On Wednesday, 25 October 2023 at around 2.30 p.m., our nature conservation partner Łukasz Ławicki took a photo of a westward-migrating, capital moose cow on the road from Gryfino to Mescherin in the Lower Oder Valley International Park, i.e. in the Lower Oder Protected Landscape Park (Park Krajobrazowy Dolina Dolnej Odry), but not far from the German border. Soon, as in Sweden, a moose sign will be placed along the road to indicate possible game crossing. We will be pleased if the elk, despite the many ASF fences, finds its way to Germany and is neither shot nor killed there. Welcome!

Kind regards

The board of directors

Cow moose between Gryfino and Mescherin on 25 October 2023 (Photo: Łukasz Ławicki)

Der Beitrag Press release 04/2023 erschien zuerst auf Nationalpark Unteres Odertal.

Criewen, 13 July 2023 — As part of the LIFE AMPHICON project, two successful workshops were recently held at the Wilderness School of the Lower Oder Valley National Park Association. The events offered various school classes the unique opportunity to actively learn about practical nature conservation and experience nature in a playful way.

LIFE AMPHICON, a wide-ranging nature conservation project of the Lower Oder Valley National Park Association together with the European Union, aims to protect particularly endangered amphibian species such as the fire-bellied toad and the great crested newt and their habitats. Equally important is the implementation of environmental education measures to sensitise the next generation to the importance of species conservation and to involve them in active work.

One highlight of the workshops was the monitoring of the development of amphibian populations at renaturalised small bodies of water in the Felchowsee area. The pupils had the opportunity to learn more about the interrelationships in our local waters.

There was also an exciting landing net excursion to the polder areas of the Lower Oder Valley National Park with Year 3 pupils from the Bruno H. Bürgel primary school in Eberswalde. Back at the wilderness school, various types of ponds and pools were microscoped by the pupils in the laboratory room, allowing them to experience the diversity of the ecosystem at first hand.

“The workshops as part of the LIFE AMPHICON project enable schoolchildren to experience practical nature conservation and get actively involved in the protection of endangered amphibian species,” explains Lars Schulz, project manager of the AMPHICON project. “It is very important to us to get young people interested in nature conservation, because you only protect what you love and you only love what you know.”

These successful workshops emphasise the commitment of the Lower Oder Valley National Park Association to the protection of amphibians and the training of the next generation of conservationists.

Press contact:
Lars Schulz
National Park Association Lower Oder Valley
Park 3, Criewen Castle
16303 Schwedt/Oder

Telefon: +49 3332–2198-25
Mail: l.schulz@nationalpark-unteres-odertal.de

Pictures of the monitoring at the Felchowsee area
Class of the Montessori School Berlin
Picture credits: Lars Schulz

Pictures Wilderness School Teerofenbrücke
Bruno H. Bürgel Primary School
Picture credits: Lars Schulz et al.

Der Beitrag Press release 03/2023 erschien zuerst auf Nationalpark Unteres Odertal.

We wish all friends of the Lower Oder Valley National Park a happy and healthy New Year 2023.

Together we have been able to achieve a lot for nature conservation in recent years. And for that we would like to thank you very much.

In 2022 there was a restructuring at the management level, which we would like to draw your attention to at this point.

In recent years, Mr. Thomas Michael has successfully headed the National Park Association, the National Park Foundation and the Öko Agrar GmbH Unteres Odertal. After ten years of working for the Lower Oder Valley National Park, he is now dedicating himself to new tasks, but will remain the managing director of the National Park Foundation, at least part-time.

On October 1st, 2022, Dr. Luisa Zielke the management of the Lower Oder Valley National Park Association. Miss Dr. Zielke studied landscape ecology and nature conservation and received his doctorate in agricultural sciences. Before joining the National Park Association, she was a research associate at the Eberswalde University for Sustainable Development.

Mirko Vergien took over the management of Öko Agrar GmbH Unteres Odertal on January 1st, 2022. Mr. Vergien has been working for Öko Agrar GmbH since 2015 and is therefore very familiar with the company. Before joining Öko Agrar GmbH Unteres Odertal, he was an employee of Agrar GmbH Crawinkel in the function of administrator of the subsidiary Agrar GmbH Gut Hobrechtsfelde.

