Lüneburg Heath Nature Reserve

	Lüneburg Heath Nature Reserve IUCN Category IV - Habitat / Species Management Area
	Heath in the nature reserve near Niederhaverbeck
location	Between Schneverdingen , Bispingen , Egestorf , Hanstedt and Handeloh in the Lower Saxon counties Heidekreis and Harburg
surface	23,436.9 ha
Identifier	NSG LÜ 002
WDPA ID	102317
FFH area	23,147.5 ha
Bird sanctuary	23,213.6 ha
Geographical location	53 ° 10 ' N , 9 ° 56' E Coordinates: 53 ° 10 '7 " N , 9 ° 56' 23" E
Sea level	from 62 m to 169 m
Setup date	01/12/1922
administration	NLWKN
particularities	Largest and oldest nature reserve in Lower Saxony, highest elevation Wilseder Berg , overlay with the natural forests Ehrhorn Dunes (71.1 ha), Meninger Holz (68.3 ha) and Bullenberge (83.9 ha)

The Lüneburg Heath nature reserve is one of the oldest and largest nature reserves in Germany and the oldest and largest nature reserve in Lower Saxony . On December 29, 1921, an area of the Lüneburg Heath of four square miles was declared a nature reserve by the Prussian government for the first time; on January 12, 1922, the Protection Ordinance came into force. The current ordinance of the Lüneburg district government "on the nature reserve 'Lüneburger Heide' in the districts of Harburg and Soltau-Fallingbostel " dates from June 17, 1993 (last amended by an ordinance of July 11, 2002).

The area of the area, also known as the Lüneburg Heath Nature Reserve, was identical to it before the Lüneburg Heath Nature Park was expanded in 2007 .

Area description

The nature reserve is located in the north of the Lüneburg Heath . To the north it borders on Schierhorn, a district of the municipality of Hanstedt ; it has its easternmost extension at Egestorf and further south at Bispingen . The southernmost tip is west of Deimern , and its westernmost extension is the nature reserve near Schneverdingen . The center is the Wilseder Berg , a terminal moraine at 169.2 m above sea level and the highest point in the north-west German lowlands.

Around 1900 the large heather areas were converted to forest or farmland. In 1922, 21,000 hectares were designated as a nature reserve. In 1993 the area was expanded to 23,440 ha. On February 14, 2007, the area of the nature park that was previously the same as the nature reserve was expanded to 113,000 hectares.

The districts of Heidekreis and Harburg are the lower nature conservation authorities responsible for the area.

Flora and fauna

Black Grouse ( Lyrurus tetrix or Tetrao tetrix )

In the nature reserve there are over 60% forest , 26% heather , 8.5% arable land , 3% grassland , 2% moors and 1.5% settlements, bodies of water, etc. Here there are 5,100 hectares of dry sandy heath . They are the largest contiguous remains of inland dwarf shrub heaths in Central Europe. In addition, there are large coniferous forests in the nature reserve, mainly made up of pine trees . These go back to heather reforestations from the middle of the 19th century. It also has small stocks of older deciduous forests with oak and beech . The high proportion of forests makes the Lüneburg Heath nature reserve one of the largest forest nature reserves in Germany. There are also stream valleys, moors, meadows, pastures, fields and open sand areas.

The area is of outstanding importance for the protection of biotopes and species . In September 2007, near Niederhaverbeck, municipality of Bispingen , a wolf was spotted again for the first time, probably from the Südheide Nature Park . In 2004, the entire natural area of Lüneburg Heath was home to most of the black grouse in Lower Saxony. The results of the black grouse census have shown a positive development in recent years.

Population development of the black grouse in the Lüneburg Heath NSG

year	Taps	Hens	All in all
1978	21st	12	33
1988	27	22nd	49
1998	8th	15th	23
2007	45	33	78

Sights in the nature reserve

Heidemuseum " Dat ole Huus " in Wilsede

One of the oldest open-air museums in Germany, the " Dat ole Huus ", which was moved here in 1907 , can be visited in Wilsede . In the house you can see how the "Heidjer" lived and worked around 1850. The Emhof in Wilsede , the Totengrund heathland , old heather churches in Egestorf and Undeloh , the nature information centers in Niederhaverbeck and Undeloh and the Pietzmoor near Schneverdingen are also worth seeing. In the nature reserve you can find Bronze Age barrows, historical paths, border markings, boulder walls, old sheep stables and stairwells .

In the Lüneburger Heide nature reserve, pasture with heather sheep , mechanical maintenance measures such as mowing or pesting and the controlled use of fire in the winter half-year are used to maintain the heather . These measures ensure the necessary rejuvenation of the common heather . The strong jaws -Anflug needs through regular Entkusselung be fought. In order to protect the landscape and the flora and fauna, there is a general ban on motor vehicles, with the exception of two roads crossing the area.

Initiators

The heather area "Totengrund"

The Egestorf pastor Wilhelm Bode acquired a heather area, the Totengrund , as early as 1906 . This was made possible by a donation of 6000 gold marks from the university professor Andreas Thomsen from Münster. In 1909 he founded the Naturschutzpark eV (VNP) association in Munich . He had set himself the goal of practicing nature conservation on a large scale , following the example of the American national parks . He wanted to protect the heathland in the core area of today's Lüneburg Heath Nature Park from building, afforestation or turning into arable land. In 1910 he became active in northern Germany with the purchase of the Wilseder mountain. Today the Association of Nature Conservation Park owns more than 8,200 hectares in the Lüneburg Heath, and just under 1,100 hectares are leased on a long-term basis. In January 1954, the Hamburg businessman Alfred Toepfer became chairman of the association. He had been a member of the Nature Park Association since 1927. Thanks to Toepfer's good connections in politics, business and with foreign nature conservation organizations, important projects could be implemented. In honor of its founding father Alfred Toepfer, the former North German Nature Conservation Academy (NNA) was renamed the Alfred Toepfer Academy for Nature Conservation in 1995 .

Military use

A particular problem was the military training in the south-western half of the nature reserve, which had to be accepted as a direct consequence of the war with permanent loads. From November 1950, British and Canadian troops used Reinsehlen near Schneverdingen as a base camp for tank exercises in the “Red Areas” . The Soltau-Lüneburg Agreement was signed in 1959 between the Federal Republic of Germany, Great Britain and Canada and established the boundaries of the tank training area. To the west of the Behringen- Wintermoor road , the extent of the devastation caused by allied tracked vehicles could be seen. Proposals by the Naturschutzpark eV (VNP) association to relocate tank training operations to the adjacent 102 km² military training area Munster-Nord went unheard. Instead, they continued to practice on 17 km² of the most valuable heathland. In the Lüneburg-Celle-Soltau area there was a further total of 598 km² of training area, including the Bergen training area , which could have been used. The Canadians withdrew after a short time, the British troops stayed until 1994.