The Grottos and the Karst Phenomena of Monte Generoso

A karst region is characterised by the solubility in water of the rock that it is made up of (predominantly limestone). The moulding of the surfaces by the water, the erosion and the presence of grottos, distinguish the karst areas. The surfaces seem tormented, the rock decayed, the phenomena of erosion is imposing.
The Monte Generoso is a karst massif, made up predominantly of limestone flints of the Inferior Lias. Because of the irregular flinty nature of these limestones, the superficial karst phenomena are relatively discreet and irregularly distributed. The deep phenomena are, however, well developed and very old and to a great extent, still unknown.

Surface Karst Phenomena

The ploughed fields
Are furrows in the rock due to the chemical dissolution (“corrosion”). The most representative examples are to be found in the limestone of “biancone” (majolica) beneath the “Alp of Mendrisio” and above the road that leads to Cragno.

The natural arches
Are rock arches produced by erosion. A splendid example is to be found in the vicinity of a grotto that is some distance away, the “Böcc dal Daldin”, that opens like a terrace in a picturesque natural setting, in the vertiginous cliffs above Melano.

The karst valleys
Are valleys that are excavated like gullies and deep canyons, where the water often infiltrates the sub-soil. At times they originate from karst springs. On the massif of the Generoso there are a considerable number of karst valleys. Numerous grottos open up in the karst valleys, such as the “Buco dell”Alabastro”, between the Val dei “Cugnoli” and the “Sistema Immacolata”, the main karst system explored to date on Monte Generoso, in the upper Valley of the Breggia.

The swallower-holes (losses)
Are points where the waters are absorbed and disappear into the earth. On the Monte Generoso, the most spectacular losses are to be found in the upper Valley of the Breggia and in the Valley “dell’Alpe”, above Somazzo. Some of them are penetrable and are the mouths of vast, deep grottos such as the “Sistema Nevera”, one of the deepest abysses discovered to-date on the mountain, whose origin is a series of swallow-holes that are still active.

Deep karst phenomena

Karst springs
Operate the hypogeal karst network.
The water that has penetrated within the mountain, runs along a succession of completely unknown grottos and tunnels, and eventually comes back out into the light as the main karst springs. At the foot of Monte Generoso can be found the “Cà del Feree” and the “Sorgente Bossi” in Arogno, the “Buco della Sovaglia” in Rovio and the “Sorgenti del Paolaccio” in Mendrisio.

The grottos
In recent years only we are discovering that in the bowels of Monte Generoso there exists an intricate system of tunnels, salt, galleries and wells that have only partly been explored and that together constitute not only grottos, but an actual subterranean world.
To-date we know 73 grottos on Monte Generoso.