Field and methods course Slovenia 2024/2025

At the borders of Italy, Austria, Hungary and Croatia, Slovenia is a small country shaped by multiple land use drivers. This includes impacts from climate change and increasing climate extremes, karst soils with little water retention potentials, diverse cultural practices from neighboring countries, and general trends causing land use intensification, dis-intensification, afforestation and urbanization.

We propose an integrated geography/geoinformatics field course where students work on projects related to changes in land use, climate extremes, and water resources, and try to attribute these changes to one or more of the above factors. We target both students from both human and physical geography with an interest in improving GIS and remote sensing skills for land-use studies, and students from geoinformatics with interest in acquiring qualitative and quantitative social science skills relevant for assessing climate change mitigation and adaptation practises.

The course will teach students a variety of methods, and ways to integrate these methods for a geography/geoinformatics research project. The methods include remote sensing, field observations and ground truth sampling strategies, surveys, and interviews. The students will be trained in observing and responding to cultural differences between Eastern and Western Slovenia when doing interviews.

Teachers: Martin Rudbeck Jepsen & Stéphanie Horion & Thomas Friborg/Andreas Westergaard-Nielsen

1. Ideas for topics:
• How vulnerable is Slovenian land use to climate change and extremes?
• Are there regional/sectoral differences?
• How do local farmers respond to climate extremes?
• What are the differences between land use systems, and between East/West Slovenia?
• Are current crops and management practice adapted to changes in the climate?
• Focus on land use and extreme weather events (drought, extreme precipitation and storms)
• Which kinds of climate risks and impacts occur and are expected to increase in frequency?
• How can we map climate extremes and their impacts on land use and ecosystems?
• How to assess impact of climate disasters on the land-use sector?
• How does land-use impact the local hydrological cycle and climate?

2. Methods
• Mapping land-use and land-use change (remote sensing and qualitative methods)
• Mapping and monitoring climate extremes (drought, extreme precipitation and storms) (remote sensing and time series analysis)
• Mapping and assessing impact (remote sensing and qualitative methods)
• Identifying and assessing strategies for land-use adaptation from farm to national level (qualitative methods, farmer interviews on adaptation strategies, public authorities’ adaptation plans)
• Measure climate and hydrological gradients and local effects of land use
• Evaluating impact on growing condition of local climate / regional differences.
• Measure land-use effects on C cycles and vegetation productivity in the landscape

3. Theoretical framework The IPCC vulnerability definition. Vulnerability = (exposure, sensitivity, adaptation). Resilience theory - do systems bounce back (at a new quasi-steady state) or are they transformed? Robustness: Can systems withstand impacts or are they shifted? If they shift, how long does it take for them to bounce back? During the preparation block, students will have the opportunities to meet and listen to key experts in land-use, climate change adaptation in Slovenia.

4. Field work Multiple sites / regions in Slovenia will be visited to provide a comprehensive overview of the regional differences in land-use. Mode of transportation: train or mini-buses
Preliminary planning: Day 1: Departure from Copenhagen Day 2: Arrival in Ljubljana, visit to University Days 3-6: Field site in Eastern Slovenia Days 7-10: Field site in Western Slovenia Day 11: Departure for Copenhagen Day 12: Arrival in Copenhagen

5. Project work Each project will be carried out by a group (2-4 students) and should bring together methods from geoinformatics (quantitative methods e.g., field techniques, GIS remote sensing, time series analysis), land use science (land use system analysis, qualitative methods, farmer interviews on adaptation strategies, public authorities adaptation plans), and physical geography. Ideally, after field work all groups combine their findings into a comprehensive, standardized report.

6. Course planning Block 3 (2025): theory (preparation to field work) Field work: mid-April during skemafri uge Block 4 (2025): processing data, writing report, exam Priority will be given to students enrolled in the MSc Geography/Geoinformatics program.