Country

Austria: 4 ecoregions. Each with its climate now and toward 2050, and its conservation tier.

Four forest ecoregions divide Austria along its topography. The Alps conifer and mixed forests hold the mountainous west and center, the country's high-elevation core. Around and below them, three temperate broadleaf systems take over: the Central European mixed forests in the north, the Western European broadleaf forests along the Alpine foreland, and the Pannonian mixed forests in the warm, drier east around the Danube lowlands. This is thoroughly temperate gardening territory, with the real variable being elevation and continentality: Pannonian-edge gardens get the warmest summers and suit heat-tolerant deciduous planting, while Alpine valleys favor conifers and cold-hardy mountain species with a short season. The broadleaf zones all carry the Nature Could Recover tier, and hedgerow and woodland-edge natives fit them naturally.