Skallabjäret, Naturreservat

The reserve consists of an old overgrown pasture located on the top of the mountain Skallabjäret with a view of the Ätrans valley. Skallabjäret is an interesting area in terms of culture and forest history, but it is difficult to access and not particularly well adapted for outdoor activities.

The area was protected as early as 1952 and the idea then was to preserve the pasture with its rich herb flora for posterity. Later, the idea changed and the area was left to develop freely for scientific purposes. In 1996, the Skallabjäret nature reserve was established.

Area in transition

The juniper scrubland still exists today, but many of the juniper trees are dead and only remain as dry skeletons. Other shrubs have grown up, such as bramble, hazel and olive. The undergrowth, which was low in the 1950s, has grown up into a sparse forest consisting mostly of oak with low, wide crowns. Other elements in the tree layer are old apples, older wide-crowned oxen, bird berries, rowan, maple, spruce and birch. On the slopes to the north and east there are tall, older hazel trees. In the otherwise fairly sparse field layer there is still bilberry.

The forest takes over

Skallabjäret is both a culturally and historically interesting area. Since the reserve has been left to develop freely for a long time, it has been possible to follow the area's development from pasture overgrown with juniper to the more forest-like appearance it has today. In the future, the forest will take over more and more of the old pasture.