Oostvaardersplassen

The Oostvaardersplassen is a nature reserve in the Netherlands which is managed by the State Forestry Service. Covering about 56 square kilometres (22 sq mi) it is noted as an example of rewilding. It is in the Flevopolder which was created in 1968, but in spite of the environment having little time to develop, by 1989 it had international importance as  a Ramsar wetland. We live in this polder since 1979 and have visited this area many times. There are wet and dry areas, before the establishment of the reserve the dry area was a nursery for willow trees and hundreds of seedlings. To avoid the reducing of the habitat for water birds, the park managers brought in a number of large herbivores to keep the area more open. In 2011 there were 1150 Konik ponies, 350 Heck catlle and 60 red deer.

Public is not allowed in the living area of the animals but there are walking path in the park where you can have a look with a binocular. We never saw an animal very close they were always far away, but last week we were very lucky. Walking the path along the water the whole livestock with hundreds of Konik ponies was right in front of us!

It was amazing to see the amount of animals.

With the zoom we could make such nice pictures of them.

They even posed closer where we had a better view .

After a while they suddenly decided to move on and like a slowly moving stream on the horizon.

Recently a movie has released about the Oostvaarderplassen which is a big hit here and I am going to watch this week. In the previous post you can watch the trailer.