Günther Reichelt

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Günther Reichelt (born October 26, 1926 in Schladen ) is a German biologist, geographer and conservationist.

Youth and professional career

Reichelt attended the elementary school in Schladen from 1933 to 1939 and from 1939 the German high school in Wolfenbüttel . In 1941 Reichelt was drafted into the Flieger-HJ , from 1943 he was an air force helper in Braunschweig and from summer 1944 a soldier on the Western Front , where he was captured by the Americans in 1945.

In 1946 he passed the admission test for former combatants and studied biology, chemistry and geography at the University of Göttingen from 1946 to 1951 , where he worked in a research group of Franz Firbas , then at the University of Freiburg . In 1951 he passed the first state examination, he summarized the results of his field investigations in a work entitled "The vegetation of the Bollsee area near Stolzenau and its development history ".

After a brief employment with Reinhold Tüxen in Stolzenau at the Federal Institute for Vegetation Mapping , Reichelt was a research assistant for plant sociology and experimental ecology at the State Research Institute for High Altitude Agriculture in Donaueschingen from 1951 to 1954 .

From 1954 to 1964 he was a trainee lawyer, study assessor and from 1959 a teacher in Donaueschingen, Freiburg, Baden-Baden and Villingen . In 1960 he was at the University of Freiburg in Nicholas Creutzburg with a dissertation on quaternary deposits in the Hotzenwald Dr. rer. nat. PhD.

From 1964 until his retirement in 1988, Reichelt was head of the specialist seminar for biology as a high school professor and from 1970 as a professor at the state seminar in Rottweil .

In 1972, Reichelt formed a private curriculum committee with Ernst Waldemar Bauer and others, which developed new curricula for biology teaching in general schools, which later became binding. From 1978 to 1983 Reichelt was also a lecturer for ecological principles of environmental protection at the Furtwangen University of Applied Sciences .

Scientific Research

Reichelt has scientifically dealt with various aspects of the geosciences and ecology. Among other things, he worked on the ice age glaciation of the southern Black Forest , the methods of which he later applied to investigations on the same subject with Fritz Fezer in the northern Black Forest, the Harz and Thuringian forests . His method of rounding degree analysis was used by other researchers in Scandinavia, Japan, the Sahara, the Namib, the Antarctic and in New Zealand; it is now considered the standard method of morphometry .

At the beginning of the 1960s, Reichelt edited on behalf of the Federal Institute for Regional Studies , Remagen , the Freiburg newspaper (1: 200000) for the manual of the natural spatial structure of Germany , in which he summarized the units primarily based on ecological ( vegetation ), geomorphological and climatological criteria tried which were later taken over by several editors.

After Reichelt had scientifically dealt with the effects of the microclimate on irrigated low mountain meadows and with late frost damage in grassland as early as 1955 , he worked on climatological aspects and their effects on forest vegetation in the Baar area around 1960 . He was able to show that the silvicultural problems at that time with the establishment of red beech stocks are less due to the original climatic conditions, but are "homemade". Because the bare slopes of the Baar act as “cooling surfaces” for the cold air flowing out, the young beeches are damaged by late frosts. This situation was created by deforestation in the Middle Ages, when originally deciduous trees, particularly the common beech, had dominated the forests in this area.

Reichelt's investigations into " forest dieback ", which he undertook between 1981 and 1986, met with national interest . In the mapping that Reichelt and his colleagues initially carried out in the Schwarzwald-Baar-Heuberg region and later extended to southern Germany and eastern France, damage levels on trees were mapped on test quadrants of the same size and then in the form of so-called "isomals", i.e. lines of equal damage height, evaluated. At that time, Reichelt received mainly support from the scientific guild for his comparatively simple method.

However, Reichelt received violent opposition when, while evaluating the data, he came across a correlation between the damage findings and the locations of nuclear power plants , for example in the vicinity of the nuclear power plants in Obrigheim , Beznau in Switzerland or Brennilis in Brittany . In order to support his theses, Reichelt extended his mappings to areas with uranium ore deposits, such as the Black Forest ( Wittichen ) and six locations in the Fichtel Mountains . While he found advocates in the Tübingen full professor of plant physiology, Helmut Metzner , the forest botanist Peter Schütt and the physicist Inge Schmitz-Feuerhake , professors at the University of Freiburg such as Hans Mohr , Arno Bogenrieder and Günther Osche vehemently opposed his interpretations. His theses were vehemently rejected by a large part of the scientific community and are hardly discussed any more today.

