Under the grey skies raindrops draw circles on the lake. Tiny frogs hiding in the plants fill the air with their loud sounds.
nature is taking back over
Ever since humanity started growing, cities expanded and technology became a part of our lives. We have tried to rule over nature, pushing it away from us, building fences around it and using it for our purposes. Living in harmony with nature is something most of us forgot.
We profit from places and neglect them as soon as we don’t need them anymore. Nature is slowing but steadily claiming them back as hers, never giving up.
Why do we destroy nature to then see how much it actually belongs to us?
change
Inventing technological devices and starting to increasingly depend on them, we searched for new ways to generate energy using everything we could. North Rhine-Westphalia mainly focused on burning brown coal extracted from the earth, removing what stood on top to reach it.
In our need to control nature we almost completely changed the landscape of our country. We dig huge holes in the ground, regulate our forests and discard dead trees instead of using their decomposition. We relocate rivers when they interfere with our plans.
We change everything that seems to disturb us. We recultivate the land the way we choose, not like nature would. And then we fly away to see untouched places in far away countries.
wild
This place used to be a gravel pit when the opencast mine Zukunft-West was still operating. When mining was finished the gravel pit was left to itself. I was told, when the gravel was being washed in huge tanks it used to be indescribably loud. Now you can only hear the calls of frogs. Nature took this place back and finally was allowed to grow wild. Now it is a nature conservation area.