Game reserve

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Fallow deer enclosure in Schmallenberg

Game enclosures are fenced-in areas on which otherwise wild animals , which are usually subject to hunting rights, are kept permanently. Today they often have a tourist and gastronomic function, and more rarely that of the conservation of endangered wild and domestic animals , whereby species-appropriate keeping should be guaranteed. Game enclosures, with the exception of the game gates, can be declared pacified areas . There are no game reserves in Switzerland.

species

  • Hunting enclosure or gate for keeping and using hoofed game in the size of at least one own hunting district .
  • The wildlife park is a large hunting reserve and must be officially recognized.
  • Show and special enclosures: The smallest form of game enclosure is not subject to hunting law. One such game reserve is, for example, the Ice Age game reserve Neandertal .
  • Game and fur farm: enclosure for meat and fur production. As far as game is kept in it, it is not subject to hunting law, but to agricultural game keeping.

Other game enclosures are reintroduction enclosures for species conservation , acclimatization gates, protection gates and winter gates .

history

Drawing of a game reserve, 15th century

The first game enclosures were built in the last century BC in the Italian and Gallic parts of the Roman Empire . There is evidence of Charlemagne's document from 812, which refers to the maintenance of a game reserve and its limits.

Great Britain

They have been recorded in the British Isles since the early Middle Ages , and some of them are listed in the Domesday Book . In the two centuries after the Norman conquest in 1066, their numbers increased dramatically, to about 3,000 (with an average size of 40 hectares) in England, around 50 in Wales and 80 in Scotland. These medieval enclosures, which were used for wood and food production as well as for hunting, included not only forest areas, but also lakes, meadows, open heathland or other uncultivated areas. They were usually on the edge of the owner's possession. One of the largest was one near Woodstock with a diameter of eleven kilometers.

A slow decline began from the 13th century. Their maintenance, especially the fencing, but also the keeping were considered too expensive, and their owners' prolonged absence led to mismanagement. The use of wood also increasingly came to the fore or it was cleared and then used for agriculture. Of the rest, quite a few were incorporated into the landscape gardens that emerged from the 18th century .

literature

Web links

Wiktionary: Game reserve  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Haseder p. 916