How old is the Drenthe landscape? And what can we do with our landscape history? Two researchers spent more than a year trying to find an answer to these questions. They did this on behalf of ten municipalities and the province of Drenthe. The results were presented today in Westerbork and will influence our outlook in the coming years.
The most important conclusions: if we want to live in greenery in the future, we must build it quickly. Moreover, Drenthe is not that old at all.
The young heathland reclamations and land consolidation were especially important for the development of what we now know as our landscape. “The story of Drenthe has changed to a great extent in the past 150 years,” says researcher Luuk Keunen. “The young heathland reclamations tell the classic story of how the image of Drenthe farmers with large sheep herds changed into a large agricultural production landscape with large state forests. This resulted in a completely different landscape than in the previous period.”
According to Keunen, you can see a clear development in the hundred years that heathland has been reclaimed. “What started very small-scale and private, went to private with some help and eventually became very large-scale. That has resulted in many different types of landscape: the palette that you still see today.” This entire palette has now been mapped out with the research.