There is close cooperation and constant exchange between the three managing directors. They are supported by Ms. Schmidt (National Park Association), Ms. Lindemann (National Park Foundation) and Ms. Vergien and Ms. Glade (Öko Agrar GmbH Unteres Odertal).

We look forward to the new year with all its tasks and challenges and look forward to any voluntary support.

Your team from the Lower Oder Valley National Park.

Thomas Michael
Managing Director (National Park Foundation)

from left to right: Mirko Vergien, Dr. Luisa Zielke, Thomas Michael

Der Beitrag Press release I/2023 erschien zuerst auf Nationalpark Unteres Odertal.

We wish all friends of the Lower Oder Valley National Park Association a happy and healthy New Year 2023.

Together we have been able to achieve a lot for nature conservation in recent years. And for that we would like to thank you very much.

In 2022 there was a restructuring at the management level, which we would like to draw your attention to at this point.

In recent years, Mr. Thomas Michael has successfully headed the National Park Association, the National Park Foundation and the Öko Agrar GmbH Unteres Odertal. After ten years of working for the Lower Oder Valley National Park, he is now dedicating himself to new tasks, but will remain the managing director of the National Park Foundation, at least part-time.

On October 1st, 2022, Dr. Luisa Zielke the management of the Lower Oder Valley National Park Association. Miss Dr. Zielke studied landscape ecology and nature conservation and received his doctorate in agricultural sciences. Before joining the National Park Association, she was a research associate at the Eberswalde University for Sustainable Development.

Mirko Vergien took over the management of Öko Agrar GmbH Unteres Odertal on January 1st, 2022. Mr. Vergien has been working for Öko Agrar GmbH since 2015 and is therefore very familiar with the company. Before joining Öko Agrar GmbH Unteres Odertal, he was an employee of Agrar GmbH Crawinkel in the function of administrator of the subsidiary Agrar GmbH Gut Hobrechtsfelde.

There is close cooperation and constant exchange between the three managing directors. They are supported by Ms. Schmidt (National Park Association), Ms. Lindemann (National Park Foundation) and Ms. Vergien and Ms. Glade (Öko Agrar GmbH Unteres Odertal).

We look forward to the new year with all its tasks and challenges and look forward to any voluntary support.

Your team from the Lower Oder Valley National Park.

dr Luisa Zielke
Managing Director (National Park Association)

from left to right: Mirko Vergien, Dr. Luisa Zielke, Thomas Michael

Der Beitrag Press release 01/2023 erschien zuerst auf Nationalpark Unteres Odertal.

We are happy about the birth of our first bison offspring this year. On the bison pasture, at the parking lot Criewen behind the chicken farm, our small bison herd has grown. It is thanks to the careful care of the experienced cattle breeder and organic farmer Norbert Meene from Criewen that all bison kids could grow up healthy and lively last year. This is not self-evident. The danger comes less from the wolf, the family members already defend their youngest, but the social integration into the group must succeed. We hope that this will be the case again this year.
The meanwhile quite respectable bison breeding is a contribution of the Lower Oder Valley National Park Foundation for the preservation of a rare animal species. After the two world wars only a few breedable wild cattle were left, on which the entire worldwide population is now based. Today, the last native wild cattle — the wild Ur (aurochs) was irretrievably wiped out in the 17th century — live not only in gates as in the Lower Oder Valley, but also in the wild, in Germany in a field trial in the Rothaar Mountains, in Poland in many places in the country, for example also in the West Pomeranian Voivodeship, not far from the Lower Oder Valley National Park. Sooner or later they will come across the Oder River and immigrate, rather return home, hoping for a hospitable welcome. The Lower Oder Valley National Park is looking forward to the homecomers and is preparing for their arrival with an enclosure that is unfortunately still necessary for legal reasons.

Dr. Ansgar Vössing Board of Directors

Der Beitrag Press release I/2022 erschien zuerst auf Nationalpark Unteres Odertal.

