Wandering shepherdess in the Barker Heide

Yes, they still exist: itinerant shepherds. Members of one of humanity's oldest professions. Their existence is also acutely threatened in this rapidly changing world, similar to other traditional crafts, most recently for example Fischer in the Schlei and western Baltic Sea.

Today, transhumance sheep farms have a generally recognized, indispensable role in landscape management: raised moors and heaths would quickly grow over with trees and bushes without sheep and goat grazing. The promotion of nature conservation and biodiversity is therefore the decisive driving force for the contemporary transhumance craft, especially in Schleswig-Holstein with its extensive moor and heath areas. 

A few days ago I met Birgit Voigtländer with her herd of 600 sheep and a few goats in the country's oldest nature reserve, the Barker Heide in the Segeberg district. Her Sheep farm with headquarters in Aukrug is one of five companies in Schleswig-Holstein with migratory herds. It is expected that one of these companies will close down due to age next year. Then there will only be four transhumance sheep farms left in Schleswig-Holstein.

So it's high time to focus more closely on this topic.