Nature conservation: When the forest disappears

Tree felling in forest protection areas occurs again and again, at least 300 times since the beginning of 2022. Experts see significant damage to endangered species. Nature conservation authorities are often left out.

Mid-October: Grumbach in Thuringia, right on the Bavarian border. One of those days when Nathalie Bothner once again feels like she’s in a fake movie. The mayor stands in a barren landscape that was once a forest.

Now all you see here is almost tree stumps. “It was shady, green, with moss. Everything you could want from a forest,” said Bothner, who walked her dogs here almost every day. Now there is almost nothing left here.

Enforce strict guidelines Federal Nature Conservation Act

“It’s really bad,” says the mayor. Not least because the site is part of a European bird protection area, a so-called Natura 2000 area. They have been around since the 1990s: areas in which strict legal requirements apply, regulated for example in the Federal Nature Conservation Act.

Interventions are therefore fundamentally inadmissible if they significantly harm the conservation objective of the area, i.e. the protected species and habitats. For example, endangered species should be saved from extinction, such as the gray woodpecker and the hazel grouse. Both are on the so-called Red List, and both were also found in the protected area in Grumbach.

An area where trees have been felled without interruption since March. The forest owner, the so-called Bundesforst, a department of the Federal Agency for Real Estate Tasks, writes probably until November. Opposite Report Mainz She justifies the measures with the bark beetle, but at the same time excludes “significant impairment of the conservation objectives of the Natura 2000 area”. Breeding sites, if any, were also left standing. In other words: The forest is gone – no big problem for the protected animals.

Expert: Economic Constraints on foresters

For Pierre Ibisch, professor at the University for Sustainable Development, this is one example among many, especially among public forestry authorities, which manage the majority of protected forests in Germany. “Perhaps in some cases there is simply a lack of ecological knowledge,” he says. “Of course it is a significant deterioration for forest species when the trees are gone.”

It is also not enough to check whether there was still a nest there or whether birds were acutely present when the evacuation took place, says Ibisch. “Ultimately it’s about a living space, a potential living space in the future.” This especially applies to dying trees, which provide a home for endangered species while being a loss-making business for the forest.

Contradictory Targets

Forestry scientists like Klaus Pukall from the Technical University of Munich also repeatedly observe how their own guild deals with the protected areas entrusted to them in a sometimes difficult way: “You notice when you talk to foresters in the state forest that they always get contradictory formulations of goals.”

Most forestry offices today are organized like commercial enterprises – with clear guidelines regarding the amount of wood to be cut. “And on the other hand, there is a demand: please implement the FFH guidelines in an exemplary manner. You can see that very often the conflict is delegated down to the individual forester, who solves it more or less well.”

Nature conservation authorities are often left out

The problem with all of this is that it mostly takes place in secret. Because no one knows exactly how often an intervention occurs in protected areas. The federal government and state forestry companies cannot provide any figures upon request.

Most lower nature conservation authorities also respond to requests Report Mainz clueless. According to the evaluation of the responses, there have been at least 300 interventions in Natura 2000 areas in the forest since the beginning of 2022. The number of unreported cases is likely to be considerably higher.

“The problem is that foresters can essentially certify to themselves: Everything I’m going to do in my forest is okay,” says a man who was once a senior forest director until a year ago. Volker Ziesling now leads a citizens’ initiative and repeatedly argues with his former colleagues across the country about tree felling in Natura 2000 areas. “As a rule, one form is enough for the foresters. Signature, date, two holes in it and the paper disappears into the file folder.”

Förster evaluates himself

The forester uses this to assess whether or not his tree felling can cause significant damage to the protected area within the meaning of the federal nature reserve – if he answers the question in the negative, he does not even have to inform the responsible nature conservation authority. This is actually officially regulated in most federal states.

“The nature conservation authorities only find out about this if they actively contact the foresters,” confirms a department head at a state forestry company who wishes to remain anonymous. “But they don’t even get to do it because of the absolute understaffing.”

This is also shown by the survey among all lower nature conservation authorities, in which 30 percent nationwide took part. More than a third of them state that they do not have enough staff to meet the requirements of the Federal Nature Conservation Act.

Federal Government doesn’t see anyone Need for action

In Grumbach, too, the lower nature conservation authority was not involved before the felling began, the Federal Forestry Office confirms. The authority itself made the decision about the relevance. Appointments with the responsible district were only made one month after the work began. But a large part of the trees were already gone.

“We urgently need independent control and testing of such things,” says Ibisch. “We are a very bad example in many respects, especially in relation to the strictly protected areas.” The forest biologist sees the federal government as having a duty, which is currently working behind the scenes on a new forest law.

But when asked, they see no need for changes at the federal level. The Environment and Agriculture Ministries write together that, based on their own knowledge, the implementation of existing regulations in Natura 2000 forest areas is “fundamentally not objectionable”, even if the Federal Government does not have any figures for this.