Bode Gorge

The Bode Gorge (german: Bodetal) is a long ravine that forms part of the Bode valley between Treseburg and Thale in the Harz Mountains of central Germany. The German term, ''Bodetal'' (literally "Bode Valley"), is also used in a wider sense to refer to the valleys of the Warme and Kalte Bode rivers that feed the River Bode.

At the Bode Gorge, the River Bode, which rises on the highest mountain in the Harz, the Brocken, has cut deeply into the hard Ramberg granite rock. The ravine. The Bode Gorge was designated a nature reserve as early as 5 March 1937; its boundaries being subsequently expanded. With an area of, currently , it is one of the largest nature reserves in Saxony-Anhalt.

Geology

Apart from intrusions of Ramberg granite, which rose to the surface and solidified 300 million years ago in the Upper Carboniferous Period, and their associated veins of quartz, the ravine of the Bode also cuts through hornfels and knotenschiefer (a type of slate), as well as argillite and graywacke with quartz elements and diabase dikes from the Devonian Period, 400 to 370 million years ago. Ramberg granite predominantly forms the front section of the ravine and characterises its highest rocks. It appears light-coloured due to the high proportion of white feldspar. The quartz lends it a grey shade. The proportion of black mica ( biotite) is low and carries no weight in terms of colouring. The light-coloured granite stands out from the dark to black coloured rocks of hornfels and argillite. As a result, the front section of the ravine and the river bed of the Bode in this area appear clearly lighter than the rear section. The argillite at the rear of the gorge shows bands of colour in places that evinces the former strata of the marine sediments. The stratified slate was only slightly metamorphosed.

Climate

In the area of the Bode Gorge average annual temperatures range from 8 °C down to 6.5 °C and annual precipitation between 600 and 720 mm. But sharp, local differences in the ravine between, for example, the sunny, warm and dry southern slopes and the more shaded, cooler and damper northern slopes and valley floor, modify the local climate considerably.

Soils

The most common soil types are silicate leptosols, that belong to the thin stony soils around areas of rock and scree. In flatter areas with less rearrangement of the soil particles are stony ''Ranker'' leptosols of various thickness. One particular soil type, brown ''Ranker'' occurs above argillite rock. Podsolised brown earth soils are found around the edges of the gorge.

Rivers and streams

In the area of the ravine the Bode has a width of 7 to 25 metres and descends 100 metres in 17 kilometres. Its river course and bed are very much in their natural state inside the ravine. Kettle-holes, rapids and scouring in the rock alternate with islands of gravel and flat river banks. The most notable rapids on the Bode, the ''Bodekessel'', not far southwest of the Königsruhe tavern, is shrouded in legend. It was a low waterfall before its explosive demolition in 1798. Stones and boulders occupy the river bed. Slow-moving stretches of water occur, especially in the area of the Hornfels (''Zahme Bode''); rapids (''Wilde Bode'') are found particularly in the lower part of the ravine and formed by the incision of the river into the blocks of Ramberg granite. The water regime inside the ravine is affected, however, by the dams owned by the ''Bodewerk'' in the upper reaches of the river. The discharge can vary sharply: during the devastating New Year floods of 1925 a discharge of 350 m³/s was recorded; in the summer of 1926 the Bode almost ran dry (0.,35 m³/s). Other major floods occurred in 1667, 1730 and in April 1984. There was a plan to impound the Bode in the ravine as well in 1891 with a 150 m high dam at the ''Bodekessel''. The plan was scrapped.

Only a few streams enter the Bode, on the right-hand side of the ravine. The Luppbode is a lively, bubbling brook coming from the direction of Allrode which joins the Bode near Treseburg. Another tributary stream is the Dambach, which empties into the Bode from a side ravine below the Rabenstein.

Flora and fauna

Vegetation

There is a rapid succession of habitats in the Bode Gorge that produces a tightly woven mosaic of vegetation, characterised by an especially rich variety of plant species.
* On the steeper slopes, small clumps of ravine and scree forest (''Blockschutt'') alternate with dry broad-leaved woods, scree slopes, silicate rock outcrops with rock vegetation, crags and xerothermous grass.
* Meadows of cheddar pink and Alpine aster and Anthericum heath in the Bode Gorge have been classified as rock meadows.
* The most widespread dry forests are the birch-oak woods and the catchfly-sessile oak woods.
* In places, extensive and very near-natural lime-sycamore ravine woods and scree woods have developed on the lower mountainsides (''Tilio-Acerion'') on shaded slopes.
* On small areas of the lower slopes on acidophilous soil, copper beech woods occur (''Luzulo-Fageten'').
* The banks of the Bode, in places where the water velocity is slow, have favoured the formation of reed beds of reed canary grass (''Phalaridetum arundinaceae'') and ground elder-butterbur (''Quercus petraea''), large-leaved lime (''Tilia platyphyllos''), sycamore (''Acer pseudoplatanus''), silver birch (''Betula pendula'') and rowan (''Sorbus aucuparia''). Also worth mentioning is the common yew (''Taxus baccata'').

Dominating the ground cover are plants like the wood bluegrass (''Poa nemoralis''), wavy hair-grass (''Avenella flexuosa''; especially in dry oak woods), white wood-rush (''Luzula luzuloides''), male fern (''Dryopteris filix-mas''), limestone oak fern (''Gymnocarpium robertianum''), wall hawkweed (''Hieracium murorum''), baneberry (''Actaea spicata''), small balsam (''Impatiens parviflora''), Herb Robert (''Geranium robertianum''), dog's mercury

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