Turracher Höhe

Turracher Höhe
	View from the Schoberriegel on the Turracher Höhe with the Turracher See
Pass height	1795 m above sea level A.
expansion	Turracher Strasse (B95)
	profile
	Map (Styria)
Coordinates	46 ° 55 '6 " N , 13 ° 52' 25" E Coordinates: 46 ° 55 '6 " N , 13 ° 52' 25" E

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Turracher Höhe or Turracherhöhe or the Turrach refers to a village, an Alpine pass and a landscape in the Gurktal Alps in Austria . The settlement of the same name and the Turracher See on the top of the pass are divided into two federal states by the border between Styria and Carinthia . Due to its high location, which is far away from early settlement areas, the area was settled relatively late. Mining began below the Turracher Höhe from the 17th century, and the pass was only opened up later by means of a paved road. In the course of the 20th century, the region was gradually opened up for tourism . Attempts are made to do justice to the growing biodiversity of plants and animals on the Turracher Höhe with landscape protection areas and careful and natural expansion of the tourist facilities.

geography

Geographical location

Streets and places around the Turracher Höhe region

The Turracher Höhe is located in the Nock Mountains, the western part of the Gurktal Alps . The area extends from the peaks of the Rinsennocks ( 2334 m ) in the west to the Lattersteighöhe ( 2264 m ) in the east, in a north-south direction from the Styrian village of Turrach to Ebene Reichenau in the south. A little further away are the peaks of Eisenhut ( 2441 m ), Großer Königstuhl ( 2336 m ) and Gruft ( 2232 m ).

The apex of the approximately two-kilometer-long pass is located 1795 m above sea level south of the Turracher See , whose lake level is 1763 m above sea level. A. and to which the village is directly connected. As a “classic” pass, the Turracher Höhe is also part of a ridge divide between the Upper Murtal and the Upper Gurk , which originates below the Lattersteighöhe at around 2000 m above sea level.

Coming from Salzburg , the Turracher Straße B 95, which leads along the pass at the top of the pass on the western bank of the Turracher See, connects the Styrian Obere Mur Valley in the north with the Upper Gurktal in Carinthia and further via Feldkirchen with the Klagenfurt Basin in the south. The pass road is 16 km long (from Turrach to Ebene Reichenau), the distance between the connection points to Murauer Straße B 97 in Predlitz and Kleinkirchheimer Straße B 88 near Patergassen is 35 km.

A total of three communities share the Turracher Höhe area: the Styrian Stadl-Predlitz in the north and the Carinthian communities Reichenau and Albeck in the south, although there are no direct traffic routes from the latter to the top of the pass.

The “divided” town

For a long time there were only individual farmsteads on the Turracher Höhe, as well as accommodation for woodcutters who felled wood for the mines and smelting works in Turrach, as well as stonemasons and miners who hired themselves here as wage and seasonal workers. A closed settlement only developed with the advent of tourism in the second half of the last century.

The village on the top of the pass has around 100 inhabitants today, and over 400 second homes are registered. Like the Turracher See, it belongs partly to the Styrian municipality of Stadl-Predlitz and partly to the municipality of Reichenau in Carinthia. The much larger part of the village and the lake are on the Styrian side. The northern half of the town, which belongs to Styria, has the postcode 8864, the southern part 9565, which is in Carinthia, but the telephone code is the same for the whole town (04275).

Turracherhöhe town center. On the right the national flags of Styria and Carinthia

Formally, there are two localities on the Turracher Höhe, the Styrian part of the Turrach district of the Stadl-Predlitz community, while on the Carinthian side the Turracherhöhe (official spelling) is a district of the Reichenau community. However, there was no setting up of place-name signs within the village; On the Carinthian side, the Reichenau district “Turracherhöhe” is announced with a place-name sign at the entrance to the village, while a sign at the entrance to the Styrian town bears the inscription “Turracher Höhe tourist area”. Anyone who does not know about the administrative division of the place can only guess from the two state flags on the former federal highway that the border between two federal states runs here.

