Harthwald
The Harthwald (also the "Harth", "Hardt" or the "Hardtwald", French Forêt de la Harth or Forêt de la Hardt ) is a largely contiguous forest area in the southeastern Alsatian Upper Rhine Plain between Mulhouse and the Rhine . The forest area, which originally stretched its entire length between Basel and Neuf-Brisach , ends today in the north approximately at the level of Roggenhouse , in the south in the area of Bartenheim . The area has a size of 13,040 ha and an extension of about 45 km in length in north-south direction and about 7.5 km in width in east-west direction. In 2005 it was declared a Zone de Protection speciale (ZPS - special protection area) within the EU project Natura 2000 .
East to the Rhine is today a few kilometers of Aue corn grown so that the forest area of agriculture here had to give way. However, numerous district names still point to the originally larger extent of the area, such as the Canal de la Harth , an irrigation canal leading south from Neuf-Brisach , the smaller Hardtwald east of it, which has remained as a remainder, or the Hardtfeld, which is used for agricultural purposes today.
The Harthwald is crossed by numerous roads, so by the French motorways A35 ( E 25 / E 60 ) and A36 ( E 54 ), the department of road D 39, the rail lines Mullheim - Mulhouse and Basel - Mulhouse , two branches of the Canal du Rhône au Rhin and several back roads.
The Harthwald was originally a hunting ground for the upper classes of Mulhouse and Neuf-Brisach. This is indicated by the long access aisles, some place names (“salt lick” for attracting animals, “castle path” with a view to the west) and the numerous hunting lodges . The forest area forbidden for the farmers to be deforested was cleverly chosen at the agriculturally most unfavorable place in Alsace: coarse gravel in the subsoil without loess layer dominates the area. The Rhine brought the end of the Würm large amounts of gravel with, of which at least the worst on were far transported away from the Alpine glaciers. As a result, they settled in the Upper Rhine Graben, becoming finer towards the north, and have made agriculture difficult to this day where it is practiced despite the circumstances. Artificially irrigated maize fields dominate the landscape north of the Harthwald, which in the last few decades cut into the Harthwald to the south, depending on the technical progress in irrigation systems. However, today's core area has been spared so far.