Now the African swine fever (ASP) has also broken out in Baden-Württemberg, as reported on 26.05.2022 and 27.05.2022 the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and the Tagesspiegel. The ostracized proboscideans come as a carrier probably rather out of the question, for that the way would be too far. But the National Park Association has always pointed out that as a carrier of ASF by no means only wild boars, but also birds of prey and corvids, rodents and even the man comes into question, the feed, but also meat and sausage products over long distances and borders transported and thus, if they are infected, also the virus. Viruses cannot be stopped by fences, not even by the new “anti-imperialist protective wall” on the Oder-Neisse border, despite its double construction. It is unreasonable and disproportionate in every respect, not only in terms of the exorbitantly high costs, about the distribution of which the district, state and federal government are engaged in an unworthy squabble. Everyone would like to pass the costs on upwards. It is also disproportionate because the fences cut up the landscape, are not only a nuisance for farmers, residents and visitors, but also prevent the important migrations of ungulates, such as the return of bison and elk from Poland, but also the escape of deer confined by the fences in the national park, which die miserably in the fences during floods. A cattle-like cruelty to animals! As predicted, the virus will continue to spread throughout Germany. Vaccination will come too late, if at all, and will have little effect. The epidemic must be allowed to pass through and new populations must be given a chance from resistant residual stocks. Reports such as the one from Baden-Württemberg will be repeated time and again. Therefore, I would like to ask all responsible persons in the districts once again: Tear down the pig fences!

Dr. rer. nat. Ansgar Vössing
Vice Chairman of the Board

Der Beitrag Press release 04/2022 erschien zuerst auf Nationalpark Unteres Odertal.

The argument has been going on for a long time, now it is decided. On the one hand there were the farmers, who wanted to be royally rewarded for all nature conservation measures on their land by the taxpayer, supported by agro-savvy conservationists who ran through the landscape with their checkbook and wanted to reward every hedge and every pond in the cleared agricultural landscape. In the good years it worked quite well, there was plenty of money – at least virtually – and the farmers should also have their share of it. But in the lean years, which according to biblical experience follow the fat years, there is simply no money left for conservation, an obvious luxury.
This is currently becoming clear from the around 1.3 million hectares of priority ecological areas in Germany that farmers have had to leave unused in order to receive EU agricultural subsidies. Russia’s brutal attack on Ukraine and the associated lack of food and feed, and potentially also fossil fuels, are now leading to the termination of these nature conservation measures. In the future, these areas may also be used for growing grain, even if only as animal feed. None of this makes sense or is necessary. These ecological priority areas make up only a tiny fraction of the agricultural area in Germany. Incidentally, a good half of German grain production is used as animal feed. The ecological focus areas are therefore of no importance for human nutrition. The Danes were smarter at the time: at the beginning of the First World War in 1914, as the largest pig farmer in Europe, they quickly slaughtered and fed their Bristle cattle. After that, they could use the pig feed to feed the people and – unlike Germany – got through the years of hunger well.
In addition, almost ten percent of the world grain harvest is not used for food and animal feed, but for the production of biofuels. In Germany alone, five percent of the arable land is used for biofuel production. Welthungerhilfe is rightly calling for a change of direction here and, for example, to give up the ten percent proportion of E10 petrol. It is not timely to grow energy crops on good agricultural sites so that rich people can supposedly drive around in heavy vehicles ecologically.
The nature conservation contract has therefore disappeared into thin air faster than expected. Going back will be long and arduous, especially since the energy transition that is being pushed ahead at the same time requires an incredible amount of space, no longer for opencast lignite mining, but now for wind turbines with their huge foundations and long access roads or the photovoltaic systems placed everywhere in the landscape. Farmers get far more money for this than contractual nature conservation can ever offer them. Farmers are economists, they will opt for more money. Species protection, or as you can put it even more beautifully in Greek-Latin, biodiversity protection only plays a secondary role.
The Bündnis 90/Die Grünen party decided in favor of wind energy in the indisputable contradiction between species protection and the promotion of wind energy. In a key issues paper presented by the two Green Federal Ministers for Economic Affairs and the Environment, Robert Habeck and Steffi Lemke in April 2022, only 16 breeding bird species are listed as species relevant for wind power planning. In Brandenburg, for example, these have also included cranes, bitterns and bitterns, curlews, ruffs, redshanks, corncrakes and black-tailed godwits, as well as whooper and miniature swans, black grouse and capercaillie, and the great bustard. These are no longer taken into account in the key issues paper by the two federal ministers. After all, the federal states can continue to create their own regulations for bats, but no longer for birds because of the “overriding public interest” of wind energy. In the future, wind turbines will continue to be installed in the forest, which is already groaning and groaning under the drought caused by climate change and is therefore threatened by pest infestation and windthrow. Now it is additionally broken up by the numerous, solidified access roads and has to accommodate the large and heavy concrete foundations in its ground. What is new, however, according to the key issues paper by the two “green” federal ministers is that in future wind turbines should also be possible across the board in landscape protection areas (LSGs). Only NATURA 2000 areas and world cultural and natural heritage sites will be excluded in the future.
However, the owner can still defend himself against wind power and photovoltaic systems on his property, private owners of forests and fields are unlikely to do so because of the enormous profits that can be expected. This is where non-profit organizations, associations and foundations come into play. The non-profit association of the Friends of the German-Polish European National Park Lower Oder Valley e.V. (National Park Association), for example, only allows the installation of wind turbines outside of protected areas of all kinds, with appropriate distances to these, outside of forests and at the necessary distance from important breeding grounds rarer birds. Photovoltaic systems may not be set up on its agricultural or forestry land. In the opinion of the National Park Association, they belong on sealed surfaces and on roofs, most of which are still unused in Germany for energy purposes.
The Greens are once again trying to kill two birds with one stone and to promote photovoltaic systems on rewetted fen sites, to allow dual-use systems, so to speak. However, a low moor does not only consist of water, but of a complex community of plants and animals, which cannot develop so splendidly under photovoltaic systems.
In short, what remains but resignation? Actually only the old recipe that the National Park Association has enforced for 30 years, even against resistance from official nature conservation in Potsdam: In future, nature conservation must become an equal player in the capitalist competition for the limited and coveted area, powerful and assertive, but non-profit, in contrast to its self-serving competitors for the area. That’s his unique selling point, he has to grow with this pound. Like every fight for limited resources, this fight is waged with hard drums, nothing is given to you. But, as former Federal Environment Minister Angela Merkel would have liked to say, if she had put it that way, there is no alternative.

