6. Morphometry and Land Use on High Mountains in the Republic of Macedonia

In this chapter, basic morphometric (geomorphometric) characteristics and their influence on the land use of high mountains in the Republic of Macedonia are presented. Morphometric elements are computed from specially prepared 15-m DEM of the Republic of Macedonia instead of the 3″SRTM DEM (v4; Jarvis et al., 2008) model used in a previous edition. Special attention is given to hypsometry, slopes, and aspects that are characteristic for each mountain. Land use is calculated from Corine Land Cover (this time, CLC2006) data and the appropriate raster map with 100-m resolution, according to the CLC land cover categorization. Land use patterns on the high mountains are analyzed in respect to hypsometry, slopes, and aspects, finding large differences in all these elements. Some of these differences are the result of anthropogenic influences and human impact on the landscape, which is also highly influenced by topography. That fact must be taken into account considering the sustainable development of mountain areas, especially with regard to accelerated erosion and overall landscape degradation.