The king of the forest

Since it's a bit cold and messy outside, allow me to take you on a little journey of natural discovery.

On the farthest Eastern edge of our country, straddled over the border we share with Belarus lies a magical wilderness: the primeval forest of Białowieża.

With only small villages to house guests and scarce transportation, the region does not, at first glance, seem like an inviting tourist location. No large hotels, no resorts, no shopping, no night life.

But one does not come to Białowieża for the night life. Not the human sort, anyway, which leaves you hungover and dry-mouthed, sleeping through the better part of the morning. In Białowieża, it behooves the tourist to rise before the sun, don her wellingtons, and rush through the dewy dawn with eyes wide open and camera in hand, to catch the boar, the deer, and the wisent at their breakfast grazing.

Deer coming to have a drink of water from the pond, at 4:30 am. A sight worth losing sleep over.

Leave man-made entertainment in the cities. Here, nature is your host.

A path designed to protect the undergrowth from humans in the strict protection zone of the National Park.
You cannot enter this area without a guide.

The border leaves most of the woodland on the Belarussian side, but what is left in Poland is still a vast and ecologically rich area. Over centuries, it was protected as a king's hunting grounds, and thus survived almost intact until the 1900s. Both World Wars caused significant damage, but it was in 1919 that the forest suffered what was arguably its greatest loss: the death of the last wild wisent.

What's a wisent, you ask?

Hello!

Otherwise known as the Bison bonasus, it is a cousin of the American bison (Bison bison), and the largest European mammal. A male can weigh up to 920 kilos (that's over two thousand lbs!), and lives about 25 years. Isn't it frightening that both species of this impressive genus, though divided by a great ocean, came so close to extinction by fault of man's drive to war and conquest?

I say they came close- because luckily, the wisent is back.

Back in style, baby.

In 1923, in that short period between World Wars, a society was formed in Poland with the express intention of saving the species and returning the wisent back to the European wilderness- starting with the Białowieża forest. Their hope lay in the many wisent from Białowieża which had been sent to zoological gardens worldwide during the 19th century. As it turned out, there were only 54 individuals who had survived in captivity. And not all of them were fit to reproduce...

But in the end, the attempt was successful. The first wisent, a male born in Germany and named Borusse was placed in the forest preserve a mere six years later. He was joined by two females, the pureblood Biserta and the half wisent half bison Faworytka, both raised in Stockholm. By the time World War Two broke out, sixteen wisent were romping in the forest- luckily, all of them survived the ordeal.

A little herd chilling out.

Today, there are over 500 bison living wild in the Polish part of the Białowieża forest. This is still a small number, and with the genetic material all going back to the same small group of wisent recovered from the zoos, it is important to control the further expanse of the population. Each new wisent is recorded in the European Bison Pedigree Book, published yearly- this helps guarantee the purity of the species and grants important information to breeders. Today, the Book counts over 4000 bison worldwide, over half of that number living in the wild. A 1000 of them live in Poland, of which half reside in the Białowieża forest.

So, you see, if you go visit Białowieża, you won't have too much trouble spotting a wisent, whether in the reserve, or out grazing a field. Just remember these few tips: don't get too close, approach them quietly and with great caution, and if the wisent looks right at you- stop, and don't come any closer. He's watching you, now. He'll keep on watching you until you go away. And if you don't go away- he will.

Most of all, remember that he's the king of the forest, and you are merely his guest.

By the way, the Polish word for wisent is 'żubr'. Have you ever heard of a vodka called Żubrówka? It's a yellowish colour, and comes in a tall bottle with a blade of bisongrass inside. Yep. It's named after the wisent, and it's one of the best vodkas in Poland.



Meta Info:

Wikipedia entry on Białowieża Forest:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bia%C5%82owie%C5%BCa_Forest

Official website of the Białowieża National Park:
http://bpn.com.pl/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=104&Itemid=178

A photo of dr Erna Mohr and Borusse, the first wisent to return to the forest:
http://bpn.com.pl/images/stories/opisy/wydawnictwa/erna.png

The European Bison Pedigree Book in History and Today ( a pdf with lots of cool old photos)
http://bpn.com.pl/images/stories/opisy/wydawnictwa/krz/broszura_ang.pdf 

Wikipedia entry for Żubrówka Vodka:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%BBubr%C3%B3wka

A story of two wars

This is a true story and I never tire of hearing it.

My paternal grandfather was born in 1899 in what was then Prussian territory, and so at seventeen, he was drafted into the Prussian army to serve during World War One. He was Polish, of birth and of heart, which he later proved through his actions in the Uprising of 1918, but being born in bilingual territory, he spoke the cleanest German. He was an officer, a professional soldier, and his name was Stanisław Bryll.

