Regional Mountain Conference

Stone pines are iconic parts of the mountain forests and the impressive landscape surrounding our conference venue and they show remarkable adaptations to the environment at the treeline ecotone. This conifer tolerates low temperatures, short growing seasons and the extreme frost and drought conditions during alpine winters. Its close symbiosis with the Eurasian nutcracker enables efficient seed dispersal, which also is the base of the protective function of stone pine forests. This keynote deals with the distinctive ecophysiology of stone pine and, held in a protected stone pine forest close to the conference center, it invites participants to smell, taste and hear these beautiful trees. The keynote forms part of the conference opening and the science communication event “The Future of Mountain Forests” of the Austrian Science Fund.