Infrastructure

In the broad saddle of the top of the pass, where the road runs horizontally for a distance of two kilometers, there are four four-star hotels (Hotel Hochschober, Seehotel Jägerwirt, Hotel Turracher Hof, Schlosshotel Seewirt), two three-star hotels, and several apartments -Houses (e.g. the Turracher Höhe apartment house or the Sundance Grande Mountain ), a recreation house of the German IG Bau and over 30 medium-sized and small hotels and guest houses.

There are many holiday homes in the southern and western stone pine forest as well as on the eastern side of the lake, but they are mostly covered by forest or in hollows so that they hardly stand out from the natural area. Here, the place offers those seeking relaxation three alpine hut settlements: Marktl Alm, Meizeit Dörfl and Alpinhütten Turrach (also called holiday homes or chalets).

The infrastructure also includes four ski schools, several ski rental and sports shops, a bank and a few souvenir shops, but there is no grocery store or gas station on the Turracher Höhe, for example. The next shop with a bakery, sausage and cheese counter and everyday items is in Turrach , about five kilometers or six minutes north of the Turracher Höhe (calculated from the Marktl-Alm settlement); the next large supermarket in Patergassen , about 17 km or 20 minutes south and 640 meters below the Turracher Höhe.

For a long time there was no church or chapel on the Turracher Höhe. It was not until 1985 that a modern ecumenical church, the St. Christophorus mountain church, was built at the suggestion of local residents . It is administered by the parish of Stadl an der Mur and is available to holiday guests and locals of all Christian beliefs. In the nearby town of Turrach, the smallest parish in Styria, there is the lovely St. Josef Church (service every two weeks on Saturday evening).

climate

The sunshine is abundant all year round, due to the altitude, both the cloudiness and the formation of fog are significantly lower than in the Drau valley, for example . Therefore, the average temperatures are favorable:

In January the mean temperature is between -5.9 and -8.2 ° C (for comparison: Klagenfurt, at 447 meters above sea level and over 1300 m lower: -5.8 ° C),
in July between 10.6 and 11.0 ° C (Klagenfurt: 18.3 ° C) and
annual mean 1.9 to 2.2 ° C (Klagenfurt: 7.7 ° C).

Due to the pass location, the wind often blows.

The amount of precipitation is quite low at 1218 mm for mountainous areas. Snowfall usually sets in in October at the latest and a solid snow cover quickly forms, which remains in place until April and sometimes until May. On average, there is snow on the Turracher Höhe 158 days a year.

history

First settlement

The name Turrach comes from the old name "Durrach". This was used for a forest area in which many trees have fallen and are lying around "dryly", and occurs several times in the rest of Austria.

While the area around today's Predlitz an der Mur was already settled by Slavs in the 6th century, the first clearings and settlements south of the Turracher Höhe are only known from the early 14th century. Politically, the region, which previously belonged to the Duchy of Carinthia, was already divided into three countries in the 12th and 13th centuries when the Lungau was separated from Salzburg and the Murau rulership was part of the Duchy of Styria . Until the development through tourism, which began in the late 1920s, there had been individual farms north and south of the pass since the late Middle Ages, but no closed settlements. The Turracherhöhe also played no role as a traffic route for a long time. In the Middle Ages and early modern times, the connections via the Katschberg in the west and the Flattnitz in the east were the main routes in north-south direction, while routes over the Turrach remained of only local importance, for example for the transport of salt from the Salzkammergut to Reichenau (First documented mention: 1332), where a branch toll office was located.

In the upper Murtal north of the Turracher Höhe, the area around Predlitz (first documented mention 1311) was sparsely populated, as the slopes to the right of the Mur were not very suitable for farming. The dominant settlement in the region in the Middle Ages was Murau , which was owned by the Liechtenstein family . To the south, on the other hand, rural colonization around Reichenau, where a district court was also located in 1520, resulted in more closed settlements and individual farms.

Mining

Ham card of the iron mines from 1707

In a Moosheimer deed from 1256, the Carinthian Duke Ulrich III. the minstrel, poet and former stewardess of Styria Ulrich von Liechtenstein the mining sovereignty in the regional court district on the Mur, to which the area around the Turracher Höhe also belonged. However, there are no specific references to mining activities in the Turrach area either in this document or in the centuries that followed.

