Lecture on the Zoetermeer peat bog
What is left of the vast moorland of and around Zoetermeer? How did it come to be and what can still be seen? Wednesday evening, October 22, these questions are the focus of the Forum branch of the Zoetermeer Library.
Once this region was one big, virtually uninhabitable peat bog. It looked completely different from today's landscape of polders, canals and mills.
What causes this? Landscape changes because of the way residents farm, use and inhabit the land on which they settle. Nature in that landscape evolves with it: as the landscape changes, herbs, plants, trees, birds and insects make way for other species. In the course of history, a landscape can change its character and appearance many times. This was also the case in our region.
Zoetermeer history expert, historian Ton Vermeulen, will discuss the history of Zoetermeer in which the peat played a very important role, also as an economic factor. And on the question why the peat disappeared. Nature expert Dr. Henk Lubberding, guide of the Nature and Landscape Garden Zoetermeer, discusses the special flora and fauna of the peat. He also tells where you can still see peat in our hometown.
This evening is a joint initiative of the Zoetermeer Library and the Nature and Landscape Garden Zoetermeer. It is the first of a cycle of 3 evenings in the coming months. For this evening we have collaborated with Historisch Genootschap Oud-Soetermeer.
Time and place
Wednesday, Oct. 22, from 8 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.
Location: Forum Library branch, Stadhuisplein 1, Zoetermeer
To register
Admission is free, but seating is limited. Therefore, it is necessary that you register at: library-zoetermeer.op-shop.nl | Lecture Series Nature Garden 22-10-2025