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Field trip

During this field trip, we will visit the Oianleku area in Oiartzun, located within Aiako Harria Natural Park. We will enjoy a gentle walk through a unique landscape of pollarded beech trees, shaped over centuries by traditional forest practices. Along the way, there will also be a demonstration of how terrestrial LiDAR technology can be used to study forests in detail.

A pollarded beech forest is a type of woodland where beech trees have been regularly pruned at a certain height (usually above the reach of grazing animals). This traditional practice, known as pollarding, encourages the trees to produce new shoots and branches. Over time, this gives the trees their characteristic thick trunks and rounded crowns, creating a very distinctive and culturally important landscape. These forests are not only visually striking, but also rich in biodiversity, as they combine natural growth with centuries of human management.

For the field trip, no special equipment is needed. In any case, it may rain, so we recommend bringing a raincoat and waterproof shoes.

NOTES ON THE FIELD VISIT OF MAY 20 TO OIENLEKU (OIARTZUN). You can download this information in pdf.

We will visit the public forest MUP 2.063.2 “Kausua”. It is a 530 hectares-forest and it is owned by the Oiartzun Town Council and managed by the Forestry Service of the Provincial Council of Gipuzkoa. It is located within the Aiako Harria Natural Park, which is also a Natura 2000 Site.

It contains one of the oldest conifer forest plantations in Gipuzkoa, on slopes with a high risk of erosion and at the headwaters of a river basin (1). 

It also hosts the largest pollarding beech forest in the Basque Country, covering around 250 ha (2).

Geographical and forestry information in the GeoEuskadi web-viewer https://www.geo.euskadi.eus/geobisorea

Virtual visits of the beech forest generated using the low-cost 3DMakerPro laser scanner:

More information about the LIFE projects carried out in recent years in the pollarded beech forest between HAZI and the Provincial Council of Gipuzkoa:

Ortophoto 1954:

Comparison between the orthophotos from 1954 and 2009 (infrared):

Arrival at Kauso parking lot (P1) at 10:00. We expect to leave Oienleku parking (P2) around 12:30. 

First stop: a conifer plantation at harvesting age, where HAZI will carry out a simultaneous terrestrial and aerial laser scanning demonstration (1).  In recent years there have been windthrows, defoliation problems caused by foliar fungi, and regeneration fellings and replacement with native broadleaf species.

Before concluding the visit, another simultaneous terrestrial and aerial laser scan will be conducted in the pollarding beech forest (2). In recent years, forestry actions have been carried out to promote the conservation of pollarded trees, the natural regeneration of the beech forest and the increase of the population of the saproxylic insect Rosalia alpina.