensing data. Developed methods must be applicable for all landscape types and recognize appropriate uncertainties reliably.

Available languages: English

This project funding is done by FOEN in order to observe actively the ongoing developments within GMES Land Services like GSE-Land, Geoland, Urban Atlas. This encompasses the collaboration in working groups like EAGLE, technical/scientific assistance in EIONET meetings or expertise in GMES validation teams. GMES, which stands for Global Monitoring for Environment and Security, is a joint initiative of the European Commission (EC) and the European Space Agency (ESA) aiming to operationally provide sound, reliable and affordable geo-information products throughout Europe and over the globe.

Available languages: German English

Im Rahmen des EU-Projekt BIOASSESS (Biodiversity Assessment Tools Project) leitete die WSL Indikatoren aus dem GIS- und Fernerkundungsbereich ab, die mit Biodiversität korrelieren und so Aufschlüsse über das Verteilungsmuster einer Art gaben. Schwerpunkt bildeten dabei die Flechten.

Available languages: German

In diesem Projekt werden verschiedene MODIS-Datensätze auf ihre Brauchbarkeit getestet. Wissenschafter vergleichen angebotene Fertigprodukte mit bestehenden Waldinventurdaten und CORINE-Daten. Für Snowcover-Untersuchungen verwenden sie Original-Spektraldaten. MODIS steht für "Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer".

Ziel dieses Projektes ist es, Zukunftsszenarien für alpine Regionen zu entwickeln, um die Auswirkungen von politischen Entscheiden oder klimatischen Veränderungen zu untersuchen. Mit Hilfe verschiedener Modelle lassen sich die zukünftigen Veränderungen simulieren und bezüglich Nachhaltigkeitskriterien bewerten.

Available languages: German

In the Alps, the multipurpose utilisation of agricultural and forest resources has a long tradition. But domestic animals grazing in forests are considered hindering tree regeneration, reducing timber quality and impairing the protective function of mountain forests. What is the effective impact of forest grazing?

Available languages: German English

Spatial interpolation of biological and biophysical variables is of central interest to many landscape ecologists. In this study, scientists evaluated the utility, accuracy, and effectiveness of ordinary kriging, inverse-distance weighting, and thin-plate smoothing splines with tensions using soil samples from the Omo Basin, Ethiopia.

Available languages: English

High resolution climate maps were generated for NW-Wyoming (USA) in order to measure tree species realized niches. The goal of this study was to define species parameters for a spatially-explicit, dynamic forest simulation model.

The potential of plants to migrate to habitats which are more favourable under changed conditions plays a key role in assessing the impacts of climate change on terrestrial ecosystems. A new, spatially explicit, physiologically mechanistic, and efficient forest succession model was developed in order to study the potential of trees to invade, migrate and get extinct under current and possibly changed future climate.

The main objectives of this project were to stratify the landscape of individual military ranges, to identify the fundamental vegetation and soil attributes, to establish ecosystem response and recovery in relation to disturbance (land use), to identify the attributes of remote sensing systems and to develop methods for scaling indices between coarse and fine resolution imagery.

Forests of the Central Rocky Mountains are of value for nature conservation and biodiversity maintenance. Developing a spatially explicit forest succession model upon a sound physiological basis is important to assist management and to further science of these crucial forests.

Die Nutzung des Waldes in der Schweiz hat sich seit der 1950er Jahre grundlegend verändert. Viele traditionelle Waldnutzungen verschwanden. Sie sind oft kaum dokumentiert, obschon sie aus kulturhistorischer und ökologischer Sicht von grossem Interesse sind. Diese Veränderungen werden mit der Methodik von Oral History dokumentiert und analysiert.

Available languages: German

Only 150 years ago, Swiss forests were markedly affected by agro-forestal uses. In many places leaf litter was collected for different reasons. By experimental removing of the leaf litter, we examine the ecological consequences of this forest use and we evaluate it's potential as a new tool for nature conservation in forests.

Available languages: German English

Nature and landscape conservation issues have a high priority since an intact landscape is considered as important for tourism and well-being. On the local level however, there is a fair amount of contradiciting views. In this research, processes that positively or negatively influence acceptance have been investigated.

Available languages: German English

The lay assessment of tourism-induced landscape changes was investigated with standardized questionnaires and photo-experiments. A main result was that tourists are very sensitive to landscape changes caused by tourist infrastructure. They wish the landscape to remain traditional.

Available languages: German English

One of the main arguments for handing out agricultural subsidies in Swiss mountainous areas is the conservation of traditional landscapes. To find out what people think about land abandonment WSL conducted qualitative in-situ-interviews as well as standardised questionnaires and photo-experiments.

