Natural Heritage of the Region around Großkorbetha

A trip through Saxony-Anhalt Welcome to Saxony-Anhalt. Großkorbetha lies in the south of Saxony-Anhalt near Halle at the river Saale. The region is rich of natural resources and historically important places. In this presentation we want to show you some of the most interesting ones. Enjoy it.

Saxony-Anhalt On the first slide you can see Saxony-Anhalt with its capital city Magdeburg and its biggest town Halle. Großkorbetha is a village in the south of Halle, about 30 km away.

Magdeburg Halle Großkorbetha

Natural resources The next slide shows you what natural resources the region has and where they are found. Natural gas, salt and coal are the main raw materials which have been mined for hundreds of years. One of the biggest coal mines is to the south of Großkorbetha.

T K K T natural resources: coal kali salt natural gas Magdeburg Halle Großkorbetha T

Agriculture This slide shows you agricultural products Agriculture This slide shows you agricultural products. They grow sugar beet, rape, potatoes, corn and fruit in our region. Around Großkorbetha you find huge fields with sugar beet which are grown to produce sugar.

K T Vegatable raw materials sugar beet fruit potatoes rape corn vegetable K Magdeburg Na Halle Großkorbetha T

Animals We also keep useful animals like pigs, sheep, chicken, and cattle. You can find huge sheds and large meadows around Großkorbetha.

Animals cattle pigs sheep chicken

The Geiseltal region   About 15 km west of Großkorbetha lies one of the most interesting natural regions. For many years the region around the Geiseltal was one of the biggest open-cast minings for coal. Thousands of holes showed how much coal was found here.

  Pre-historic animals In the last 80 years of coal-mining, a whole zoo of prehistoric animals was found there. For example the 200,000-year-old female mammoth, which was put up in its original size of 3.20m height and 4.60m length in the History Museum in Halle.    

The mini-horse of the Geiseltal In 1933 the Geiseltal became famous all around the world, because the skeleton of the unique pre-historic mini-horse was found here. It is only 56cm long, but shows what the world was like 50 million years ago.  

The Neanderthal men They also found skeletons of elephants, lions, hyenas and rhinos which lived here millions of years ago. The skeletons also show marks how they were caught and cut by Neanderthal men who lived in this region 120,000 years ago. One of the Neanderthal men left the world's oldest fingerprint on a stone.  

Subtropical climate around Großkorbetha The findings of more than 180 species of plants show the variety of the fauna 50 million years ago when the climate was subtropical in our region.

Today’s Geiseltal look After the end of the prehistoric diggings in the Geiseltal in 2003, the area was flooded with water. Now the Geiseltal Lake is the biggest artificial lake in Germany. It has an area of 19 square km. It is becoming more and more a centre for water sports, riding, walking, and relaxing. With its 41km of beach it is ideal for swimming and sun-bathing. A harbour for yachts and boats was built, so all kinds of water sport are possible. On one side of the lake they also grow wine.