Sheets of dark cloud cover the bare peak of the Hohneck. Blizzards wreak havoc among the grass. Arnaud Foltzer points to a rocky ridge at the foot of Petit Hohneck, on which several wire cages are camped. A bright anemone with daffodil flowers inside smiles and offers a momentary respite from the harshness of the elements.
“Crown jewels”: this is how Arnaud Foltzer, technician of the Ballons des Vosges regional nature park of the Frankenthal-Missheimlé national nature reserve, describes the flora of the Hohneck massif. “With a mosaic of more or less forest and grassland ecosystems, its flora is one of the most diverse in the Vosges,” he said.
A changing flora
Generations of botanists who have studied the flora of the Vosges wear out their binoculars when they think about it. “Emile Issler, Jean-Baptiste Mougeot, and especially Camille Brunotte and Constant Lemasson (authors of a Bible, The guide…