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The former military training area (”polygon”) at Utsal in spring 1999. The photo shows that at the time there were still large treeless areas

 

Utsali was a village in the midst of marshes and bogs on the left bank of the beautiful Pedja river. In 1952 a training ground for the Soviet Army air bombing squadrons was established here whereupon forced liquidation of the village and bombing of the area during nearly 40 years followed. The last Soviet militaries left Utsali in 1992: one year after Estonia’s regained independence and a few years before the birth of the Alam-Pedja Nature Reserve.

 

The village lane in Utsali in autumn 2014. A few open areas remain

 

In autumn 2014 the boundaries of the hayfields of the former Utsali village could only be guessed. The majority of them are covered by new forest where birches, alders and goat willows (Salix caprea) stand out. The former village lane has become a path for wild boar.

 

Treecreeper

 

The trip offers plenty of silence, in which the voices of tit flocks ring now and then. The callers are familiar acquaintances from every autumn: great tits, blue tits, marsh tits and nuthatches. And true – in addition to them there is a noteworthy number of treecreepers here. Long-tailed tits move too, but they keep to themselves.

 

Mighty bomb crater, now a beaver habitat. Here the diameter of the water surface is about a dozen meters

 

A part of the bomb craters are visible from the village road. Going to ramble in the new forest, one bomb crater leads you to another. Each following ground hollow is mostly predictable from afar if not visible. The diameters of the water surfaces in the craters reach up to a dozen meters. The larger water surfaces have sauna pond dimensions: in summer one can go swimming in them!  The traces from activities suggest that now mainly beavers come to swim here.

 

Kirna homestead. The former farmhouse was located in the open area in the foreground. Preserved barrack buildings can be seen at left in the distance. The new building at right is the Kirna Learning Centre where the space is shared between the Defence League (Kaitseliit) and the Alam-Pedja Nature Centre.

 

It has been said repeatedly that in their own way the Soviet military forces also defended the nature of Alam-Pedja. Due to the strict special regime, utilisation of the forests was significantly impeded. Movement prohibitions around the Utsali training area were more severe than in the present nature reserves in the protected area – human activities were banned in a large area - at risk of gunpoint measures! Considered in this way, the liquidation of the Utsali homesteads can be regarded as a kind of sacrificial offering, although a very undesirable one. Now the former village has disappeared, in its place the land of a thousand ponds has come into existence.

 

More photos: LINK

 

Looduskalender’s Alam-Pedja stories are supported by the Keskkonnainvesteeringute Keskus (KIK).