Johann Adolf Graf zu Schwarzenberg , owner of the Murau estate, had copper ore searched in the area around Turrach in 1657. Large deposits of brown iron ore were found in the Steinbachgraben , whereupon the count asked Emperor Leopold I for a concession for their mining and smelting, which he was issued on January 31, 1660. In the same year Johann Adolf commissioned the construction of a raft furnace in Turrach , and the first tapping took place in 1662 . Initially, iron ore mining was mainly operated and smelted on the Styrian side around the village at the northern foot of the Turracher Höhe. In 1783, Prince Johann Nepomuk Anton von Schwarzenberg had the 15 km long route from Predlitz an der Mur to his factory in Turrach expanded to facilitate removal. But there were also transport routes for wood and charcoal above the village, which reached up to today's pass.

After the general economic crisis due to the coalition wars and their consequences also affected the Turrach mining industry in the first two decades of the 19th century, the mining operations experienced the appointment of Peter Tunner the Elder (father of Peter Tunner ), who from 1823 to 1844 Held a significant rise through the rationalization of working methods and the introduction of modern technology. In the middle of the 19th century, the amount of ore extracted annually by the approximately 60 miners was around 100,000 to 120,000 quintals (around 5,600 to 6,700 tons). At that time, work was only done in Turrach in winter because the ore had to be pulled to the hut in sacks.

From 1863 a tiltable Bessemer pear was used in Turrach , which rationalized steel production, in 1865 three converters with a capacity of 35 to 40 hundredweight each and two cupolas were available. At that time, the ironworks was the largest in Styria and was considered one of the most modern in Europe. Despite the technical innovations, an economic decline soon followed. From the 1870s onwards, sales deteriorated and pig iron production fell from 3,800 to 1,500 tons between 1869 and 1885. In addition to rising prices for coal, the unfavorable location of Turrach away from the main traffic routes was responsible, which caused high transport costs, so that the coal and steel works became less and less competitive. In 1899 the ironworks was leased, but this did not bring any improvement, so that the blast furnace in Turrach finally ceased operations in the spring of 1909.

In addition to iron ore mining, copper mining also played a certain role at times . Other mineral resources are mainly small deposits of high-quality anthracite coal , which were still mined in the 1950s and 1960s. The mining of cinnabar in the Hohen Kor on the eastern slope of the Rinsennocks was first mentioned in the 19th century. There is the Barbara tunnel with the remains of mining activities. A former quarry right on the Turracher See, as well as a magnesite quarry and a slate quarry are further evidence of mining activity around the Turracher Höhe, which, however, was completely abandoned for economic reasons during the 20th century.

Tourist development

First holiday home on the Turracherhöhe

"Sixties" kilometer stone offset in the center of the village

In the 19th century the first dwellings were built on the top of the pass at Turracher See. They served both as accommodation and for entertaining woodcutters, stonemasons and miners. It is known from the demonstrably oldest of the inns that still exist on the Turracher Höhe today, the "Seewirt", that an alpine farm was operated here as early as 1830. Already at the end of the 19th century the first tourists were drawn to hikes on the Turrach, shortly before the First World War the first skiers came to extensive ski hikes. Little by little, other hotels and inns opened, including the still existing “Jägerwirt” (1905), “Siegel” (1911) and “Hochschober” (1929).

It is not known when an old alpine path was converted into a street. On the south side, a new construction of the stone Devil's Bridge over the Stangenbach gorge is known from 1893. In the inter-war period of the 20th century, the roads, which at that time essentially corresponded to today's course, were adapted to the demands of modern automobile traffic. A bus service was started on the south side in 1928, followed by the Predlitz – Passhöhe bus line in the north in 1929. The first tourists were nevertheless forced to walk for kilometers to the quarters on the Turracher Höhe in winter, because the buses could not cope with the steep climbs in winter conditions. The first private holiday home was built in 1936 on the north side of the Turracher See on a small hill.

British tourists came to the parts of Austria occupied by British troops (Styria, Carinthia and East Tyrol) as early as the winter after the Second World War . They were quartered on the Turracher Höhe in the seized companies Siegel, Hochschober, Jägerwirt and in the small holiday home. In 1946 a drag lift was built about the height of today's Kornockbahn, the use of which was initially reserved for the English. Based on this, a lift on the Turracher Alpe is still called the “Engländerlift” today.

