Orchard meadows are valuable habitats and characterize the landscape. The city supports the preservation of these valuable biotopes in a variety of ways.
In Bad Homburg, there are large stands of orchards in Kirdorfer Feld, Ober-Erlenbach, Platzenberg and Pilgerrain. The intensification of agriculture, the growth of the city in its peripheral areas and subsidized clearing campaigns endangered large parts of Bad Homburg's orchards until the 1970s. Today, the surviving stands are often overaged and overgrown and require intensive care and replanting.
Since the 1980s, more and more existing orchards have been reactivated and new ones planted. The care and maintenance of orchards requires a considerable amount of time and money. As the town itself owns very little land, it is almost exclusively in the hands of the owners to maintain these special landscape areas, which are also of great importance for general local recreation. A key role is played here by the associations and communities, which are highly committed volunteers. Without them, the preservation of Bad Homburg's cultural landscape would not be possible.
The town of Bad Homburg v.d.Höhe promotes the preservation, creation and maintenance of orchard meadows as valuable, typical and landscape-defining biotopes, which are to be supplemented and preserved, within the framework of the available budget funds.
Every year, the Bad Homburg Apple Day offers a colorful mix of information and experiences related to apples and orchards. In October 2005, the first Bad Homburg Apple Day took place in the Kirdorfer Feld, after all groups, farmers and private individuals, some of whom had been active in orchard protection for years, had come together for the first time that year on the initiative of the town to cooperate on the protection and increased care of the orchards. Parallel to the municipal initiative to pool activities, not only did the existing initiatives and associations step up their efforts - new initiatives were also successfully launched.
Since 1991, the town of Bad Homburg v.d.Höhe has financially supported the Ober-Erlenbach conservation group in its efforts to preserve the orchards in the Ober-Erlenbach district on the basis of a town council resolution. In addition to the Ober-Erlenbach bird protection group, the local farmers' association, the fishing club, the nature conservation foundation and the hunting cooperative are members of the conservation association. The aim of the conservation association is to protect nature in the waters, fields and forests of Ober-Erlenbach. The harvested fruit is processed in the wine press at Oberhof in Ober-Erlenbach.
An initiative of landowners and tenants of orchard plots in Kirdorf came together in 2006 to form the Kirdorfer Feld interest group. It is committed to preserving the centuries-old cultural landscape of the Kirdorfer Feld. The IKF has received financial support since 2006. In joint campaigns, plots of land are mowed, bushes are cleared, trees are pruned and new trees are planted. The association has purchased a new wine press with financial support from the town of Bad Homburg v.d.Höhe. For the first time in over 40 years, wine was pressed again in Kirdorf. Since then, a press festival has been held in Kirdorf every year in the fall.
The first forms of cooperation to preserve the orchards have also been established on Platzenberg. Several private individuals and the Platzenberg Landscape Conservation Association are involved here with the support of the town.
With financial support from the town of Bad Homburg v.d.Höhe, members of the Ober-Erlenbach bird and nature conservation group have restored an apple press and made it functional again. It is located at Domäne Oberhof, Burgholzhäuser Straße 2, in Ober-Erlenbach, and has been in operation there for a few weeks at a time during the apple harvest (from September) since 1998. Citizens of Bad Homburg have the opportunity to press their own fruit or have it pressed and then take the cider home with them.
The town of Bad Homburg v.d.Höhe regularly offers pruning courses or supports them financially. Pruning courses are announced in the local print and internet media.
for municipal areas are awarded as far as possible.
They are drawn up by the city as a basis for the protection and development of the priority areas with orchards in Bad Homburg in particular. Concepts for the areas of the Kirdorfer Feld, the Platzenberg and the Pilgerrain are available or in progress.
The site in the Kirdorfer Feld has been restored to a good condition in recent years.
To counteract the theft of fruit, which is unfortunately not uncommon, the town of Bad Homburg v.d.Höhe has designed orange, reusable barrier tapes with bold but clear slogans to help against "apple theft". The original idea came from the environmental department of the city of Frankfurt and designer Lara Alexandra Glück, who developed similar ribbons as part of the "Apple Appeal" project back in 2009 and brought them to people and trees with great success. This was an attempt to educate people in a charming way, as permanent fencing off of meadows in the open cultural landscape is neither desirable nor permissible. The barrier tapes are provided free of charge by the Bad Homburg v.d.Höhe town council to caretakers and tenants of orchard meadows. They should only be attached to the trees during the harvest period to indicate that this orchard or this tree is being cared for and harvested.
