Main-Taunus Arboretum
The Arboretum Main rope is about 76 ha large park on surfaces of the communities Sulzbach (51 ha), Schwalbach am Taunus (23 ha) and Eschborn (2 ha).
Between 1937 and 1945, was the 185-hectare site airbase of the German Luftwaffe . After the war, it served the Americans as an airfield until Frankfurt Airport was reopened. After that, the area became the property of the Federal Republic of Germany and was used by the German Federal Post Office and the Technical Relief Organization. In 1981 the state of Hesse acquired the freely accessible 76 hectares in order to plant them as replacement afforestation for the expansion of Frankfurt Airport .
In the Arboretum about 600 different growing tree and - shrub species . While tree parks usually consist of a collection of individual trees - with name tags and designation of origin - the state of Hesse has taken a different approach with the arboretum.
Different forest areas of the earth are shown, each represented by a group of trees and bushes, as they occur in nature. Between each of the 36 small “forests” there are orchards and flower meadows , a nature trail for rocks and one for native trees, as well as a wet biotope that is completely ingrown to protect it. A Sulzbach farmer cultivates near-natural arable land and meadows in the arboretum and an organic beekeeper has set up beehives. The diversity of the tree park comes into its own in the forest area "Southern Europe". There are 63 different tree and shrub species on just under half a hectare. 17 different oak species are represented in the park.
In the arboretum there are not only specimens of the most massive tree in the world, the (North American mammoth ), but also the tree species with the highest life expectancy (the awn pine ). However, you are still young. The "hedgehog" under the trees, the prickly Chilean araucaria , is represented by three specimens in the arboretum. They are the only trees in the park originally native to the southern hemisphere. Only those forest communities were selected for planting that can adapt to the climatic conditions of the Main-Taunus foreland, for example tolerate an average annual temperature of 9 degrees Celsius and annual rainfall of around 650 millimeters and are also frost-resistant.
The Königstein Forestry Office, which is responsible for the arboretum, is aiming for three goals in the medium term: First, the park should be a showpiece for dendrologists , i.e. it should serve arborists scientists. Second, in the interests of nature, the park is to form an area of networked structures made up of forest, near-natural agriculture (11 hectares of arable land, 15 hectares of meadows) and areas for nature conservation. In third place is the recovery of the population. The arboretum now fulfills the function of a popular recreational area , as dogs are allowed as well as cycling and riding on marked trails.
Peace tree
Former aircraft hangar
Part of the educational rock trail
Orchard meadow with nesting wall for insects
literature
- Hessian Ministry of Agriculture, Forests and Nature Conservation: Arboretum Eschborn - A forest park landscape , Wiesbaden 1989, ISBN 3-89051-085-X .
Web links
Coordinates: 50 ° 8 ′ 8 ″ N , 8 ° 32 ′ 59 ″ E