Available languages: German English

In der Vorstudie zum Nationalen Forschungsprogramm 48 "Landschaften und Lebensräume der Alpen" wurden der Wissensstand aufgearbeitet, das Forschungs- und Akteurnetzwerk erfasst, die Erwartungen von Institutionen und Organisationen ermittelt und die aufgeworfenen Forschungsfelder evaluiert.

Available languages: German

Scientists developed a guide designed to help local communities start up and carry out participation-in-development. The guide has been published in the form of a brochure. You will also find a web-paket.

Available languages: German English

Rural communities in Switzerland experience a process of urbanization running contrary to the needs of the locals. In order to stop this harmful process, answers to the following questions are needed: What needs of the people can be met by the "every-day-landscape"? Why don't people shape their "every-day-landscape"? How could they be encouraged to participate?

Available languages: German English

Grossraubtiere breiten sich in der Schweiz wieder aus. Die Einwanderung von Wolf und Bär oder die Luchsumsiedlung stossen aber in Teilen der Bevölkerung auf Widerstand. Um die Akzeptanz von Raubtieren langfristig zu fördern, braucht es wissenschaftliche Grundlagen über das Verhältnis der Bevölkerung zu diesen Tierarten.

Available languages: German

Outdoor-activities can have negative consequences on nature and landscape. A PhD student has analysed the motivation of outdoor-activists, their attitudes towards nature and landscape and their behaviour changing strategies.

Available languages: German English

Acceptance and success of biosphere reserves depend very much on the local population's perception of and identification with the biosphere reserves. The objective of this study was to determine the attitudes of various social groups towards nature and nature protection in Ukraine and Switzerland.

Available languages: German English

What are the global attitudes towards nature and wilderness? What is perceived as wilderness and what degree of wilderness is accepted by the population in general? What are the differences between people accepting wilderness and those objecting it?

Available languages: German English

In the context of sustainable development of the resource alpine landscape it is necessary that these developments are supported by a large part of the population. Therefore people's manifold objectives and desires must be known and included in planning measures.

Available languages: German English

What is the meaning of the river space for the local public? What are the attitudes and demands of the population in regard to river restoration and which demands do people have regarding participation? This project shows possible ways towards socially sound river restorations.

Available languages: German English

The aim this project is to investigate the implications of transit traffic on nature and society and to design a monitoring tool to detect changes related to the amount of traffic. The project also investigates the influence of transit traffic and the related landscape changes on wellbeing and place attachment of inhabitants.

Available languages: German English

Considering the constantly increasing leisure activities in various outdoor areas the question arises, how social use conflicts and ecological impairment of nature can be reduced.

Available languages: German English

Durch Zunahme der Freizeit steigt der Druck auf Naherholungsräume im periurbanen Raum. Um Nutzungskonflikte zu vermindern, braucht es Informationen zu Nachfrage, Potential und Intensität der Raumnutzung. Wissenschafter ermitteln deshalb Kriterien, die das Naherholungsverhalten bestimmen und entwickeln Naherholungsmodell.

Available languages: German

The positive influence of natural environment can contribute to public health, and should be considered in landscape architecture. We will show the comparison of an influence of tended and wild woods onto human wellbeing.

Available languages: German English

Für den Menschen ist das Erkennen von visueller Information auf Bildern (z.B. "Was ist Waldrand") relativ einfach, nicht so für Computer. Dieses Projekt soll das automatische Erkennen von Vegetation und anderen Inventurdaten auf digitalisierten Luftbildern und Karten ermöglichen.

Available languages: German

Remote sensing is an indispensable tool for monitoring landscape. Aim of the project is to develop efficient methods, which are supposed to allow for the acquisition of reproducible, high-quality landscape informations from remote sensing data. These methods are applied in the National Forest Inventory and the Landscape Inventories.

Available languages: German English French Italian

During the past century until nowadays, the Swiss Plateau has seen heavy building activities and an increase in farming intensities. It is the aim of this project to investigate landscape changes and their speed (transformation rate) during the last century in two selected regions, situated between the Swiss plateau and the Alps.

Available languages: German English

Most types of pasture woodlands in Switzerland suffered a dramatic decline during the last century. This project focuses on the evolution of a type of pasture woodland typical of the Jura mountains: the "pâturages-boisés". They are considered of medieval origin and result, in terms of modern ecology, from a specific disturbance pattern.

