Four Rivers / VierStromen
(Fly)Fishing the lowlands

River nature

River valleys take or should I say took, a specific form in the Netherlands. A form we all had to learn by heart at school: summer bed, summer dike, flood plains (uiterwaard), and winter dike. Well, may be at some time in the past when uiterwaarden were still economically viable this was true but now there is only one dike and no controlled summer bed. The uiterwaard has returned, for the most part, to its natural state: floodlands.

New but all to common:
a woolhand crab.
Dead and lunch for the birds.

This is due partly because you can't build in floodlands and agricultural returns are ever diminishing which makes the land next to worthless and partly to the growing insight that the rivers need room to expand during floods. Dikes channel rivers with the result of flash floods. Floods move like a tsunami through the channel created by the dikes. What flood plains do is store water and release it more slowly, calming down the flood.

Another growing insight is that in a crowded land as the Netherlands there is not much room for nature. Claiming any land for nature development is a costly business. Here however necessity and nature go hand in hand: the water engineers need land with lots of vegetation and no obstructions like buildings and roads and the nature needs room and not a lot of human interference. And there we have it; lots of new nature along the banks of our rivers.

This new kind of nature is a bit rough and if the truth were told not very pretty. It is nature of the "life is delayed dying" type. A bit gothic, maybe. But its not fragile and that is good news because that means that the public is allowed in and can do whatever they more or less want to do (and believe me that is very rare indeed over here).

The vegetation is rough, thorny and clinging to your clothes. It is not a place for summer dresses and flip-flops. We even have coined a term for walking in this new nature: struinen. I suppose for the Dutch walking on a flood plain is as close as they can come to the 'great outdoors' in their own country as possible.

Ooibossen (floodplain forests)

The woods growing on these plains are called Ooibossen, floodplain forests. They consist of several kinds of willow, alder, birch and poplar, seldom high, seldom straight. It grows any way the light falls. At some locations attempts are made to preserve the old pollard-willows but for the most part it is laissez faire.

The result is beautiful in a surprising way. I suppose that as Dutch we are used to see and appreciate well-groomed landscapes. Benign landscapes controlled by man. We expect to be able to go anywhere and to go without encountering quicksand, horses run wild, deep creeks or thistle jungles. These woods are different, they are not exactly dangerous but it is clear that they are not ruled by man. They live and die by the rules of light, land and water.

This doesn't mean that man is absent in this landscape, far from it. Ruins are everywhere. De uiterwaarden used to be prime real estate. Brick ovens are everywhere because flood plains mean clay and clay means bricks. They built these ovens here despite the risk of flooding, to be close to the raw material clay and to the main supply route for fuel the river. These ovens are like fortresses in brick. Some have been restored and can be visited. If you are interested in a visit just let me know.

As I have said most of the floodlands are now open to the public and they are certainly worth a visit. With the boat a visit is as easy as going ashore.

Ooibos in photo's All these pictures have been taken in early spring, which improves the atmosphere no end. What these pictures cannot show is the immense growth power of these woods. As soon as the water recedes plants shoot up in a race to the light. Their feet still in water but look at the moss on the stems that's how high the water came. The woods flood twice a year and they survive. At these locations where water stands for a long time and there is no current the ground is mostly clay. Where there is a current sediments are more coarse, white sand and even pebbles. Near the small village of Kekerdom this even has resulted in the return of river dunes. (to the right) A good example of how trees grow here. Multiple stems are normal and any height is only achieved when they force each other up in a race to the light. The trench in the ground is man made. Here clay has been dug off to provide the brick ovens. The pattern is the same every where: parallel trenches. The dikes between them where used to remove the clay by wheelbarrow.

	(Left) Another example of the clay mining trenches. I hope the atmosphere comes across. This place always gives me the creeps. Horses and cows roam here and they are not totally tame... Every now and again you encounter one standing discouraged between the trees. Head down, wet skin. Almost enough to feel sorry, certainly enough for a detour.   Erosion caught up with this mighty willow. Once upon a time it stood high up on the bank but the river crept up and now its days are numbered.
The river has won: a willow on its way to Rotterdam.
Late summer, burdock ready to cling to anything.