Nachtigallental I

More information about the history

Willi Ostermann

Listen in. Here you can find out what the Cologne composer Willi Ostermann, his ditty about a forest hike and the beginning of mass tourism have to do with “Nightingale Valley”:

Image: Postcard, signed souvenir photo, with a comment from Willi Ostermann, in private ownership (Kohl collection)

Willi Ostermann was a popular singer from Cologne and the composer of numerous well-known folk and carnival songs – most of which were in Rhineland dialect. In the 1930s, he regularly visited the nearby castle inn. Here, he met up with friends from Königswinter, and it was the base from which he began hikes in the surrounding countryside. Underneath this typical tourist photo, Ostermann humorously quoted from the famous song “Mer rigge met dem Äsel op der Drachenfels” [I rode on a donkey up the Drachenfels] (Toni Steingass).

Image: Record label, “Da wo die sieben Berge...” by Willi Ostermann

In 1930, six years before he died, Willi Ostermann sang about the Siebengebirge and “Nightingale Valley” in the marching song “Da, wo die sieben Berge” [There where the seven hills]. The composer from Cologne thereby brought the valley to prominence, in line with other well-known places on the Rhine. 19 years later and in Ostermann’s honour, a Königswinter carnival society and the local male voice choir inaugurated the Ostermann monument, designed by Franz Josef Krings, which the Willi Ostermann Society still regularly pilgrimages to today.

"Nightingale Valley" habitat

Image: Fire salamander

The fire salamander feels most at home in damp, mixed deciduous forests with clean and cool streams. As its habitat is becoming smaller and smaller due to the frequent development measures and the straightening of streams, it is now deemed a “specially protected species” in accordance with the Bundesnaturschutzgesetz [German Federal Nature Conservation Act] and catching, harming or killing it is forbidden.

Image: Thin-spiked wood sedge, wikipedia, Kristian Peters

“Nightingale Valley” is not only a home to rare and endangered species of animals; a number of sensitive plants also flourish here. One of these is the thin-spiked wood sedge (Carex strigosa), which grows in damp deciduous forests and in alluvial forests with streams. It also likes dense soil which is rich in nutrients and contains low levels of lime. The ecological gem on the Mennesbach can provide it with all this.

Practical information

Visit the permanent exhibition on the history of nature conservation in the outer bailey of Drachenburg castle.
Opening hours:
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Rhine travel, Rhine romanticism and regional history Siebengebirgsmuseum Königswinter, Kellerstrasse 16
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