Elm-Lappwald Nature Park
The Natural Park Elm Lappwald is a natural park in southeastern Lower Saxony east of Brunswick. Him shape the wooded hills of Elm, Lappwald and Dorm and the area of Helmstedt trough.
- 2.1 Park History
- 2.2 Soil History
- 2.3 Settlement history
Geography
Location
The nature park has an area of approximately 470 km ² and is located in the counties of Helmstedt and Wolfenbüttel. It is bordered to the west from the outskirts of Braunschweig and in the north of Wolfsburg. In the northern area of the A section in the Hanover-Berlin cuts through the park 2. The nature park comprises the mountain ranges, landscapes and forest areas of:
- Elm
- Lappwald
- Dorm
- Elz
- Eiz
- Helmstedter trough
- Rieseberg and Rieseberger Moor
- Forestry Kampstüh in teaching
Landscape default, the nature park is part of the ostfälischen hills. It is located in the transition region between the central mountain region with the resin in the South and the North German Plain to the Lüneburg Heath in the north. Climatically the area is located in west-east direction in the transition zone between maritime and continental weather.
History
Park History
The Nature Park was founded in 1977 as a collaboration between the counties Helmstedt, Wolfenbüttel and the City of Brunswick. The Natural Park Elm Lappwald is now part of the UNESCO and European Geopark Harz -Braunschweiger Land - Ostfalen.
Ground history
The last ice age ( Weichsel ice age ) around 12,000 years ago encamped in the southern part of Helmstedt and throughout the course of the Schöppenstedter trough from one up to 3 m thick loess layer on which trained the fertile black and brown earth. During defrost the ice created the fine shapes of the landscape. A dense deciduous forest vegetation developed in the post-glacial period and covered the entire territory of today's natural parks. Your tree species adapted themselves to the ground conditions. So alternated in the northern area of the park oak-hornbeam forests of beech - oak forests and swamp forests on wet, peaty layers ( fen areas). In the southern part of the beech forests prevailed.
Settlement history
The area of present-day natural park was permanently inhabited since the 6th millennium BC, which megalithic tombs testify. With the colonization of this area by humans changed the naturally grown vegetation image. Although the first settlers in the Middle Stone Age as hunters, fishermen and collectors still no significant role in this change. The trough location of the area with approaches to the loess soil made already in the stone age for a settlement by early farming cultures. They cleared early on the dense trees. The greatest loss of forest cover brought the era of the great clearings ( 900 to 1200 AD), as this time was " taken into culture " the natural landscape. Today indicate place names, listen to end -rode, - field, on the settlement period back. Especially clearing many villages put on the Marientaler Cistercian monks. Cursor over this time Abbenrode, Hemkenrode and Erkerode on the northwest slope of the Elms and Rotenkamp on Rieseberg back. In the Middle Ages there were in this region still significantly more settlements. Almost half of them were abandoned by their inhabitants again and fell, it became deserted villages, whose number in the territory of Lappwaldes, at the Dorm and on the southwest slope of the Elms is particularly high. The area with its good soil remained until today a preferred location field. Since the Middle Ages the cities king Lutter, Schoningen, Schoeppenstedt and Helmstedt are geschichtsträchige places in the area of today's natural parks. Decisive for the early, already 952 incipient development of Helmstedt its location on the trade route from Braunschweig to Magdeburg, today's B was first
Flora and Fauna
The Elm is considered the largest and most beautiful beech forest in Northern Germany. The appearance of the natural park includes forests, and Moore, swelling rivers, lakes, heathland, salt marshes and abundant lime - poor grassland. There occur more than 800 plant species, of which more than 10 percent are considered at risk. Birds, mammals and amphibians are represented in many ways in the habitat nature reserve. Especially the Reitlingstal Elm and the Brunnental in Lappwald are deemed idyllic.