natural reserve

Reichelt became involved in nature conservation early on and was the district commissioner for nature conservation and landscape management in the Villingen district from 1959 to 1970 . He was also significantly involved in building up private nature conservation in Baden-Württemberg. In 1971 he founded the “ Working Group for the Protection of the Black Forest-Baar-Heuberg ”, which, together with the “ Action for Freiburg Environmental Protection ” and the “ Working Group for Lake Constance Nature Conservation ” under the direction of Gerhard Thielcke, is one of the three roots of the “Bund Natur- und Umwelt- Umwelt- Baden-Württemberg ”, which became the state association of the BUND .

Günther Reichelt has made particular contributions to the establishment of the umbrella organization for nature conservation associations in Baden-Württemberg. In 1976, the year the association was recognized as the Baden-Württemberg State Nature Conservation Association, he was elected as deputy and in 1983 as first chairman. In his term of office until 1991, he shaped the LNV into a respected mouthpiece for the interests of nature and the environment in public and politics, despite the competing interests of the member associations and their claim to independence from the umbrella organization.

Functions

  • 1964–1978: Chairman of the Natural History Department in the Association for History and Natural History of the Baar
  • 1964–2005 Editor of the "Schriften der Baar"
  • 1971–1989: Chairman of the "Working Group on Environmental Protection Schwarzwald-Baar-Heuberg"
  • 1976–1985: Deputy Chairman of the BUND regional association in Baden-Württemberg
  • 1982–1991: Chairman of the Baden-Württemberg State Nature Conservation Association ; previously from 1976 executive chairman
  • Member of the state advisory boards for nature and environmental protection of the state government of Baden-Württemberg
  • Member of the board of trustees of the "Foundation for Nature Conservation Fund" Baden-Württemberg
  • 1983: Member of the state government's "Research Group on Forest Dying"
  • 1984–1993: Member of the environmental advisory board of the Evangelical Church in Baden
  • 1990: Member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the European Academy for Environmental Issues

Honors

Publications

(Selection)

  • Quaternary phenomena in the Hotzenwald between Wehra and Alb. Ber. Naturf. Ges. Freiburg. 1960
  • Geographical land survey: The natural spatial units on sheet 185 Freiburg i. Br. Federal Institute for Regional Studies, Bad Godesberg 1964. →  Online map (PDF; 3.7 MB)
  • The Baar . Villingen-Schwenningen: Neckar-Verlag, 1972
  • Vegetation geography . with Otti Wilmanns . Braunschweig: Westermann, 1973
  • Roots of the environmental crisis - ethical considerations for environmental protection . Stuttgart: Landesnaturschutzverb., 1979
  • How sick is our forest? Freiburg: BUND-Verlagsges., 1983
  • The dying forest in southwest Germany and eastern France . Freiburg: BUND-Verlagsges., 1984
  • Forest damage from radioactivity? Karlsruhe: CF Müller, 1985
  • Let the Rhine live! Düsseldorf: Girardet, 1986
  • Where the Danube and Neckar originate: the Baar . Donaueschingen: Mory, 1990
  • Picturesque Baar . Constance: Stadler, 1991
  • Be awake for tomorrow . Stuttgart: Theiss, 1992
  • The Baar 1945 to 1995 . - Villingen-Schwenningen: Kuhn, 1995
  • Habitat earth . With Helmut Metzner . - Stuttgart: Hirzel, 1997
  • Baar walks . Donaueschingen: Association for History and Natural History of the Baar, 2004
  • Stony landscapes. My scientific field . 88 pages, Moog-Druck, Donaueschingen 2006
  • Beard days . Donaueschingen: Mory, 2008

literature

  • Birgit Tilgner: Exceptional commitment for the Baar: Prof. Dr. Günther Reichelt and his love for geology, nature, history and art. Almanac Schwarzwald-Baar-Kreis 22: 137-139. 1998.
  • Bärbel Häcker: 50 years of nature conservation history in Baden-Württemberg . 305 pages, Ulmer, Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-8001-4472-7 .
  • Susanne Huber-Wintermantel: Laudation for Prof. Dr. Günther Reichelt on the award of honorary membership in March 2005 Writings of the Association for History and Natural History of Baar 49: 31-33. 2006.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Reichelt, Günther
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German biologist, geographer and conservationist
DATE OF BIRTH October 26, 1926
PLACE OF BIRTH Schladen