The Lias clay pit - a special geological feature

To mark Geotope Day, the Nossentiner/Schwinzer Heath Nature Park is organizing an excursion to the former Neu Schwinz clay pit near Dobbertin from 10 am to 12 noon. Nature park manager Ralf Koch will familiarize participants with the geological development and special features of this site. The Hellberg brickworks once stood here, producing bricks intermittently from 1873 to 1940. After 1945, the brickworks lay in ruins. Numerous buildings were demolished to extract building materials and the last machines were removed. Some of it was used to rebuild other brickworks after the war.

The former clay pit became famous due to fossil finds in the Posidonia slate, which is found in a clay clod from the Lias (sediments from the Lower Jurassic). Insect and fish fossils in particular have made this site famous beyond the region. A small educational trail leads through the former clay pit, and information boards tell interested visitors all about the use of the pit, the brickworks and the fossils discovered here.

The meeting point for the excursion is the parking lot opposite the clay pit next to the turn-off to Neu Schwinz.