Grandpa Staś

In 1939, he fought under General Kleeberg in the last large battle of the September 1939 defensive campaign.

This battle was fought by the small town of Kock (pronounced Kotsk) in the Podlasie region, close to the present Belarussian and Ukrainian borders. Grandpa Stanisław was a scout, mainly on account of his excellent German. Kleeberg's Corps was in fact the last organised unit of the Polish Army left standing, and his men fought fiercely to defend their position, hoping for the aid promised by the French and English Allies.

The Allies, however, never came, and Kleeberg was running low on supplies. My grandfather took part in one desperate skirmish fought with bayonets- the soldiers had no bullets left. But the mad advance was such a shock to the Germans that they retreated. The hopeless charge turned into another victory.

Thus, though outnumbered, the Polesie Group, as they were called, continued to win battle after battle- but their time was running out along with their provisions and ammunition. And when Bolshevik airplanes roared in from the East, Kleeberg was forced to make the difficult decision to disband the Corps.

General Franciszek Kleeberg

So, on October 6th, after sending his men away through the forest, Kleeberg capitulated. He had not lost a single battle in that campaign, and was the last Polish general to surrender in 1939. He did so knowing that there was no hope of winning another battle, and that if his men would be captured by the advancing Bolsheviks, they would no doubt be executed. He was right- by the end of the war, thousands of Polish officers were murdered by the Soviet Secret Police in one of the many attempts of the aggressors to eliminate the Polish elite.

Kleeberg died as a prisoner of war,  but his men escaped through the thick, primeval forests of the Podlasie region. Alas, the hunt was on, and finally, grandpa Stanisław was taken prisoner. Luckily- as it turned out- by the Germans.

Along with a few others, he was marched West, to an unknown fate, under the supervision of a man only slightly older than him. Since he knew German, he began to chat with this Wehrmacht officer, who was after all just another man and not the barking Hollywoodian stereotype Nazi we have come to class all German soldiers as. They talked about the battle, about weapons, this and that- and it was not long before the German noticed something curious about Stanisław. This Pole, he observed, did not only speak perfect German, but he used a particular military jargon.

A very familiar military jargon.

This is the coincidence that saved my grandfather's life. It turned out that Stanisław and his German captor had both served in the Prussian army in 1916. They had practically been brothers in arms, fighting the same battles and skulking in neighbouring trenches at Verdun. They spoke the same language; the instantly recognisable, very particular jargon of WWI soldiers.

I don't know how long the Wehrmacht officer thought about what he did next, and how he rearranged his loyalties. I don't know exactly what went through his mind when he asked Stanisław where he lived.

Fifty, maybe sixty kilometres from here, was the answer. Not too long a walk, for a soldier.

"Kameraden," said the German. "I will turn around, and I will not look. And you will run home."

Who knew whether he would keep his word? As Stanisław turned and made away through the forest, he feared a bullet in his back, as any fleeing prisoner would. Maybe the German was playing a cruel game?

He was not. No shot was fired, no chase given. Out of sentiment, or perhaps out of some complicated loyalty towards his fellow soldier, the German had let my grandfather go.

I never met my grandfather- he died before I was born, in 1969, still hiding from socialist repression towards Home Army soldiers. But in October 1939 he did make it home to his wife and son, exhausted and ill, crawling with lice and wearing a disguise of rags pulled from clothes lines and scarecrows- his uniform would have been a death sentence. He went on to fight in the underground, often working as a spy, using forged papers to pass as a German and gather information.

Here is his grave, which I visited this week for All Souls' Day. He is buried in Falenica, a district of Warsaw, where he died unexpectedly while walking to the train station to meet my stepbrother, and my grandmother. Her name was Helena, and I remember her as she outlived him by nineteen years. She is buried beside him, and it is worth mentioning that she, also, worked for the underground, gathering information while working as a translator in a hospital for German soldiers.

They were both remarkable people. But so was that German officer, whose story we'll never know, at the very least in that moment when he decided to turn his back, and let my grandfather escape. He must have been quite aware that he would not only risk being tried for treason if his deed was discovered, but that the man he had let go would never cease to fight against the invaders.

Whatever it was that made you do it, thank you, unknown German soldier.



Meta info:

Wikipedia page for General Kleeberg's Corps, the Independent Operational Group Polesie:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independent_Operational_Group_Polesie

General Kleeberg's photo taken from a Public Domain file:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kleeberg.jpg