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Ham and sausage need time — and at Zsankó Family Farm, they are given just that. You won’t find these flavors anywhere else.
About 10,000 years ago, rapid climate warming triggered a cascade of natural responses: torrential floods, landslides, and intense rock weathering. The landscape we walk on today was not shaped over mere centuries, but by the dramatic forces of climate and water, working together. Did you know that the Zala Valley floor is made up of sediments deposited by a kind of "river of time"? Discover how the Earth’s surface became one of the most sensitive indicators of climate change.
We often associate climate change with contemporary issues, but Earth’s climate has shifted many times throughout its history — sometimes quite rapidly. Within large-scale climatic cycles, alternating periods of warming and cooling have long been part of the planet’s natural rhythm.
A change in climate sets off a chain reaction of environmental processes. It’s not just animals and plants that respond — so does the landscape itself.
Around 10,000 years ago, as the climate warmed significantly, rainfall became more intense.
More rain meant more erosion: stormwater began washing away sediment from hills and valleys into riverbeds. The rivers, now carrying more water and more sediment, flooded more often and spread these materials across the landscape.
This had a major impact on topography: the land surface became more fragmented and dynamic. Warming temperatures also sped up chemical and physical weathering, breaking down bedrock and helping fertile soil layers to develop.
In short, natural geological processes that had long been underway suddenly accelerated — and reshaped the surface of the land.
Today, in many areas of the region, the lower slopes and valley edges are coated with sediment — debris washed down from higher ground, largely within the last 10,000–20,000 years. In the Zala Valley, for instance, these deposits have spread so far that they now reach the center of the valley floor.
The original bedrock source of these sediments varies: in Zala, it’s typically Pannonian sand (Somló Formation), while in the Keszthely Hills, marine-origin carbonates dominate — mostly dolomite, with some limestone. These sediments now appear as fine gravel, pebbles, or coarse sand, quietly recording the environmental changes of the recent past.