alpine pastures
High grazing grounds
Alpine pastures are high mountain meadows used for grazing livestock, typically above the tree line where forests give way to grass.
In traditional European farming, cattle and sheep are moved to alpine pastures during summer months—a practice called transhumance.
The term evokes idyllic scenes of cows with bells grazing steep green slopes: The sound of cowbells drifted down from the alpine pastures.
- grassNarrow-leaved ground cover
- wild flowersUntamed native blooms
- cowFemale bovine
- cow bellsLivestock neck chimes
- goatHorned, bearded livestock
hiking · open sky · mountain · mountain villages · haymaking · endemic species · cheese-making · pastoralism · biodiversity · watershed areas · buttercups · folk traditions · folk songs · valleys · herding · chalet · slopes · oral histories
- European farmingdairy farming, dairy farms, sheep farming, olive groves, wheat fields
- Alpine Culturealphorn, chalets, chalet, cowbell, alpenhorn
- Central AsiaKazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan
- Alpine historyTyrol, Innsbruck, Dolomites, Matterhorn, Mont Blanc
- Cantabrian MountainsAsturias, Leon, mountain refuges, mountain meadows, beech forests
- SwitzerlandBern, Geneva, Zurich, Basel, Lausanne
alpine pasturescoastal plains
Flat land beside seas
valley floors · flatlands · prairie · valley floor · steppe