Dr. rer. nat. Ansgar Vössing
Deputy Chairman of the Board

Der Beitrag Press release 03/2022 erschien zuerst auf Nationalpark Unteres Odertal.

Researchers from the Polish universities in Gdansk and Warsaw analyzed 62 wolf droppings in Poland for African swine fever (ASF) viruses, particularly in the ASF zones. As the editors of the renowned hunting magazine Pirsch (Munich) reported on December 29, 2021, they found remains of wild boar, the wolves’ favorite food, but no virulent ASF viruses. Since wolves often and happily eat dead wild boars that are definitely infected with ASF, the researchers had counted on ASF viruses, but to their surprise they found none. Apparently, the ASF virus does not survive the long march through the wolves’ gastrointestinal tract. The wolves’ stomachs are very acidic with a pH value of 1. Wolves seem to be a kind of health police in the forest, devouring infected carcasses, including wild boar, and thus curbing the spread of ASF. Nature helps itself, so to speak, if you let it.

The national park association is still of the opinion that the fences around the national park must be dismantled as quickly as possible, first on the eastern side towards the Oder. The subsequently installed crossing aids and culverts do not fulfill their intended purpose. The next time the Oder floods, unspeakable animal suffering will be repeated on the fences. The natural migration movements of many animals are prevented, which is completely unacceptable in Brandenburg’s only national park. The outrageously expensive fences cutting through the landscape will not stop the advance of the virus to the west anyway, since there are other transmission options apart from the wild boar, for example scavenging birds or meat and sausage products from infected areas. The first sources of infection have already appeared to the west of the martial line of defense in the hinterland, and this development will continue and make the attempt, which was helpless from the outset, to keep viruses away through fences, completely ad absurdum.

dr re. nat. Ansgar Vössing
deputy CEO

Der Beitrag Press release 02/2022 erschien zuerst auf Nationalpark Unteres Odertal.

