Most people know what a sycamore, a beech or a spruce tree look like as one finds many of these trees on any walk in the woods. It is far less usual to come across a tulip tree, a Nikko fir or a sequoia in the countryside but it is possible if you visit Haslach woods near Herrenberg. Here you will find trees that are normally found only in foreign and exotic locations. Herrenberg Director of Forestry Hansjoerg Dinkelaker describes the arboretum in Herrenberg-Haslach, which is a popular and instructive destination for nature lovers.
The woods around Herrenberg contain a wide variety of indigenous trees and shrubs. However, trees from distant countries and continents are also represented in these woods, although not in large numbers. It is often quite difficult to recognise this variety and to locate trees and shrubs that in some instances are very rare. At the end of the 1970s it was proposed that all the species of trees and shrubs that grow here should be planted in one place, to help nature lovers and school groups to study the trees in their diversity and to identify their distinguishing features. The town of Herrenberg made an area of about one hectare in Haslach woods available for this purpose. The land was lying fallow at the time and its chalky residual clay and fine clay of varying degrees of freshness offered broad and favourable location conditions. We should not forget that every plant makes its own specific demands on the soil. The planting was planned and carried out by the State Forestry Office in Herrenberg in 1979.
Over 80 Different Species
Apart from our indigenous woodland trees and woodland shrubs, the arboretum contains trees from the Mediterranean, the Near East, China, Japan and the North American continent. The arboretum is regularly tended and added to. A notable recent acquisition is a Japanese sickle tree, which is considered a rarity. The total number of species (as a rule there are several examples of each species) has risen to 80 and it is planned to increase this to 100 different trees and shrubs in future. The sequoias are especially impressive in their growth and size, as well as in their beauty. They come from the Pacific region of North America. Those who have been there and seen the "General Sherman" know how big these trees can be. The "General Sherman" is almost ten metres in diameter, 84 metres tall and its crown has a diameter of 33 metres. Not far away we find the tulip tree, which is also a native of North America but is mainly indigenous in the east. As the name suggests, it has unusual blossoms and leaves and goes by the fine-sounding Latin name of Liriodendrom tulipifera. Goethe once wrote a deep poem about the Ginkgo tree ("The leaf of this tree, entrusted to my garden by the East..."). Two examples of this tree have so far survived in the arboretum. Although attacked by frost again and again, they have always budded again. Let us hope that they will once again become giant trees, as they are in many of our parks and as they once were in the prehistoric period known as the Perm. Fossilised remains of these trees from the Pliocene period 30 million years ago have been found here in Europe. Today''s ginkgos come from the primeval forests of China near the Yangtsee river.
Rare Plants
The "prehistoric sequoia", which for a long time was known to exist only as a fossil, is also represented in our arboretum. This tree was discovered as a living plant in China in 1945 and since then it has adorned many a garden and park with its mimosa-like needle leaves. It is undoubtedly also interesting for the visitor to the arboretum to study the various types of firs, pines and spruces and to discover that rowan trees, whitebeams, snowberries and service berries are close relations or that pear and apple are indigenous woodland trees. In order to allow visitors to observe branches, buds and fruit over a long period, cutting or tearing off branches is not allowed in the arboretum. However everyone is most welcome to observe and study the plants and to enjoy their diversity.
The path to the arboretum can best be reached from the "Schulmeisterbuche" car park in the woods (see sketch map). This car park is located on the edge of the "Spitalwald" next to the B 28 going towards Nagold. If you follow the wooden signposts and walk for about 15 minutes through the former Herrenberg "Spitalwald", you come to the arboretum. The arboretum can also easily be reached by the public means of transport. From Herrenberg city rail link (S-Bahn) station, where trains go to and from Stuttgart every half an hour, you can catch a bus from "Kalkofenstrasse" (next to the post office) which take you to "Schulmeisterbuche" station in five minutes (bus number 776).
There are of course no opening times for the arboretum. It can be visited at any time.
