News:
Project of the Month June 2025

With your help, we can now provide hundreds of butterfly species in the southern Harz Mountains with another valuable mountain meadow flower paradise ...

In the southern Harz Mountains, north of Nordhausen, lies the hilly countryside of the ‘Rüdigsdorf Alps’, rising to a height of 350 metres. This is home to one of Thuringia's last reasonably intact gypsum karst areas, rich in wildflowers.

Aware that a mining company had applied for the classification of further gypsum mining areas, we were able to purchase a total of 12.9 hectares (129,000 m²) of ecologically valuable flower meadows, home to a unique variety of butterflies, in 2005/2006, thereby saving them from misuse and destruction... or so we thought!

Unfortunately, this species-rich mountain meadow landscape has been increasingly misused for leisure activities, with all the destructive waste disposal that this entails, and without any consideration for its ecological value or our land ownership.

Even the flock of sheep we located there after the flowering season and seed fall, to protect and preserve the mountain flower meadows, often couldn't settle down, despite being accompanied by a shepherd, because free-roaming dogs and recreational athletes kept causing hassle and stress for the sheep, the sheepdogs and the shepherd.

This spelt the end of sheep grazing for meadow maintenance. The subsequent widespread growth of bushes and trees, with their falling leaves and shade, increasingly destroyed the warm, sun-loving flower meadows.

The loss of this unique mountain meadow habitat with strictly protected orchids, gentians and hundreds of flowering plants such as Centaury, Restharrow and Wild Sand Thyme would have affected the nearly 300 diurnal and nocturnal butterfly species found there, many of which are on the Red Lists of Germany and Thuringia, rare bird species such as the Red-backed Shrike, Yellowhammer, Red-breasted Flycatcher and Whitethroat, many of which are on the red lists of Germany and Thuringia, and up to five bat species.

To end the misuse of our property, we have erected fences along the boundaries of our land with the permission of the relevant nature conservation authority. Since then, we have had a farmer use the meadows for grazing his Longhorn and Scottish Highland cattle under strict conditions after the flowering period and seed fall, such as mowing pasture and/or meadows.

This protective investment of around €23,000 has paid off: today, our mountain meadows are once again undisturbed, providing the peace and quiet that this sensitive flower meadow habitat and the animal species that depend on it so desperately need!

And another piece of good news: after 18 years of searching for additional suitable land in the 'Rüdigsdorf Alps' region, we were finally able to sign the purchase agreement for a further 2.3 hectares (23,000 m²) of mountain meadows at the beginning of June. These are directly adjacent to our existing mountain meadow property!

In order to raise the funds to purchase the land, totalling €39,700, by the beginning of August 2025, we need your active financial support. Please contribute to the project with a donation of, for example, €15, €30 or €50, or any other amount! Together, we are saving butterfly species in the southern Harz region of Germany that are increasingly endangered and even threatened with extinction. We are creating a permanent paradise full of nectar-rich flowering plants and suitable feed plants for their caterpillars..