Xeric, thermophile grasslands of middle European calcareous rock cracks, mostly dominated by the strong tufts of the glaucous Festuca pallens and F. pannonica and of the green Sesleria albicans, and with Dianthus gratianopolitanus, Melica ciliata, Aster alpinus, Artemisia campestris ssp. lednicensis, Hieracium spp., Biscutella laevigata ssp. varia, Teucrium botrys, Allium strictum, locally distributed in the Rhenish Schist Massif, the Pfälzerwald, the Rhine-Nahe-Mainz valleys, the Rhön, the Harz and its periphery, the Black Forest foothills, the French, Swabian and Franconian Juras. The communities of the Festucion pallescentis often occupy isolated stations and include rare or relictual species which impart to many of them a distinctive biogeographical and physiognomic individuality. In particular, rare and highly disjunct western outposts occur in the Meuse basin of the Belgian and French Ardennes, harbouring, among others, very isolated populations of Draba aizoides var. montana, Artemisia alba ssp. saxatilis and Hieracium vogesiacum.