New Geopark brochure: The Burgwald moorland landscape
Moor landscapes have always fascinated people. They can harbour dangers for careless hikers, but at the same time they also provide the raw material for soothing active substances for rheumatic diseases. In literature, mystical moors have repeatedly served as the backdrop for exciting stories, for example in Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings" with the mosquito water moors and the dead swamps that the heroes have to cross. And who doesn't know the infamous "Hound of the Baskervilles", who wreaks havoc in Dartmoor and can only be defeated by Sherlock Holmes, probably the most famous detective in fictional crime history. So it was obvious that the GrenzWeltenNational Geopark should take up the theme and point out the occurrence of this natural form in the region with its latest brochure from the Geo-Landscapes series, "Die Moorlandschaft Burgwald".
"A landscape built on sand" is the subtitle of the Burgwald moor landscape. It points to the history of the bog's formation: Thick sandstone layers from the Permian red sandstone period about 250 million years ago created the basis for a unique flora and fauna in the Burgwald, one of the largest closed forest areas in Hessen. The moor areas there provide a habitat for numerous plant and insect species, and at the same time they store six times as much CO2 as a forest area of the same size. This makes peatlands true "climate heroes", whose importance is increasing in times of climate change. The largest contiguous mire area in the Burgwald is the 203 ha nature reserve "Franzosenwiesen/Rotes Wasser" between Rosenthal and Münchhausen.
The new brochure not only offers a compact insight into the geology of the Burgwald and the special climatic and natural conditions of the moor complexes. It also shows three hiking trails with different starting points and lengths of 16.3 to 19.2 km. Thus the brochure can serve as a practical guide on the tour through the Burgwald. It is now available free of charge from the Border Worlds National Geopark project office. Further information is also available here .