The first single chairlift, the Panoramabahn, was added in the 1950s. It was replaced by a new single chairlift in 1983. This was also replaced in September 2006 by the new combination chair / gondola lift. In 1966 the "Pauli Schlepplift", named after Paul Pertl, went into operation and is still there today. The practice meadow lift was also added.

The "Kornockbahn" double chairlift opened in December 1976 and was replaced in 2000 by a six-seater chairlift from Doppelmayr, which is now equipped with heated seats . With the Zirbenwald six-seater chairlift (2006/07), the panorama lift and the year-round Nocky Flitzer toboggan run (2008/09), the range of leisure activities was expanded considerably. For the 2015/16 season, the newly built Schafalm six-seater chairlift expanded the ski area with an additional four new runs.

From the 1970s, the rush of winter sports enthusiasts to the Turracher Höhe increased, and as a result, the gradients of the federal road were gradually defused by adapting the route. From 1978 to 1980 , a new section of the route with avalanche barriers was put into operation on the Kornock above the old road, which was repeatedly affected by avalanches.

With a gradient of up to 34% at kilometer 60 (calculated from Klagenfurt), at times the steepest alpine road in Europe ( coordinates ), due to its high demands on cars, it was at times also a test track for the automobile manufacturer Porsche, which produced in nearby Gmünd after the Second World War . In January 1978, Audi presented the newly developed Audi Quattro to the corporate management on the Turracher Höhe, where the performance of the then innovative all-wheel drive could be convincingly demonstrated on the steep, winding and snow-covered mountain pass . 46.912774 13.872032 1795

Today the new pass road has a maximum ascent of "only" 23% on a short section on the Carinthian side. It is cleared well in winter and only needs to be closed very rarely today.

Economy and Infrastructure

The dominant industry on the Turracher Höhe today is tourism. Apart from hotels, inns and lift operators as well as the few small shops and the mineral museum, there are no companies here. After mining ceased in the 20th century, wood and forestry is the only "traditional" branch of industry that still exists on the Turracher Höhe, along with a few small farms.

Wood and forestry

Large areas of forest in the Upper Mur Valley and in the area between Predlitz and the Turracher Höhe are still family-owned from the Murau rulership acquired by the Schwarzenberg family in 1623 . They are administered by the “Fürstlich Schwarzenberg'schen Family Foundation”. The area managed by the forest administration in Turrach in the area of the municipality of Stadl-Predlitz amounts to a total of 8,411 hectares , of which 5,804 hectares are forest ( commercial and protective forest ) and 2607 hectares of alpine pastures and other areas at an altitude between 930 and 2434 meters. Felling by the Turrach Forest Administration amounts to around 24,000 cubic meters of harvest , of which 79% are for final use and 21% for previous use .

The forest on the southern side of the Turracher Höhe is also largely privately owned; 90% of the entire forest stock of the municipality of Reichenau is distributed over private parcels of less than 200 hectares. The yield is mostly resold as round wood , there are no sawmills or other wood processing companies in the immediate vicinity of the Turracher Höhe.

Water management

The drinking water supply comes from two sources near the Grünsee and another from the Kornock. Both the quality of the drinking water and that of the Turracher lakes are very good, as a ring sewer system built between 1967 and 1972 is connected to public sewer systems, so that the waste water that arises is drained off to sewage treatment plants in Feldkirchen via Ebene Reichenau . The Turracher See was the first lake in Carinthia on which a sewer system was completely completed.

energy

It was not until 1957 that the Turracher Höhe was connected to the KELAG public power grid . Until then, electricity was generated by generators from individual objects. With the construction of a district heating system in 1997, hotels and some holiday homes are connected to an environmentally friendly heat supply.

traffic

As a supra-regional north-south connection between Carinthia and the neighboring federal states of Salzburg and Styria , the Turracher Straße B 95 pass crossing over the Turracher Höhe is of comparatively little importance. Until the partial relocation of the most critical section of the route, it was known as the steepest pass road in Carinthia. The roads that are much more frequently used by long-distance traffic are the Tauern Autobahn A 10 and the parallel Katschberg Strasse B 99 from Bischofshofen to Spittal to the west, and the Friesacher Strasse B 317 from Judenburg to Klagenfurt to the east of the Turracher Höhe.

