Welcome to the Wildcat Village Hütscheroda!
This village, located in the center of Germany, right at the edge of the national park and UNESCO natural heritage “Hainich”, is dedicated entirely to the trademark animal of the park – the European wildcat.
In most places, this type of cat native to Europe has vanished almost entirely. The main reason for this development is the continuous division and regression of their natural habitat, the deciduous and mixed forests that used to cover Germany. To counter this, the German nature conservancy organization “BUND” has created a plan nicknamed “Safety net for the wildcat”. The goal of this project is to connect the separated and widespread patches of forests in Germany with green corridors to allow the wild animals to once again roam and wander from one area to another, so they might reappear in areas where they went extinct previously.
The main goal of the wildcat village is to showcase these amazing animals that would normally be impossible to see in the wild, and to help understand the desperate situation they are in today.
The facts:
The village was opened on the 1st of April 2012 and consists of three major parts:
- The wildcat barn, a 500 year old barn building, redesigned as a modern information center
- The wildcat enclosure, containing four wildcats in their natural habitat
- The wildcat path, a seven kilometer long hiking track through the national park with the viewing platform “Hainichblick” on the halfway point