From October 26th to 28th, UNIMONT – University of Milan hosts Bernat Claramunt to hold a series of seminars on climate change and biodiversity in mountain areas. The meetings are in English.
Bernat Claramunt is a Researcher at CREAF – Centre for Research on Ecology and Forestry Applications and Professor of Ecology at the Department of Plant Biology, Animal Biology and Ecology at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. He is CREAF representative in Euromontana, and the coordinator of the Network for European Mountain Research (NEMOR).
Mountain systems are among the most affected by global change in the world. Climate and land use change are affecting all components of the natural and human environments. During the presentation we will visit all these components, describe their current status and future threats. Finally, using recent works, we will discover how the different components of mountain social-ecological systems can be pooled in a unique working framework for decision making under different scenarios.
During our visit in neighbouring areas representative of some important mountain ecosystems (forests and mountain grasslands) we will dicuss the different field methodologies that are used in ecological studies to study the natural communities. We will discover which methods answer which questions, which experimental designs are needed, and the pros and cons of each method.
The field trip will take place in Val Grande (Vezza d’Oglio) in Stelvio park https://www.vezzadoglioturismo.it/val-grande/?lang=en
We recommend clothing appropriate to the season and the altitude (1.300-2000 m). The car in necessaryto move from Edolo to Vezza d’Oglio. Hiking itinerary from Vezza D’Oglio.
Plants and animals live in an extremely interconnected network, and their interactions are extremely important for their stability, specially important in fragile enviroments such as mountains. During the seminar, we will learn the basics of ecological networks, how their complexity is measured, and which of their emerging properties need to be preserved to ensure their stability.