The Turracher Höhe is only sparsely served by public transport. From Predlitz, where the “Predlitz-Turrach” train station of the Murtalbahn is located, a bus line operated by the Styrian Transport Association runs a few times a day to the top of the pass, the same applies to an ÖBB bus service to Reichenau and on to Klagenfurt.

tourism

Overview

“Sea taxi” on the frozen lake

Kornockbahn mountain station

The Turracher Höhe is open to both summer and winter tourism; most recently 233,000 overnight stays were registered, two thirds of them in the 2004/05 winter season and one third in the 2005 summer season. A total of 1,350 commercial and 570 private beds are available, on an annual average 320 people are employed in tourism companies. The expansion of the tourist offer has been carried out carefully and close to nature since the first transnational regional development concept of 1963. A development model for the years 2005 to 2015 (see web links ) provides for further expansion based on these principles. In the summer of 2007 the new 1600 m long year-round toboggan run opened .

Winter tourism

In winter, five chair lifts (including a combined gondola-chair lift next to the year-round toboggan run) and nine drag lifts along the 38 kilometers of slopes open up on the Turracher Höhe. The "local mountain" is the Kornock ( 2193 m ), on the eastern slope of which two chairlifts run , the Kornockbahn and the Panoramabahn. The valley station of the Kornockbahn is in the center of the village, and the system is also operated in summer. On the northern slope of the Turracher Höhe there is a challenging FIS run into the Turrachtal, on the east and west flanks of the saddle there are longer, easy to medium-difficulty runs.

A total of 15 km of cross-country ski trails are groomed, alongside which winter hiking trails run. Areas for ice skating and curling are kept free of snow on the lake . The “Seetaxi”, a snowmobile with handrails, which commutes between the lifts east and west of the lake along the border between Styria and Carinthia and pulls skiers across the frozen lake free of charge, is unique .

Due to the snowy location, the ski season starts in November and the large slopes are open until May 1st each year, while the smaller lifts and slopes (e.g. Übungswiesenlift, Engländerlift, Sonnenbahn) for example in 2017 closed on Easter Monday (April 17, 2017).

Summer tourism

The Turracher See is rarely used as a bathing lake in summer, as the water temperature is seldom above 18 ° C. Therefore, the offer for summer tourism, which on the Turracher Höhe only reaches around half the number of visitors in the winter half-year, is essentially limited to numerous hiking trails around the lakes and into the surrounding mountain landscape. Five hiking trails are marked as "geopaths", along which noteworthy places ("geopoints") are described with information boards. Two chair lifts and the Alpine Coaster are also in operation in summer .

The Turracher Höhe is also on the eastern edge of the Nockberge National Park . About a kilometer before Ebene Reichenau branches the toll Nockalmstraße from the Turracher road into the national park.

Museums

Quartz crystal Heart of Goijas at the Museum Kranzelbinder

The privately run museum "Alpin + Art + Gallery" was founded in 1960 as a small mineral museum and expanded and redesigned in 2000. The original museum is located in an expanded Troadkåstn , as the granaries in this part of Austria are called in dialect. The expansion added another building with 400 m² of exhibition space.

In the village of Turrach at the foot of the Turracher Höhe there is another museum, the Montanmuseum "Wood and Iron" , which exhibits exhibits from the mining era in the region and also offers tours of the old buildings and tunnels (open on Thursday afternoons). Other objects from the mining and smelting operations can be viewed in the "Iron Hall" of Murau Castle . The famous Bessemer pear from Turrach is now in the Technical Museum in Vienna .

nature

geology

The geological structure of the Turracher Höhe is characterized by numerous different types of rock, as well as the effects of the tectonic shifts that become visible here , which ultimately led to the formation of the Alps in the late Mesozoic about 100 million years ago . The eastern Central Alps received their present structure at the end of the Tertiary .

From a geological point of view, the Turracher Höhe and its wider surroundings belong to the Gurktal Nappe , whose Paleozoic rocks are pushed over the younger rock cover of the so-called Stangalm Trias . On and under the thrust ore are a number of smaller and larger iron spar - brown iron ore deposits , including those in Steinbachgraben and Rohrerwald near Turrach, which were the basis for the ironworks there.

