A reclaimed limestone quarry on the Eifel edge, sheltering orchids, ferns, and amphibians above Stolberg.
Naturschutzgebiet Schomet
Naturschutzgebiet Schomet is a small nature reserve on the southern edge of Breinig, in the town of Stolberg within the Städteregion Aachen, North Rhine-Westphalia. The reserve covers roughly 8 hectares of an old limestone ridge and former quarry at about 288 metres above sea level, and is one of 37 protected areas belonging to the Stolberg municipal area.
The protected landscape is defined by disused quarries that once supplied the regional building stone known as Aachener Blaustein, a Carboniferous limestone that weathers from dark grey to pale tones. After centuries of extraction the pits were gradually abandoned, water gathered in the deeper sections, and woodland, wetland vegetation, and orchids reclaimed the slopes. Today the area is valued for its mix of hornbeam forest, spring geophytes, and orchid-rich beech stands, and for the amphibian and butterfly habitats that have developed within the disused workings.
The reserve is part of a network of small protected areas in the Aachen region that protect former quarry landscapes and relict calcareous woodland. It sits alongside the related reserves Schlangenberg and Bärenstein, which share the same limestone backbone that extends from Stolberg into Belgium, making Schomet a representative example of post-industrial quarry renaturation in the western Eifel foothills.
