Kandergrund

Kandergrund is a municipality in the Frutigen-Niedersimmental administrative district in the canton of Bern in Switzerland. The area may have been lightly inhabited during the Bronze Age, however the earliest documented settlement was around the Castle (now ruins) Felsenburg. Kandergrund, together with Kandersteg, is first mentioned in 1352 as der Kandergrund. During the Middle Ages, Kandergrund was politically and religiously part of Frutigen. In 1850, it was separated and became an independent municipality, consisting of Ausserrüteni, Innerrüteni, Kandergrund, Mitholz, Kandersteg and Gastern. In 1850 a church was built in Bunderbach, and ten years later that church became the parish church of Kandergrund parish. In 1909 Kandersteg separated from Kandergrund. The population grew dramatically during construction of the Lötschberg Tunnel and the Lötschberg railway line between 1906 and 1913. Kandergrund has an area of . Of this area, or 32.8% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 36.9% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 4.3% is settled (buildings or roads), or 0.8% is either rivers or lakes and or 25.2% is unproductive land. Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 1.0% and transportation infrastructure made up 1.8%. Power and water infrastructure as well as other special developed areas made up 1.2% of the area Out of the forested land, 32.4% of the total land area is heavily forested and 3.3% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 10.9% is pastures and 21.9% is used for alpine pastures. All the water in the municipality is flowing water. Of the unproductive areas, 11.1% is unproductive vegetation and 14.1% is too rocky for vegetation. The municipality is located in the upper Kander river valley. It consists of the Bäuerten of Ausser Kandergrund, Inner-Kandergrund, Bunderbach, Mitholz, Reckental and Rüti. On 31 December 2009 Amtsbezirk Frutigen, the municipality's former district, was dissolved. On the following day, 1 January 2010, it joined the newly created Verwaltungskreis Frutigen-Niedersimmental.