Zootzen (forest)

Location of the Zootzen in the state of Brandenburg

The Zootzen (also Zuzen ) is a forest area in the northwest of the state of Brandenburg .

geography

Today's Zootzen on the edge of the Havelländisches and the Rhinluchs is an almost closed forest area of more than 1,600 hectares that offers an extraordinary variety of biotopes in flora and fauna. It extends over areas of the city of Friesack (district Zootzen ) and the municipalities of Wiesenaue (district Vietznitz ) and Fehrbellin (district Lentzke ). In the western part of the Zootzen lies the 148 hectare nature reserve Friesacker Zootzen , which was set up in 1980 on the initiative of the former mayor of the municipality of Zootzen and former district forester Heinz Granda , an area of ​​the Rhinluchs interspersed with clay and loam, dominated by valley sands that influence groundwater , with bog holes and one by the old Rhin's ever changing face. The natural river course of the Old Rhin with its original bank vegetation is to be preserved. The east of the Zootzen is higher, the dunes there are further away from the groundwater. Around 53 ha form a natural forest parcel , an area that is not used for forestry but is left to its own devices.

The soil conditions of the Zootzen are characterized on the one hand by high proportions of rather nutrient-poor ( raw humus-like mold ) and nutrient-poor ( raw humus ) sites (approx. 950 ha), but also by significant proportions of nutrient-rich ( mull-like mold ) sites (approx. 300 ha).

Flora and fauna

The waters are a haven for water birds; Numerous species of duck and the kingfisher are at home here, as well as the otter , our local snake species, adder and grass snake, as well as the slow worm and the stag beetle, which have become rare in Europe .

In addition to the nightingale , the lesser spotted eagle and the stock dove , around 20 species of birds breed here. Bustards , black grouse and pheasant disappeared after the hydromelioration at the end of the last century.

The western nature reserve "Friesacker Zootzen" consists of near-natural alder and ash forests and hardwood-rich pedunculate oaks - hornbeam forests , in the higher east of the Zootzen you can find red oaks and beeches , which populate the embedded deeper depressions in clumps. The drier it gets, the more Douglas firs and later pines dominate the area. The area was predominantly dominated by the deciduous forest with its current pine proportion of only 61%, the proportion of hardwood is still significantly higher than the average Brandenburg forest. The oak with a surface area of ​​around 15% stands out in particular. There are around 20 different types of wood, such as maple , beech, ash, alder, linden , elm and birch . You can still find old and mighty oaks, some of them were still young at the time of the soldier king and are around 300 years old. The age groups of the entire tree population are not evenly distributed, however, the typical overhang of young trees in Brandenburg in age groups II (21–40 years) and III (41–60 years) can be clearly seen.

Numerous anemones , lilies of the valley , liverwort , lungwort , woodruff and other spring bloomers add color accents every spring.

history

middle Ages

The Zootzen originally extended from the area around Friesack to the Kremmener Forest and Brieselank ("Birkenlande" mentioned as Brisenlank in 1315) east of Nauen (namesake of the municipality of Brieselang ). In late Slavic times, the Zootzen separated the settlement area of ​​the Zamzizi in the Ruppiner Land from the settlement area of ​​the Heveller in the Havelland , but the forest belt was interspersed with small settlement areas at its edges . Castle walls ( Burgwall Klessener Zootzen ) and Late Bronze Age and Middle Slavic ceramics and finds of old paths and transitions from north to south in Bruner Luch (Briesener Zootzen) and in Klessener Zootzen are evidence of this. Today's Damm residential area in the Zootzen district of Friesack owes its name to one of these paths or crossings in the Luch. 1315, the city Nauen received from Margrave Woldemar the Holzungsgerechtigkeit , with the phrase "inter paludes seu mericas dictas Zuzen et Brisenlank super totum Glyn usque ad terram Bellin".

Modern

The cyclone quimburga mid November 1972 addressed to serious damage, he threw down all surfaces, to a total of 75,000 cubic meters of wood, the damage was. Mostly it was pine trees that fell victim to the hurricane, many were around 100 years old. It is said that exactly a hundred years earlier, i.e. in 1872, a hurricane also raged on the same day. Due to the low water table, the trees did not have deep roots and were easy victims of the hurricane, which simply overturned them without breaking them. The reforestation work lasted up to and including spring 1976. Today the Zootzen is characterized by large private forests, until the fall of the Berlin Wall it was managed by the state. The return of the forests is a step backwards from a forestry point of view, since the management of the small areas of 50 × 350 m is hardly possible from a forestry point of view. It is to be hoped that this unique area with its extraordinarily diverse forests will be preserved. The state forest and the “Friesacker Zootzen” nature reserve make a major contribution to this.

tourism

Forest visitors can use the approx. 3.5 km long Zootzen educational forest trail with pictures of the forest and information on exploring the Zootzen; For large groups, guided tours by the district forester should be possible. The forest nature trail is also used annually in autumn for the forest youth games of the Friesack forestry department.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Kreil: Friesack district - forays through Ländchen and Luch-, Geiger-Verlag (1996), p. 40, ISBN 3-89570-131-9
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e} Forstrevier Zootzen ( Memento from July 16, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
3. ↑ Framework for the assessment of forest ecosystems in the vicinity of animal husbandry facilities ( Memento of the original of August 21, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 1.1 MB) 
4. ↑ Gerd Heinrich (Ed.): Handbook of the historical sites of Germany . Volume 10: Berlin and Brandenburg. With Neumark and Grenzmark Posen-West Prussia (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 311). 3rd, revised and expanded edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 1995, ISBN 3-520-31103-8 , p. 407.

Coordinates: 52 ° 46 ′ 0 ″  N , 12 ° 40 ′ 0 ″  E