The aim of the project is to identify suitable measures to combat bracken and worm fern on several alpine pastures in Austria, depending on the area, location and available resources.
Since the mountain pastures in Austria are extremely diverse, it is not possible to apply a uniform experimental method to all participating pastures. Instead, the spatial conditions and available resources, including personnel, animals and fencing material, serve as a starting point for choosing the appropriate method. Various displacement methods are used in this project:
Night corrals or intense jostling
Intensive grazing with cattle, sheep and goats is said to cause severe damage to the above-ground biomass and the reserve-storing rhizomes. The animals are fenced in or penned at night until there is at least 50% open ground to ensure effective damage. The preferred time varies depending on the location, but is between the beginning and the end of June, in any case before the spores ripen.
Mowing, mulching and tearing out
Annual mowing or mulching of the plants is also said to lead to increasing weakening and fatigue. Depending on the location, one or two cuts or mulches can be carried out. On areas that are difficult to access, manual bending or tearing out by hand is also possible.
Guided pasture management
Through targeted, intensive and regular grazing of areas covered with fern with sheep and goats or even cattle, this should gradually be reduced and valuable grasses and herbs strengthened. What is important here is good care of the animals and intelligent paddock farming on the alpine pastures. Bumping the paddocks several times should put even more pressure on the ferns. On extensive alpine pastures, it will not be possible to keep all areas in the desired condition due to the lack of animals. It is therefore important to maintain particularly important areas in the alpine center accordingly.
As accompanying measures, the mechanical control methods are supported by targeted crop cultivation measures such as the application of lime, reseeding with a site-adapted grassland mixture or fertilization with the alpine farm's own manure.
The participating project alpine pastures are located in the federal states of Styria, Carinthia, Salzburg and Tyrol. As part of the project, an individual concept for regulating the ferns will be developed for each participating alpine pasture, which takes into account the respective local conditions. Observation areas are set up and the success of the measures carried out is documented.