Konik Horses at the Feeding Area

The Heck cattle are already very respectful!

Heath animals as helpers
Nowadays, grazing animals help to preserve the heaths by pushing back the bushes:In the Altenwalder Heide (area of the former military training area), Heck cattle, wild horses and bison do this in large paddocks.
Other heath areas are grazed by sheep and goats in herding systems.
A signposted network of paths with information boards, observation platforms and educational trails leads through the diverse Cuxhaven coastal heath landscape. The beach and mudflats have made Cuxhaven famous. (Source: duhnen.de/entdecken-erleben/natur/cuxhavener-kuestenheide/)

Koniks - a pony breed from Poland
The Konik originally comes from Central and Eastern Europe. The ponies are very robust and are now often used in landscape maintenance. Unfortunately, it is not really a wild horse. However, genetically it is said to be very closely related to the Tarpan, the extinct European wild horse. The Koniks are said to come from former wild horse populations that were also hunted. Whether these horses were real wild horses or just feral domestic horses is still unclear today. Some of these wild animals were distributed to regional farmers in the Zamość area.Due to the poverty of the farmers, the horses were kept with very little human care. As a result, they remained very robust and proved themselves as working and draft horses. During the world wars, they played an important role in transporting troops as Panje horses. Due to their originality, the Koniks quickly attracted the interest of breeding researchers in Poland and also in Germany. The brothers Heinz and Lutz Heck at Konik also tried to breed the Tarpan back. The result was the Heck horse, which is said to resemble the extinct Tarpan.
(Source: tberg.de/koniks-und-heckrinder-in-der-cuxhavener-kuestenheide/#Koniks_%E2%80%93_eine_Ponyrasse_aus_Polen