Screes

Description (English)

Accumulations of boulders, stones, rock fragments, pebbles, gravels or finer material, of non-aeolian and non-fluvial depositional origin, unvegetated, occupied by lichens or mosses, or colonized by sparse herbs or shrubs. Included are screes and scree slopes produced by slope processes, moraines and drumlins originating from glacial deposition, sandar, eskers and kames resulting from fluvio-glacial deposition, block slopes, block streams and block fields constructed by periglacial depositional processes of downslope mass movement, ancient beach deposits constituted by former coastal constructional processes. Deposits originating from aeolian depositional processes (dunes) or from eruptive volcanic activity are not included; they are included in U5 and U6 respectively. High mountain, boreal and mediterranean unstable screes are colonized by highly specialised plant communities. They or their constituting species may also inhabit moraines and other depositional debris accumulations in the same areas. A very few communities form in lowland areas elsewhere

Source: EUNIS habitat classification