Paper short abstract:

Litter-raking stands as unique cultural landscape emerged as the result of the entanglement of humans, livestock, bracken and soils. Following “the arts of noticing” (Tsing 2015), this paper focuses specifically on the bracken as a somewhat controversial plant and its multispecies relationality.

Paper long abstract:

This paper examines a specific cultural landscape, known as litter-raking stands, which has emerged as the result of the entanglement of human activities related to subsistence land cultivation, grazing animals, plants seeking suitable habitats in their circle of reproduction, and the composition of the soil itself. Litter-raking stands consisting of scarcely grown silver birch trees with undergrowth comprising mostly common bracken are unique to the Bela Krajina region of Slovenia. They gave the landscape such a special appearance that, according to one explanation, the region even got its name from the white trunks of birches. Calling for attention to a “more-than-human sociality” (Tsing 2013), I have acknowledged the agentive, co-constitutive role of humans, livestock and bracken inhabiting the litter-raking stands, as well as the role of soils and topography in shaping and maintaining these patches of land as specific ecosystems with great biodiversity. With the abandonment of animal husbandry and litter-raking practice since the 1970s, the overgrowing has occurred with gradual succession of oak and common hornbeam woodlands. Yet evidence shows that litter-collecting stands that are still maintained have greater biodiversity than successive phases. Following “the arts of noticing” (Tsing 2015), this paper focuses on bracken and its multispecies relationality in the history of litter-raking stands. Bracken is a somewhat controversial plant worldwide, often considered a weed and an aggressive colonizer that rapidly invades abandoned areas and causes habitat loss and alteration of soil properties. What can we learn from its multispecies history in litter-raking stands?