The research was designed to assess benefits of passive restoration, consisting of blocking from drainage ditches and in effect raise the groundwater level, its influence on properties of soil, water, species of plants and mesofauna in the fen CalthoAlnetum community. The research was carried out in Outer Flysh Carpathians, the area of the Babiogórski National Park (Poland) in 2011-2014. It was established that the degraded communities showed positive reaction to an attempt to restore the original groundwater level. The increase in the groundwater level changed chemical properties of soil and water of the community such as: pH, sorption properties and the ionic composition of groundwater. Changes in habitat conditions resulted in different species composition of soil mesofauna and plants growing in the restorative community.

In Poland's Babia Góra Massif (the most elevated ridge in the Western Flysch Carpathians), and in the surrounding valleys, various kinds of economic use of natural resources have been engaged in the last 600 years or more. However, the most major changes in the natural environment here have taken place under the influence of grazing and forestry. Some such economic uses already represent forms of human activity that are now history, their cessation being the prerequisite for a regeneration of vegetation that is now ongoing. One of the most visible effects of past grazing is a lowered timberline first and foremost coinciding with the more accessible southern slope of the massif. In turn, on a small part of the steep northern slope degraded by grazing, avalanches have become active, along with debris flows of earlier times, both of which also served to fragment forest. Protection of the Babia Góra Massif has brought the end to grazing referred to, and this has allowed for the progressive return of the timberline to its previous position. Overall, the work described here is based on information from the literature, unpublished studies and maps dating back over the last 400 years.

(4)Tree uprooting causes significant changes in forest habitat functioning and soil formation. In this paper soil uplifted by tree throws was compared among 15 study plots from heterogeneous Norway spruce stands of the upper mountain belt in southern Poland. Pit-mound microtopography parameters such as length, width, depth of tree-throw pits, height of the root plate, and height of mineral and organic mounds, were measured at each uprooting site. Sites were grouped in 3 age groups based on the time elapsed since uprooting. Results showed significant differences between the studied parameters among age groups. Differences were most pronounced in mean pit depth (0.52, 0.65 and 0.95 m for 5-year, 3-year, and 1-year-old pits, respectively). No significant interaction between age group and root plate height was detected by ANOVA. Regression analysis showed that pit depth decreases as root plate height increases. Redundancy analysis using pit-mound parameters as dependent variables revealed that root plate height along with slope steepness are good predictors of the volume of dislocated soil at tree-throw sites. Overall, our results suggest that the erosion expected at uprooting sites in mountain Norway spruce stands could be conveniently estimated by measuring their root plates. This may help estimate the impact of windthrow on soil microtopography and quantify its effects on soil disturbance in Norway spruce stands of the upper mountain belt.

No abstract

Cylowa Zerwa landslide – debris flow located on the northern slope of Mt. Babia Góra (1725 m a.s.l.) within the 400 m wide altitude interval (1430-1024 m a.s.l.) is a knowable object which however has not been sufficiently noticed in geomorphological research. This paper, based on geomorphological, geological and dendrochronological investigations, as well as LiDAR data analysis, develops the following issues which describe the functioning of this object during the last ca. 150 years: Cylowa Zerwa in the gravity induced mass movements system of Mt. Babia Góra; relief of the landslide – debris flow and surrounding areas; stages of changes in limit and relief of the mass movement area during the last 150 years; relief elements of the Cylowa Zerwa which are related to debris flow; relationship between dates of the Cylowa Zerwa activation with annual spruce increments. The Cylowa Zerwa, as the only one among Mt. Babia Góra landslides studied, is distinguished by a clear bipartite relief – the upper segment is represented by rock packages, whereas landforms of the middle and lower segments are similar to those originated in the conditions of debris flow. The Cylowa Zerwa landslide – debris flow shows significant education values and it is a remarkable geotourist object.