Bourtange moor

The Bourtanger Moor ( Dutch: Bourtangerveen ) was formerly the largest contiguous marsh area in Western Europe and even into the 1950s, one of the largest bogs in Germany and is located in the Emsland region west of the Ems. It stretches west until on the territory of the Netherlands and is named after the Dutch fortress town Bourtange.

Importance

The former marsh area still has a size of about 200 square kilometers. It extended in a north-south direction at about 40 kilometers from the town of roadstead in the north and Twist and Wietmarschen in the county of Bentheim in the south. The width is good 12-15 km between the towns of Emmen and Ter Apel in the west on Dutch territory and Dorpen, Haren and Meppen on the German side.

Were abgetorft only comparatively small areas in the last few centuries and brought under cultivation, it was drained in the 1950s by funding from the Emsland plan from a technical major operation almost the entire moor and developed as grazing land or farmland in particular for refugees from the eastern areas of Germany. But behind this was also the fear of annexation areas located on the border area brownfields through the Netherlands.

Of the once great bogs only small remnants have been preserved, some of which are protected today. The Bourtanger Moor is therefore now distinguished by more extensive farming; most newly created marsh colonies can expand significantly after the Second World War. Moreover, still finds an industrial Abtorfung instead about by a peat factory in Wietmarschen.

The western Emsland and the northwestern county of Bentheim and thus Bourtanger Moor are now by the newly completed Highway 31 and State Road 70 and extending on the eastern edge of the moor Emsland route ( Route number 395 of Deutsche Bahn ) developed between Munster and Emden.

In Bourtanger Moor several bog bodies have been found, including the well-known as Red Franzmann of new verses, the bog body of Kibbelgaarn and the men of Weerdinge.