reeds

Reeds denote a biotope and a plant community in the shallow water and bank edge area of waters. It consists of large breed, reed-like plants ( reed plants ) such as reed ( Phragmites australis ), reed mace ( Typha spp.), Bur-reed ( Sparganium spec.), Tube-canary grass ( Phalaris arundinacea ) and water swath ( Glyceria maxima ); also from sweet flag ( Acorus calamus ), swamp iris ( Iris pseudacorus ), swan flower ( Butomus umbellatus ), frog-spoon ( Alisma spec.) and from other species.

Description, occurrence

Dominant societies with reeds, bulrushes, pond rushes, water swaths are called large reed beds .
Plant communities with dominance of sedges and rushes plants ( rushes , sedges ) are against it in the plant sociology mostly as Ried ( small reed ; from Middle High German advised "reeds, rushes"), respectively. Colloquially, however, this term is used synonymously for reed in some regions of southern Germany. Typical forms are Großseggenried and Kleinseggenried . Großseggenriede are closer to the reed beds in terms of plant sociology and are run with them in a common class Phragmitetea , while Kleinseggenriede form a separate class Scheuchzerio-Caricetea nigrae .

In Switzerland in particular, a distinction is made between stillwater reed beds (phragmition) , which are, for example, the typical reed belts of the lakes, and land reed beds (phalaridion) .

Reeds are the habitat of many bird species; for example the pale corn ( Fulica atra ) and the pond rail ( Gallinula chloropus ) nest here ; in the stalks various build warbler types, and the reed bunting nests. The underwater zone is a spawning area and larval habitat for various fish and amphibian species, as well as a habitat for numerous invertebrates . As a natural “sewage treatment plant”, reeds take on an essential function in keeping water bodies clean ( self-cleaning ).

Due to increasing bank development and recreational use, but also eutrophication , this habitat is in great danger in many places. On the other hand, unhindered growth leads to silting up of a body of water in the long term .

Large areas that are under protection are, for example, the Neusiedler See with the Neusiedlersee-Seewinkel National Park in the Austrian Burgenland .

Rerik on the Baltic Sea has been the “city in the reed bed” since 1938.