In harmony with nature

Since 2012, we have had our own farm on the grounds of the St. Martins Spa & Lodge. However, our team does not work on "conventional" production such as milk, meat or crops. Over the years, our agriculture has increasingly focused on creating and preserving living space. Although the area is comparatively small, it is all the more structurally rich: we farm a wet meadow, a salt marsh, an approximately 500-metre-long hedge and, since the beginning of 2022, a 30-metre-long bee-eater breeding wall.

St. Martins has committed itself as an operator of active agriculture to implement certain conservation goals on part of the area around bathing lake as part of the results-oriented nature conservation plan. The sensitive habitat should thus be preserved for as many rare species as possible.

In 2015, our bird ringing station went into operation, where birds are gently caught, measured, marked and released at regular intervals and according to the standards of the Austrian Ornithological Institute at the Konrad Lorenz Institute for Comparative Behavioural Research. From the data obtained, population changes can be read and our guests can look over the shoulders of our ornithologists at work during guided tours.

During the scientific bird ringing, our guests can gain insight into this method of bird research and also marvel at the birds up close.

With the excavated soil from a wind turbine on the Parndorfer Platte, a bee-eater breeding wall was erected on our site in cooperation with Püspök Group and Porr. Already in the first year (2022), the bee-eater breeding wall was colonised by two pairs of bee-eaters and breeding was successful. We are already looking forward to further successful broods. Our TGI sheep have also already found a "retreat" there.

The building of the St. Martins Spa & Lodge, our stables and the trees along the discovery trail have been equipped with more than 100 nesting aids for birds. Several pairs of long-eared owls and kestrels breed on the grounds, more than 300 tree sparrows and one of the largest breeding colonies of house martins in Burgenland exists on the façade of the thermal baths. In addition to protecting species, nesting aids also serve as role models for thousands of visitors every year.