Nicola Arndt und Matthias Pohl - Neobiota

Also the sand dune unit, P5: the northwest European ’Atlantic’ dune vegetation complex, is more
common along Danish exposed coasts than shown in the map. The Baltic dune unit, P4, is found in
Denmark only on the isle of Bornholm.
The fifth coastal unit, E10: dune heath on acid sand dominated by Empetrum nigrum along the west
coast of Jutland seems to be a nearly exclusively Danish vegetation unit. The unit is regarded as being
the terminal stage of dune succession (climax), or at least a very stable subclimax, in the dune row of
west Jutland (RIIS-NIELSEN et al. 1991).
2.3 Open inland and freshwater units
Inland, treeless units are represented on the European map within Denmark by S8: raised bog with
Sphagnum magellanicum, which is found scattered in the landscape in Denmark as well as in southern
Sweden. Freshwater areas such as lakes and rivers, which occupy about 1,7 % of the land area, include
one map unit: R1, tall reed swamp. In the map this unit is shown at two localities. However, the unit is
very common in Denmark along sheltered banks of lakes.
3 Current land use and vegetation of Denmark
In the present Danish landscape, about 76 % of the total area is occupied by arable land, urbanization
and infrastructure (Figure 4). Accordingly, the proportion of the country left to relatively natural
development is reduced to about 24 %. This area is occupied by 12 main types of vegetation (Table 2).
Six of these types are not represented on the European map being of anthropogenic nature. The
remaining types include European map units either present in a more or less unchanged extension or
strongly reduced. Below, the occurrence of the 12 current vegetation types will be discussed in
relation to the vegetation units of the European map.
3.1 Forests
In the current landscape, the forest area including dune plantations is reduced to about 11 % of the area
(Table 2). The minimum total forest area, 4 %, was found around year 1820; since that time the forest
area has gradually increased due to afforestation. Only about 17 000 ha of the current forest area is
unmanaged or managed according to traditional practises (coppicing, grazing etc.). The remaining
forest area is mostly intensively cultivated (BUCHWALD et al. 2001, RUNE 2001).
The cultivated forests are dominated by introduced coniferous tree species (about 62 % of the forested
area): Picea spp., Pinus spp., Abies alba etc., which are not part of the natural forest vegetation. Stands
of deciduous trees (mostly beech and oak) make up the remaining area. The deciduous forest, which
makes about 93 % of the potential natural vegetation, is reduced to about 4% in the current landscape,
most of which is cultivated forest.
3.3 Open inland biotopes
In the inland areas of the European map, treeless biotopes were represented only by raised bogs,
constituting less than 1 % of the area. In the current landscape, open inland biotopes make up about 9
% of the total area, including a large variety of types and plant communities, combined into five
groups: grasslands, fresh meadows, fens and mires (including raised bogs), heathlands and small, rural
biotopes (hedges, roadsides etc.) (Table 2). Apart from the raised bogs and probably some types of
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