Jan Peeters and a colleague from bird working group ‘t Hökske were the ones who discovered the large fire at De Peel on Wednesday morning. They were on their way to the Mariapeel to count migratory birds around six when they saw plumes of smoke. At first, according to Jan, it was not immediately clear what was on fire. But when they arrived at the parking lot at the nature reserve, they saw ‘flames shooting out of De Peel’. At that point, he did curse for a while, he confesses.
Then immediately call 112. “After that, the circus started,” says the birdwatcher from Maasbree in Limburg.
“A beautiful piece of nature is being lost today”, sighs Jan who is in the nature reserve all year round to count breeding and migratory birds. He is not afraid that the birds will not survive the fire. “They’re flexible,” he says. “They won’t disappear, but they will have to adapt and find another place.”
As he believes they also did two years ago after the great fire that raged in the Deurnese Peel at the time.
“The hen harrier will have to move. Too bad!”
In particular, Jan is thinking of the hen harrier, a bird of prey from northern Scandinavia, which overwinters in De Peel. The bird has its roost exactly in the area where the fire is raging. “It will have to move. A pity, because it provides a beautiful spectacle every morning when we are here,” he knows.
On Wednesday morning, the bird watcher watches with sadness how the fire is moving further and further into De Peel due to the wind. Exactly in the direction where the migration post of his bird working group is. “It burns down,” he predicts. “But yes, then we don’t have to prune anymore. That was badly needed. Every disadvantage has an advantage,” he tries to stay positive.
