Natura 2000 aims to protect, maintain and develop certain habitats as well as animal and plant species.
Natura 2000 is the interconnected network of European protected areas. This network is based on the Habitats Directive adopted by the member states of the European Union in 1992 (F = fauna, flora, flora, H = habitat). Natura 2000 also includes areas to be protected under the 1979 Birds Directive. Both directives aim to preserve biodiversity by protecting, maintaining and developing certain habitats and animal and plant species. The Habitats and Birds Directives are binding EU law that must be implemented.
In Bad Homburg v. d. Höhe, the Kirdorfer Feld and the Erlenbach in Ober-Erlenbach are protected under Natura 2000 and designated as FFH areas.
The Erlenbach rises at an altitude of 570 m in the Feldberg-Taunus ridge, passes through Bad Homburg in Ober-Erlenbach and flows into the Nidda near Bad Vilbel after a total length of 30 km.
In addition to the agricultural and residential areas, the extensive alluvial forests deserve special attention. Due to their abundance of maple, ash and English oak, they already resemble real hardwood riparian forests in larger river valleys. These valuable watercourse structures with site-typical vegetation or unobstructed river beds with high structural diversity are to be secured and preserved between the sections of Ober-Erlenbach and Burgholzhausen as well as Ober- and Nieder-Erlenbach.
The 133-hectare Kirdorfer Feld is located north-east of the Bad Homburg district of Kirdorf. Almost the entire open land area, with the exception of the orchard, the "Lazarius" allotment garden area and the grave gardens to the south, was designated as a landscape and nature conservation area by decree on October 17, 1996.
The particularly valuable wetlands are protected as nature conservation areas, while the remaining areas were designated as landscape conservation areas. The Kirdorfer Feld is characterized by its species-rich meadow communities, which have developed in a historical cultural landscape. The area is of particular value due to the great diversity of locations, structures and uses. The high proportion of orchards on the slopes and the wet meadows with their fallow land, small watercourses and springs are the characteristic elements of the area that shape the landscape.
As the meadow communities in the Kirdorfer Feld are of supra-regional importance, the Kirdorfer Feld has also been designated as a Flora-Fauna-Habitat area (FFH) by the Natura 2000 regulation of the state of Hesse.
