| The green of the woods | |
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The woods represent the “green core” of this land. They are a renewable and inalienable resource and now also satisfy a new requirement of the modern man; his physical and mental wellbeing. The current woody mantle can be hardly compared to the bloom of the woods mentioned by Leonardo from Vinci, who described the Sebino Area as covered by “very thick forests”. The demographic growth of the last few centuries has caused a strong deforestation and a wide breaking up of the grounds. The forest situation is progressively getting better because the loosened pressure on the woods allows the natural processes of woody reconstitution to proceed also through stages of seeming and predictable disorder. |
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The woods of the slopes which overlook the lake or which are disposed on the southern mountainsides are the so-called “boschi termopili” (thermopile woods). These are composed by species as the little durmast, the black hornbeam and the manna-ash which are satisfied with living on rather superficial and rocky grounds and which can bear dry and warm periods; from spring to summer in the underbrush extraordinary blooms of bear’s feet, liverwort, periwinkle, common lemon verbena, peony, orchids, “cornetta dondolina” (“swinging little horn”) and columbines follow one another. In the inner valleys the climate gets cooler and the species of the “boschi mesofili” (mesophyle woods), such as the hornbeam, the mountain maple, the ash tree, the durmast and the mountain service tree appear. In the cooler spots and at a high altitude the beech, the lime tree and the rowan tree appear and become numerically significant. The inhabitants of our valleys, probably since the Roman Age, have spread a largely providential tree, the chestnut. Majestic and long-lived, on the northern slopes the big chestnuts immortalize a landscape of rare awesomeness, which spreads itself as far as the edges of the built-up areas. On the sour grounds of the icy dregs the chestnut wood is far and away prevailing on our territory but, objectively, it’s also the wood which is more monotonous and scanty of species. In the inner valleys, such as in the Grave Valley in the resort called “La Bratta” in the town of Vigolo some conifers have been settled trough the reforestation, above all the Norway spruce, which confer to our forest landscape the tones of the mountain Norway spruce wood. But it’s the main watercourses of the territory that express the best bloom of the vegetation. The white willow trees, the poplar trees, the black alders and the plane trees take advantage from the great water availability and from the nourishments present in the alluvial grounds. |
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The most incised and inner valleys, as the Valley of Adrara, give hospitality to particular damp woods called “gorge woods”. In these very woods, it’s possible to find once again species as the alder, the ash tree, the mountain maple and the yew tree which shun the summer heat and the direct sunlight but prefer the moisture both of the ground and of the air. In the gloom of these environments, pervaded by the scent of the ramson (“bear’s garlic”), the foot dips into the bedding rich of humus and the soft musk carpet contest its space with the ferns, which here can develop their fronds with particular bloom. |
