The Blossom of the Jura Moutains

27 April 2022

The fruit trees near the village of Gempen (canton of Solothurn) are a feast for the eyes in spring. The mountains and wooded slopes put this blooming landscape in a fairytale perspective, only 20 kilometres from Basel.

The beautiful blossom is present in other regions of Switserland as well, for example, in Seeland, the Berner Mittelland, Tessin, Aargau, Thurgau, the Appenzeller and St. Gallen.

With the Nature and Landscape programme (Programm Natur und Landschaft), the Canton of Solothurn supports preserving and improving the fruit tree landscape in the Jura Mountains.

Between the hamlet of Stollenhäuser and the farm Schönmatt near the village of Gempen, there are more than 1,200 standard fruit trees. Most of them are cherry trees, some 150 years old or older.

Until the middle of the 20th century, this regi in the northwest of Switzerland had many more fruit tree areas. However, for various reasons, their number has declined sharply.

These trees enrich the landscape in all seasons because of their shape(s), the fruit, the bees and especially when they bloom.

The landscape, fruit trees, meadows and adjacent forests are also the habitat of a diverse animal world with the Alps in the background.

(Source: www.solothurn.ch).