Rosenhofer ponds

Upper (large) Rosenhoferteich

The two Rosenhofer ponds (Oberer and Unterer) are located approx. 18 km northeast of Freistadt in the municipality of Sandl and belong to the Czernin-Kinsky family. The artificial lakes belong to Rosenhof Castle . Both ponds are approx. 600 meters long and approx. 300 meters wide. The smaller (lower) one is a public bathing lake, while the upper one is not open to the public.

Both ponds have excellent water quality and are home to rare plants such as the marsh hairline and waterfowl such as the cormorant .

The Flammbach flows through the ponds and flows into the Schwarze Aist . This in turn leads over the Waldaist into the Aist and thus into the Danube .

Flood of wood

The Rosenhofer ponds were built primarily to have enough water for the wood flood. The Fürstlich Schwarzenberg forest engineer Joseph Rosenauer , builder of the Schwarzenberg canal , also planned and built the wood floodplain on the Aist. Its length was almost 80 kilometers, the gradient 650 meters; 50 weirs were on the route.

In the 19th and 20th centuries, a lot of wood was dug over the Flammbach, the Schwarze Aist and the Waldaist into the Aist every spring , where the trunks were then tied into large rafts in Au on the Danube and brought to Vienna. Another major customer was the paper and cardboard factory DJ Merckens in Josefstal (Aisttal above Schwertberg ), at that time the largest paper factory in the monarchy and even in Europe . It was not until 1947 that the labor-intensive and dangerous wood washing was stopped - it was now possible to transport the logs more cheaply by truck and train .

Coordinates: 48 ° 33 ′ 57 ″  N , 14 ° 40 ′ 35 ″  E