In mid-January 2025, a substantial new publication ‘Vegetationsgeschichte der Landschaften in Deutschland’ / Vegetation History of Landscapes in Germany’ was published by Springer. Unofficially, the book is referred to as ‘Firbas2’ in recognition of the last major comparable synthesis entitled ‘Spät- und nacheiszeitliche Waldgeschichte Mitteleuropas nördlich der Alpen’, vols 1 and 2, by Franz Firbas (1949, 1952; Gustav Fischer, Jena).

The new publication, plans for which were initiated in 2010, has involved 65 authors from various parts of Germany and beyond. The publication has been overseen by six editors, three of whom have spent substantial periods researching in the Palaeoenvironmental Research Unit (PRU), University of Galway (UoG). The lead editor, Dr Ingo Feeser (CAU, Kiel University), gained a PhD at UoG (2009) for his research into the vegetation history of the Burren. Dr Steffen Wolters (Lower Saxony Institute for Historical Coastal Research, Wilhelmshaven [WHV]) obtained an MSc for his palaeoecological research in Dingle (1996), and Dr Walter Dörfler (CAU, Kiel University) carried out research in the Burren (1993/94) as well as participating in several lake-coring campaigns in western Ireland in later years. Professor Arne Friedmann (Geography, Augsburg University), who makes substantial contributions to the volume, spent a sabbatical at the PRU in 2000/01. Financial support towards the above research was provided by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (Bonn), as well as by UoG and Irish research funding bodies.

A further Galway connection with this new publication is the inclusion of research carried out by me, as a Humboldt Fellow, at a once-extensive bog, Spolsener Moor, near Wilhelmshaven, N. Germany, while on sabbatical from UoG at WHV in 1982/83. I am also pleased to see that a photo of mine, taken during a ‘Moorexkursion’ fieldtrip (8/09/2014), of Przewalski horses (wild horses) at the paläon Forschungsmuseum, Schöningen, N. Germany, is reproduced on p. 429 as a frontpiece to Section VIII. [For more information]