Available languages: English

Mit dem Projekt "Monitoring flankierende Massnahmen" (MfM) will der Bund die Auswirkungen des Landesverkehrsabkommens mit der EU überprüfen. Das Teilprojekt "Auswirkungen auf die Natur" des MfM-Umwelt untersucht die Beeinflussung der Biodiversität durch den Transitverkehr. Wie entwickelt sich die Diversität mittel- und langfristig?

Available languages: German

Large-scale grazing systems formed once a significant part of the European landscape. Due to intensification of agriculture, continuous landscapes and habitats formed by extensive grazing diminished and biodiversity declined. It is hypothesized that Co-operative Livestock Systems are appropriate to manage large, continuous landscapes and to reconcile biodiversity conservation and land management for economic gain.

Available languages: English

Agri-environment schemes play an increasingly important role in European agricultural policy to support biodiversity and environment in agricultural landscapes. This project aims to evaluate the (cost-)effectiveness of agri-environment schemes with respect to biodiversity conservation in five European countries.

Available languages: English

Förster, Ökologen und Naturschützer sind mehrheitlich davon überzeugt, dass von allen Lebensraumtypen die grossflächigen Waldgebiete den grössten Beitrag an die Biodiversität leisten. Forschende der WSL testen die Vermutung, dass der Beitrag des Waldes zur genetischen Vielfalt in erster Linie auf dem Vorhandensein von äusseren und inneren Waldrändern beruht.

Available languages: German

Since 1996 the main bibliographic resource in tree-ring research worldwide, collected by Dr. Henri D. Grissino-Mayer (Arizona USA), is published online. At WSL, data content of this bibliography was updated and enriched, a user-friendly search was developed and a pay photocopy service has been set up.

Many of the problems associated with sustainable forest management relate to questions and understanding at the ecosystem and landscape levels, as well as requiring long-term series of data. The overall objective of ENFORS is to develop the scientific base for, and initiate a European network of sites for forest ecosystem and landscape research.

Available languages: English

The knowledge of the defoliation effects on the physiological processes resulting in tree growth is still lacking. How are the responses of the photosynthetic activity and the coresponding available carbohydrates to defoliation? What are the effects on height, on diameter growth and in the wood anatomical characteristics of tree rings?

Available languages: English

In a changing environment, the analysis of how forest ecosystems may react under scenarios involving changing climatic conditions is of major importance. This project wants to evaluate the influence of expected climatic changes (precepitation and temperature regimes) on trees and the state of our forests.

Available languages: English

Present plant/forest communities are the result of long-term interactions between vegetation and site factors including man-made impacts. For more than fifty years people have tried to develop a method to estimate the man-made impacts on vegetation or the vegetation/ecosystem change.

Available languages: English

Die heutige Landschaft ist das Produkt einer historischen Entwicklung. Trotzdem weiss man wenig darüber, inwiefern sich die Landschaft entsprechend den Präferenzen der Bevölkerung gestalten lässt. Eine Studie untersuchte, welche Landschafts-Eigenschaften die Menschen in der Region Greifensee bevorzugen.

Available languages: German

In der Schweiz ist der Druck auf das Kulturland beträchtlich. Jede Sekunde wird knapp ein Quadratmeter Kulturland überbaut, in Agglomerationen sogar noch wesentlich mehr. Welche marktwirtschaftlichen Instrumente tragen dazu bei, eine haushälterische Flächennutzung zu fördern?

Available languages: German

In the last 150 years the forests of Switzerland have increased by approximately 30 - 50%. What are the driving forces of forest expansion in the Swiss Alps? Are there patterns of land abandonment and forest expansion in space and time?

Available languages: German English

Am Beispiel der Region Surselva (GR) untersuchen WissenschafterInnen die ökonomischen, sozialen und ökologischen Folgen einer Aufgabe dezentraler Siedlungsstrukturen. Sie diskutieren, mit welchen Strategien und Konzepten sich die Zukunft peripherer ländlicher Räume gestalten lässt.

Available languages: German

Der Wert eines Waldes geht weit über die Holzproduktion hinaus. Besonders in Ballungsräumen hat die stadtnahe Walderholung grosse Bedeutung für die Bevölkerung. Forschende der WSL untersuchen den Erholungswert des Zürcher Waldes und gehen der Frage nach, wie sich die Bedürfnisse Erholungssuchenden am besten befriedigen lassen.

Available languages: German English

Major storms like "Lothar" are a great chance for below-ground studies on root architecture and growth structure. What is the relationship between below- and aboveground biomass accumulation in the past? Are roots the hidden key players?

Available languages: German English