^{This page is part of © FOTW Flags Of The World website}

Amt Foehr-Land (Germany)

Amt Föhr-Land, Nordfriesland County, Schleswig-Holstein

Wrixum municipality

See also:

County and Municipal Flags (Schleswig-Holstein)
Schleswig-Holstein
Nordfriesland County
Nordfriesland Cities and municipalities
Germany

Wrixum municipality

3:5 image by Jörg Majewski, 31 Mar 2006
adopted 12 May 2005

Municipality Wrixum
Amt* Föhr-Land (Foehr-Land)
County Nordfriesland, state Schleswig-Holstein
Flag adopted 12th May 2005
*An "Amt" is a combination of several municipalities into an administrative community.
Jörg Majewski, 31 Mar 2006

The birds on the flag of Wrixum look like oystercatchers. I don't recall having seen this bird on any flag, one more species to add to the vexillological zoo.
Pascal Gross, 31 Mar 2006

Yes, the birds are oystercratchers (Austernfischer). It is the characteristic bird of the Wrixumer Marsch on the island of Föhr.
Jörg Majewski, 1 Apr 2006

The oystercatcher is named in Dutch "scholekster" (literally: shoal-magpie). In my native language, Frisian, the bird has many names:
- strânljip (beach-lapwing)
- fjildakster (field-magpie)
- fjildekster (idem)
- bûnte liuw (multicolored lion)
- bûnte ljip (multicolored lapwing)
- bûnte pyt (multicolored birdie)
- Stynske ljip (East- or West-Indian lapwing)
- Stynske liuw (idem lion)
- Haematopus ostralegus

In my village the bird was known as "bûnte liuw" - multicolored as the Frisian cattle, but where they got the lion from is far beyond me. It is a typical bird of the Waddenzee, extending from Noord-Holland (Netherlands) to southern Denmark; every year hundreds of thousands of these birds visit this sea, and again - precious few oysters to be caught there...
Jarig Bakker, 1 Apr 2006

The local Southern African variety of the oyster catcher, known in Afrikaans as the Tobie, is all black with red legs and beak and, not surprisingly, known in English as the black oyster catcher. This little bird lays its eggs on the bare sand of the beaches of the Western and Southern Cape Provinces and is credited with changing environmental legislation. It is listed in the Red Data book as being near extinction because of human interference with its breeding habits. There is (or were) here a class of yokels who delighted in invading the beaches with their 4x4's and beach buggies and racing around on the sand without regard to the local wild life. This eventually caused such an uproar among the environmentalists that Parliament passed legislation banning all such vehicles from the beaches except at specified places. It is reported that in the past four years since the law came into effect, several more breeding pairs have been spotted.
Andries Burgers, 2 Apr 2006

Thanks to the oystercatcher and via the cows, we can reconcile France, Friesland and Holstein. The oystercatcher is called in French "huîtrier-pie".
An "huître" is an oyster; the circonflex accent on the i recalls the s from the Latin "ostrea", the Greek "ostreon" and the ancient French "huistre". The word "huitrier" is a very uncommon synonym of "ostréiculteur", oyster-farmer, and its main use is for the bird. The word was coined by Buffon in his "Histoire naturelle des oiseaux", as follows:

"On a aussi donné à cet huîtrier ou mangeur d'huîtres le nom de pie de mer, non seulement à cause de son plumage noir et blanc, mais encore parce qu'il fait, comme la pie, un bruit ou cri continuel, surtout lorsqu'il est en troupe; ce cri aigre et court est répété sans cesse en repos et en volant."

"This oystercatcher or oyster eater was also called sea magpie, not only because of its black and white feathers, but also because; like the magpie, it is continuously calling, especially when in group; this sharp and short call is relentlessly repeated either at rest or in flight."

A "pie" is a magpie and also the black and white colour of an animal fur. After having scoured the French coasts for decades, the Frisians became good fellows and cattle breeders and provided France with a holly cow called Française Frisonne Pie Noire, based on Frisian stock introduced in France in the XVIIIth century. Originally known as Hollandaise Pie Noire, the cow was renamed Française Frisonne Pie Noire in 1903 in order to please Jarig's ancestors. However, in 1990, the ungrateful French breeders renamed the cow Prim' Holstein because of the introgression of American Holstein stock (with, of course, remote origin in European Holstein). The Prim' Holstein is today the most milk-producive and most commonly found cow in France. The Bretonne Pie Noire cow, known in the past as Morbihannaise or Cornouailles, or "the poor's cow", has been progressivelty absorbed by the Frisonne and the Normande and is close to extinction. I have not
found any evidence of a relationship between the cow and the Breton flag.

The oystercatchers that nest in France are sedentary. In August and September, several Dutch and British birds join the local population for overwintering (so do more and more humans).
Ivan Sache, 29 Apr 2006