Periodically exposed shore with stable, eutrophic sediments with pioneer or ephemeral vegetation

This habitat type includes periodically exposed shores of rivers or islets of accumulated sediment in river channels, drying-out oxbows, lakes and fishponds. The same habitat conditions also occur in disturbed habitats strongly affected by humans such as ditches and other wet places in villages or shallowly inundated and drying out arable land. However these anthropogenic habitats represents degradations of other habitat types and therefore do not deserve protection. Soils are muddy or sandy-muddy, usually with a high concentration of nutrients from natural sedimentation or from human input, for example on arable land and near agricultural farms.

Vegetation growing in such environments is dominated by annual herbs, mainly of the genera Bidens, Chenopodium and Persicaria. In the Mediterranean areas where the drying out is more rapid the vegetation in the same habitat can be dominated also by perennial stoloniferous species tolerant to prolonged flooding such as Cynodon dactylon, Polypogon viridis, Panicum repens, Paspalum spp.  Depending on the successional stage, soil nutrient status and the speed of the draw-down the vegetation can be short and open, or very dense and up to 1.5 m tall (especially if dominated by annual plants of the class Bidentetea). The stands are usually species-poor, often with a single dominant species, but can be also species-rich, especially in open, frequently disturbed stands on river shores.

In contrast to habitat C3.5b, this habitat occurs in environments with quick draw-down and drying out, or on more nutrient-rich sediments. In environments with slower draw-down, low-growing vegetation belonging to C3.5b can appear first and develop into tall-growing stands of C3.5a in a later successional stage.

Indicators of good quality:

• Occurrence in natural environments such as shores of unregulated rivers or natural lakes

• Occurrence of rare wetland species

• Low incidence of neophytes

• Low occurrence of shrubs

Synthesis of Red List assessment

Confidence in the assessment

Pressures and threats