The Gurktal quartz phyllites (formed in the Lower Silurian ) and Eisenhut schist (Upper Silurian to Central Devon) occur most frequently on the Turracher Höhe , and on the other side of the Gurktal ceiling there are also old crystalline ( paragneiss , mica schist , amphibolite ), some of which were already formed in the Ediacarian . The narrow strip of the Stangalm triad in between consists of limestone and dolomite . Immediately southeast of the Turracher See, below the Gurktal blanket, the so-called Paal conglomerate , also called Königsstuhl-Turracher Karbon , begins . It lies above the Stangalm Triassic and is known among geologists for its plant fossils (see below).

During the various glacial ages of the Quaternary the Turracher Höhe was glaciated, in the Würm Glacial it was part of the Mur glacier that flowed south from the nutrient area of the Niedere Tauern. About 20,000 years ago, strong warming caused the ice stream network to melt within 1,000 to 1,500 years. As a rare relic of the Würme Ice Age, there is a glacier mill west of the Turracher See, further effects of the glaciation can be observed in the terrain and in many individual places on the Turracher Höhe. The result of tectonic shifts as well as glaciation are the rounded mountain tops with trough-like depressions ( cirques ) in between, an example of this is the Hohe Kor ; there is also another result of glacial activity, a moraine wall .

The Turracher lakes

The Turracher See and the Schwarzsee

There are three lakes on the Turracher Höhe, which, according to legend, were created by God's tears of joy, which he shed when he saw what he had created beautiful. The largest of these with an area of 19.4 hectares is by far the Turracher See, about three hundred meters to the east is the Schwarzsee (2.6 hectares), and to the south is the Grünsee (1.48 hectares). The two natural, smaller lakes are less well known because they are located in a nature reserve and no bank development is possible, and because only footpaths lead to them.

The surface of the Turracher See, which is up to 33 meters deep, is completely frozen for up to six months a year. Since the lake water is also used to produce artificial snow, its level can fluctuate by a few meters in winter.

In addition to the lakes, the ice age glaciers also formed swamps and moors due to the high groundwater level. In the area of the top of the pass there are mainly flat bogs with smaller intermediate and raised bogs , on the Kornock there is a hollow bog at over 2000 meters above sea level . The most important moor area adjoins the Schwarzsee to the south and is probably a silted up part of this body of water.

flora

The Turracher Höhe is one of the largest closed stone pine forests in Austria

The Turracher Höhe lies in the area between montane and alpine vegetation. Secondary spruce forest follows from bottom to top, interrupted by economic grassland, spruce-larch forests, stone pine and stone pine-larch forests, then dwarf shrub heaths and subalpine and alpine lawns.

The extensive pine forests that predominate here are remarkable . The Turracher Höhe is one of the largest closed stone pine forests in Austria. The subalpine forests are often thinned out like a park, in their undergrowth, in addition to the omnipresent alpine rush ( Rhododendron ferrugineum ), the dwarf juniper ( Juniperus communis subsp. Alpina ) and the spotted gentian ( Gentiana punctata ) also occur. On the Rauterriegel southeast of the Eisenhut there is a pine forest rich in pine trees. In the green alder bushes on the avalanche slope southeast of the Rinsennocks, numerous tall perennials grow, such as B. Monkshood ( Aconitum napellus subsp. Tauricum ), masterwort ( Peucedanum ostruthium ) and Austrian chamois ( Doronicum austriacum ). Large pine fields ( Pinus mugo ) can be found on Kilnprein .

At the top of the pass there is an intermediate moor: In the mud-sedge moor ( Caricetum limosae ), in addition to the mud-sedge ( Carex limosa , endangered), the heart-shaped two-leaf ( Listera cordata ) and dwarf birch ( Betula nana ) grow . A brown sedge swamp ( Caricetum fuscae subalpinum ) with the endangered species brown sedge ( Carex nigra ), round-leafed tiger ( Drosera rotundifolia ) and bastard sundew ( D. x obovata ) as well as dwarf birch grows in the flat moor south of the Schwarzsee . There is a hollow moor on the Kornock. In addition to the dominant turf rush ( Trichophorum cespitosum ), u. a. Alpine helmet ( Bartsia alpina ), Alpine butterwort ( Pinguicula alpina ) and fever clover ( Menyanthes trifoliata ).

