Research gaps in understanding flood changes at the catchment scale caused by changes in forest management, agricultural practices, artificial drainage, and terracing are identified. Potential strategies in addressing these gaps are proposed, such as complex systems approaches to link processes across time scales, long‐term experiments on physical‐chemical‐biological process interactions, and a focus on connectivity and patterns across spatial scales. It is suggested that these strategies will stimulate new research that coherently addresses the issues across hydrology, soil and agricultural sciences, forest engineering, forest ecology, and geomorphology.

Although the ecosystem services provided by mountain grasslands have been demonstrated to be highly vulnerable to environmental and management changes in the past, it remains unclear how they will be affected in the face of a combination of further land-use/cover changes and accelerating climate change. Moreover, the resilience of ecosystem services has not been sufficiently analysed under future scenarios. This study aimed to assess future impacts on multiple mountain grassland ecosystem services and their resilience. For a study area in the Central Alps (Stubai Valley, Austria), six ecosystem services were quantified using plant trait-based models for current and future conditions (in 2050 and 2100) considering three socio-economic scenarios. Under all scenarios, the greatest changes in ecosystem services were related to the natural reforestation of abandoned grassland, causing a shift from grassland to forest services. Although the high resilience potential of most ecosystem services will be maintained in the future, climate change seems to have negative impacts, especially on the resilience of forage production. Thus, decision makers and farmers will be faced with the higher vulnerability of ecosystem services of mountain grassland. Future policies should consider both socio-economic and environmental dynamics to manage valuable ecosystem services.

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In mountain areas, land surface temperature (LST) is a key parameter in the surface energy budget and is controlled by a complex interplay of topography, incoming radiation and atmospheric processes, as well as soil moisture distribution, different land covers and vegetation types. In this contribution, the LST spatial distribution of the Stubai Valley in the Austrian Alps is simulated by the ecohydrological model GEOtop. This simulation is compared with ground observations and a Landsat image in order to assess the capacity of the model to represent land surface interactions in complex terrain, as well as to evaluate the relative importance of different environmental factors. The model describes the energy and mass exchanges between soil, vegetation and atmosphere. It takes account of land cover, soil moisture and the implications of topography on air temperature and solar radiation. The GEOtop model is able to reproduce the spatial patterns of the LST distribution estimated from remote sensing, with a correlation coefficient of 0Ð88 and minimal calibration of the model parameters. Results show that, for the humid climate considered in this study, the major factors controlling LST spatial distribution are incoming solar radiation and land cover variability. Along mountain ridges and south-exposed steep slopes, soil moisture distribution has only a minor effect on LST. North-and south-facing slopes reveal a distinct thermal behaviour. In fact, LST appears to follow the air temperature vertical gradient along north-facing slopes, while along south-facing slopes, the LST vertical gradient is strongly modified by land cover type. Both Landsat observations and model simulations confirm field evidence of strong warming of alpine low vegetation during sunny days and indicate that these effects have an impact at a regional scale. Our results indicate that in order to simulate LST in mountain environments using a spatially distributed hydrological model, a key factor is the capacity to explicitly simulate the effects of complex topography on the surface energy exchange processes.

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In mountain regions, ecosystem services provision is strongly linked to land use, topography and climate, where impacts can be expected under global change. For our study site in the Austrian Alps, we examined the relationship between agricultural activities and multiple ecosystem services on landscape scale from past to future. Modelling of future land-use patterns was based on stakeholder workshops considering different socio-economic and climate scenarios. In the past, land-use intensity was reduced resulting in less forage provision but better regulating services. Future scenarios predict contrasting developments; under conditions of global change, farmers shift the focus of their activities towards tourism, but in times of global economic crisis farming becomes more important again. Developing the local economy facilitates new markets for agricultural products, but projected drought periods will cause an abandonment of farmland. While forest regeneration is valuable for regulating services, it reduces the aesthetic value. Both regulating and cultural services decrease when forage provision is optimized. To ensure multiple ecosystem service provision, agricultural management should be related to ecosystem services and included into land-use policies and agricultural incentives.

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