Welcome to my homepage about native butterflies in Germany. I will give you some interesting information about the threat to butterflies and I will show you what you can do to preserve the biodiversity of butterflies in my home country.
My name is Katharina Loevenich, I am 14 years old and I go to a grammar school, the Gymnasium Nonnenwerth in 53424 Remagen, Germany. I have been involved in the protection of nature and species during the last few years, especially that of butterflies. In February 2006 I took part in the competition "Youth explores" and won the fourth price. This led to my taking part in the competition “From Knowledge to Action” in March 2007 (www.buw-home.de). I won a first price, donated by the ministry of Education and Research. The distribution of prices took place on 21 September at Hahn-Meitner Institution in Berlin, Germany.
In September 2007 I got an invitation by the minister of research to meet another 300 German students in Berlin who had won competition prices as well. It was called "Day of Talents 2007". I enjoyed the time very much and was thankful for the opportunity to discuss global problems with politicians, scientists and experts.
In February 2008 I took part in the competition “Explore the Diversity of Nature” organized by the German Federal Environmental Foundation DBU. They gave me an invitation to the 9th UN Conference on biological diversity in Bonn. I am very proud of getting the opportunity to present my project in Bonn on 30 May 2008. Experts from all over the world will discuss topics of biodiversity and I will have the chance to join in. I am very proud to have this chance.
Once upon a time my project started ...
In the spring of 2005 my friends and I noticed that there were less butterflies in our surroundings. We saw just a few species, for example the small tortoiseshell, the brimstone and the large white. I noticed that I had to do research if I wanted to do something for butterflies. So I decided to start a rescue operation for native butterfly species.
For that purpose I got information about the biology of butterflies and the butterfly population in my home town. I observed the metamorphosis of the animals in a self-built herbarium, tested the reactions of the caterpillars to different environmental influences and their orientation in their environment and I interviewed experts. I heard that many species of the butterflies are endangered and so I asked myself why there is a loss of biodiversity of butterflies. The butterflies are endangered because their habitat is made smaller because of the constantly increasing settlements of humans and because the food plants of the caterpillars, which in a lot of cases are considered to be weeds, have got lost.
Because I talked to friends and my family about my research and recognized how little is known about the threat to butterflies I saw fast that my first step for helping the endangered butterflies was to inform the population. So I talked to my classmates, informed the visitors of a spring festival about butterflies and about what threatens their survival, I organized a project day in a primary school and wrote an article for the school-homepage and a local newspaper. After that I designed a flyer and began with the work for this webpage.
The webpage has its source in good ideas of my father and my brother. It is very exciting to see my site growing and there are more and more ideas to work on. Many people delivered important information, much as the colleagues of the butterfly park Schloß Sayn, Mr. Walter Schön (www.schmetterling-raupe.de) with his photographs, Mr. Thomas Brötz, Bund für Umwelt und Naturschutz Deutschland Kreis Ahrweiler with his interview, Family Jeroma with the interest in natural garden planning, Mrs. Stephanie Martin (www.freiraum-gartengestaltung.de) and my biology teacher Miss Barbara Knieps.
Mrs. Ursula Windheuser and Mrs. Dr. Thimann-Verhey kindly supported me by doing a lot of difficult translation work.
I wish you fun with reading my webpages and doing gardening. And please don`t forget: We live in nature- we must only realize!