In the subalpine Bürstlings calcareous grasslands ( Aveno-Nardetum ) you will find the Spring Pasque ( Pulsatilla vernalis ), the Alps-anemone ( Pulsatilla alpina ) and Campanula Scheuchzeri ( Campanula scheuchzeri ). The red blooming dwarf primrose ( Primula minima ) and sticky primrose ( P. glutinosa ) grow in the alpine crooked sedge ( Caricetum curvulae ). In non-ferrous fescue calcareous grasslands on südgerichteten steep slopes you will find the Shaggy Primrose ( Primula villosa , "Red valerian") in the endemic in the Noric Alps dark red flowering form. The wulfen man's shield ( Androsace wulfeniana ) and the wulfen houseleek ( Sempervivum wulfenii ), which are endemic to the Eastern Alps, grow in the upholstered corridors .

The capercaillie found here is also the symbol of the adjacent Nockberge National Park

fauna

In the Turracher Höhe area you can find the whole spectrum of alpine fauna, with the exception of the ibex, which was never at home here. In addition to the widespread cloven-hoofed game (red deer, chamois, roe deer) and corvids (raven, jackdaw, magpie), the four grouse wood grouse , black grouse , ptarmigan and hazel grouse also occur in stable populations.

The predatory game includes fox, badger, noble marten, stone marten, polecat , ermine and weasel . Birds of prey, such as hawk , sparrowhawk , kestrel , golden eagle , and, more rarely, tree and peregrine falcon can be seen here; of the night crawlers of the eagle owl , tawny owl , barn owl and pygmy owl . Likewise the marmot .

Funga

The main time for fungal growth , i.e. H. for the formation of mushroom fruit bodies (so-called "mushrooms"), is in August and September. The tree species found on the Turracher Höhe are active mycorrhizal formers . The atmosphere, which is largely free of impurities, helps species that are sensitive to industrial or traffic emissions (nutrients and nitrogen fleeing) to have good fructification options. The moderate daytime temperature, which also prevails on the Turracher Höhe during hot, dry summer periods, ensures that mushroom finds are possible if this is not possible in the lower elevations of Styria and Carinthia.

Due to the lack of deciduous forest elements and the sporadic occurrence of the spruce, the ridge area is relatively uninteresting for mushroom hunters. On the Turracher Höhe, you will usually look in vain for mushrooms , chanterelles or brown-headed mushrooms . In contrast, isolated occurrences of the parasol ( Macrolepiota procera ) in the grasslands were found. The large mushroom funga is dominated by the mycorrhizal formers associated with larch and pine species. Due to the subalpine to alpine character of the area, these include some species that are extremely rare in Central Europe and that can hardly be found outside of the larch-stone pine forests. The Turracher Höhe is therefore an interesting area for mycologists.

Were here to Zirbenbegleitern of Suillus Placidus ( Suillus placidus ), the suillus plorans ( Suillus Plorans ) and the ringed suillus plorans ( Suillus sibiricus ) to call, often in addition to the growing amongst larch, frequent Schmierröhrlingsarten as suillus grevillei ( Suillus grevillei ) suillus viscidus ( Suillus viscidus ) or rust-red larch boletus ( Suillus tridentinus ) occur. Furthermore, among larches one can find the orange colored larch milkling ( Lactarius porninsis ), the larch deaf ( Russula laricina ) and the hollow foot bolete ( Boletinus cavipes ). Above all, there is an abundance of deafness among pines ( Russula decolorans , Russula cessans , Russula xerampelina as a high mountain form with a chocolate-brown hat). The gray-skinned vaginal stripe ( Amanita submembranacea ) is omnipresent in the needle litter as well as numerous types of fertilizer on animal excrement. Many bright red or yellow colored saplings populate the meadows in autumn, provided they are sparse or are regularly mowed or grazed.

Carbon flora of the Stangalpe

Plant fossils were found in the 300 million year old carbon slates as early as the late 18th century. Scientifically recorded for the first time by Boué in 1835 , today 72 plant species of the coal forests are known from the Stangalpe, including giant horsetail ( Calamites ), seal trees ( Sigillaria ), ferns ( Pecopteris ), Cordaite trees ( Cordaites ) and conifers ( Dicranophyllum ).

