A former Prussian military training ground turned into a large, free-roaming nature reserve on Berlin's doorstep.
Döberitzer Heide
Döberitzer Heide is a roughly 5,000-hectare landscape of heath, sandy open ground, and wet woodland on the southeastern edge of the Nauener Platte, just west of Berlin and reaching toward the outskirts of Potsdam. For more than ninety years it served as the Truppenübungsplatz Döberitz, first under the Prussians and then the German military, and after 1945 under Soviet forces, which kept the land almost entirely free of agriculture, settlement, or forestry. After the withdrawal of Russian troops in the early 1990s, environmental groups and the Heinz Sielmann Stiftung transformed the former military range into one of the most ambitious rewilding and large-grazer projects in Central Europe.
The area today is structured as Sielmanns Naturlandschaft Döberitzer Heide, a 3,600-hectare mosaic of designated nature reserves (NSG Döberitzer Heide and NSG Ferbitzer Bruch), an inner fenced core zone where European bison, Przewalski horses, and red deer roam essentially unmanaged, and an outer ring zone where hardy breeds of cattle, horses, sheep, goats, and water buffalo keep the open habitats open. Almost 6,700 plant, fungus, and animal species have been recorded across its dry heaths, sand flats, dry grasslands, and wet fens, including white-tailed eagles and otters.
The reserve sits in the Havelland region between Berlin and Potsdam and is becoming an increasingly visible example of how a heavilyilitarized landscape can be turned into a functioning open-landscape ecosystem, a wildlife refuge for rare European megafauna, and an outdoor classroom for environmental education.
