Hutweide
The expression Hutweide (also Hutung or Magerweide ), which was often used in the past, refers to a larger agricultural area on which pets are or were herded to pasture under the supervision of a shepherd or older child .
The name is hardly used in some regions today, but lives on as a term for land use ( e.g. in surveying as a defined cultural genre) and in countless field names . Examples of the latter are Hutweide, Hiataweid ', Hutleiten, Hutwald, Hutgraben . When regulated livestock farming established itself in Europe , the hut pasture was not only used for foraging (pasture, crops) for sheep, horses, cattle or goats, but also for soil fertilization and the slow clearing of overly dense forests.
The last-mentioned aspect - as a so-called herding forest - was partly also the preparation for later reclamation of forest areas. Because a wood that grazing cattle searched for grasses and fruits developed into a lighter forest with little undergrowth and better growing conditions for grasses and sometimes herbaceous plants .
The pastures were later demarcated to secure grazing rights and to reduce the need for personnel. Today the Hutweide is experiencing a regional renaissance, on the one hand on alpine pastures (mountain pastures), on the other hand for purposes of nature protection (preservation of rural areas) and through the revival of the shepherds . The pasture is technically facilitated by traditional flexible pasture fences (bark hunter fence, etc.) and in the last few decades by electric fences , which today are mostly set up with cable reels and field-compatible batteries (i.e. without a mains connection).