Trivia

Border stone near Reichenau

Some legends tell of the Alberer, a malicious mountain spirit, as well as the Winterbrentler , who lived in alpine huts abandoned in winter. A hunter who wanted to prove his courage is said to have climbed up to an alpine hut on Martini night to defy the Alberer. But the latter threw the hunter out of the house with a slap, so that he returned to the valley with a swollen cheek. A dairy farmer who left his alpine hut too late and fled from the winter burner is said to have remained lying on the path and froze to death.
Long before skiing, “striding” was common in the region. For this purpose, rye cockroaches (high German: Schauben; bundled rye straw that remained after threshing) were moistened on one side and left outside at minus temperatures until the underside was frozen smooth. Sitting on these cockroaches the boys of the village drove into the valley.
In the 14th century the Reichenau people had the right to bring a certain amount of salt, which came from Hallein in Salzburg , but was called "Lungau Salt", duty-free over the Nockberge to the Reichenau Valley. In return for this privilege, which was maintained until the 18th century, they were obliged to keep the passage over the Turracher Höhe open. From this privilege, a lively smuggling activity in Salzburg developed.

During the rule of the French at the beginning of the 19th century, when Upper Carinthia was added to the Illyrian provinces of France after the Napoleonic Wars and the border with Austria passed shortly before Reichenau, smuggling activities revived in the region.

literature

R. Braunstingl (coord.): Geological map of Salzburg 1: 200,000 , Geological map of the Republic of Austria 1: 200,000, Geological Federal Institute Vienna, 2006
Adolf Fritz, Miente Boersma, Karl Krainer: Coal-period plant fossils. In: Carinthia II. Special issue 49, Klagenfurt 1990.
Adolf Fritz, Karl Krainer: An upper carbon mega flora from the north side of the Stangnock, Gurktal Alps. In: Carinthia II. 187/107. Year, Klagenfurt 1997, pp. 325–356 ( PDF on ZOBODAT ).
WJ Jongmans: The flora of the “Stangalpe” area in Styria. In: CR 2e Congr. Pour l'avancement dea etudes de Stratigraphie Carbonifere, Heerlen 1935. Maestricht 1938, Tome III, pp. 1259-1298.
Matthias Maierbrugger : Turracherhöhe and Nockalmstrasse. A guide and advisor through landscape and history . Verlag Johannes Heyn, Klagenfurt 1984, ISBN 3-85366-429-6 .
Barbara Leeb, Peter Leeb (eds.) With texts by Matthias Maierbrugger : The Hochschober, the Turracher Höhe and the Nockberge . Verlag Johannes Heyn, Klagenfurt 2001, ISBN 3-85366-979-4 .
Georg Sterk, Friedrich H. Ucik: The Turracher Höhe. On the trail of time . Verlag Johannes Heyn, Klagenfurt 2003, ISBN 3-7084-0039-9 .

Web links

Commons : Turracher Höhe - album with pictures, videos and audio files

Wikivoyage: Turrach - travel guide

Website of the Turracher Höhe tourist association
Development model Turracher-Höhe
Literature on the Turracher Höhe in the catalog of the German National Library

Individual evidence

^ Heinz-Dieter Pohl : Mountain names. In: members.chello.at. Retrieved April 25, 2016 .
↑ All information in this section according to Johannes Schwarzenberg: Wild animals and hunting . In: Georg Sterk, Friedrich H. Ucik: The Turracher Höhe . Verlag Joh. Heyn, Klagenfurt 2003, ISBN 3-7084-0039-9 , pp. 81-88

This article was added to the list of excellent articles on February 26, 2006 in this version .

[1] Heinz-Dieter Pohl : Mountain names. In: members.chello.at. Retrieved April 25, 2016 .

[2] All information in this section according to Johannes Schwarzenberg: Wild animals and hunting . In: Georg Sterk, Friedrich H. Ucik: The Turracher Höhe . Verlag Joh. Heyn, Klagenfurt 2003, ISBN 3-7084-0039-9 , pp. 81-88