A restored lowland wetland reserve in southern Hesse, protecting waters, reeds, and meadows for rare wildlife.
Reinheimer Teich
Reinheimer Teich is a nature reserve in the Darmstadt-Dieburg district of southern Hesse, Germany, located northeast of the town of Reinheim in the Reinheimer Becken, the northwestern foreland of the Odenwald. It covers roughly 75 hectares of open water, reed beds, wet meadows, and extensively grazed pasture set on a nearly flat plain at about 150 meters above sea level.
The reserve is best known as a regionally important refuge for the European pond turtle, along with a rich bird community that uses the open water and surrounding meadows for breeding, resting, and wintering. Beyond its local identity, the site forms the core of the larger Natura 2000 areas "Untere Gersprenz" and "Untere Gersprenzaue," tying its small protected footprint to a broader landscape-level conservation network along the Gersprenz river system.
Today the area is managed as a lowland wetland habitat with carefully restored open water zones, and it is accompanied by the Naturschutzscheune visitor center run by NABU and the HGON, a place where visitors can learn about its wildlife, history, and the volunteers who look after it.