The only national park in Brandenburg is currently being completely fenced in like a large zoo, only without the elephants! Hoofed animals such as moose or bison are no longer able to migrate, only birds can still fly freely. High metal fences block the way for the other animals, including visitors who want to recover from the anti-corona measures and are now stumbling from gate to gate. Now, as is usually the case in winter, the Oder Valley is just full of water, for the caged animals, not only the bad pigs, but also the good deer, there is no escape from this “zoo”, they fail at the fences and die miserably.

Photo: Facebook

The reason for the incredibly expensive and complex fences across the country is the desperate attempt by the responsible authorities to stop the advance of African swine fever (ASF) on the eastern front, above all to stop the pig barons with their factory farming, preferably in Lower Saxony and North Rhine-Westphalia protection. Their business principle is to import soy feed from South America grown on destroyed jungle areas and to export the pork, preferably to China.

This attempt is, however, clearly doomed to failure. Viruses cannot be stopped. African swine fever, which was transported from Africa by ship to Georgia and from there gradually to the west, is a viral infection that has so far been harmless to humans but is very deadly for pigs, for which there is no vaccine and no antidote. However, it is not only transmitted from pig to pig, but also via meat and sausage products from infected pigs. Rodents and ravens nibbling on infected, dead game are also possible vectors, and they are not stopped by the anti-virus protection wall on the eastern front, which now has to be moved further and further west, because it already exists Sources of infection west of the currently fenced line of defense.

For nature conservation, the situation is dramatic. All experts from the WWF to the Lower Oder Valley National Park Administration agree, but are not heard. Terrible scenes take place on the fences, roe deer get caught in the fence with their horns and die miserably. Animal welfare looks different.

Within the fence, all poor pigs are to be killed in every conceivable way, 365 days a year, day and night, a hunter’s honor no longer counts. Traps are also set up. But, as I said, there are other ways of infection.

The fences are also dramatic for wolf management. Herd protection with high electric fences still works quite well at the moment. Although the wolves can jump over it, they have not yet learned or practiced it. It was not necessary. Now fences are blocking their hiking trails everywhere. The intelligent animals quickly learn to jump over high fences, the previous herd protection will then no longer work well, and coexistence between humans and wolves will be difficult.

Other countries take different paths than Denmark or Germany, which are heavily influenced by factory farming. Our eastern neighbour, Poland, simply lets the epidemic pass, knowing that all expensive countermeasures are ultimately pointless and ineffective. Poland is stubbornly refusing to erect border fortifications on its western border as well. The federal government also does not want to finance the expensive fun of the countries that are also responsible for disease control according to the Basic Law. Part of the wild and domestic pigs will become infected and die, while another, resistant part of the population will survive and become the starting point of a new and healthy one. Poland recommends its factory farmers to protect their stables themselves. Even today, normal mortals cannot get into these fortresses. In any case, from a nature conservation point of view, one can only say once again in this case: Learning from Poland means learning to win!

dr Ansgar Vossing

Der Beitrag Press release 01/2022 erschien zuerst auf Nationalpark Unteres Odertal.

The Lower Oder Valley National Park Foundation, together with the Association of Friends of the German-Polish European National Park Unteres Odertal e.V., has launched its new website on 1 November 2021 and can be reached under www.nationalpark-unteres-odertal.de.

The aim of the new website is to strengthen communication between the National Park Foundation and the National Park Association and other nature and national park friends, but above all with residents and visitors to the region. We want to inform, educate and, of course, entertain, in accordance with the four most important goals of the foundation: nature conservation, ecological agriculture, environmental education and nature research.

Our website is primarily about public relations, transparent and dialogical, real and honest, emancipatory and participatory. But what should we say many words, just take a look and tell us your opinion if you want.

Kind regards

Dr. Ansgar Vössing

Board of directors

Der Beitrag Press release VIII/2021 erschien zuerst auf Nationalpark Unteres Odertal.