That manically melodic melody of the nightingale is a scarce occurrence in England these days, however it's different at the Surrey site. Previously, a lone bird could be noticed at this hidden location in rural Surrey; recently, they were in multiple locations. “We were hearing them chirping all night, from five different territories,” notes Meg Cookson, top biologist for the youth rewilding group. A group of volunteers were residing temporarily at the location, but the birds were so noisy, “we stayed awake all night,” says Layla Mapemba. “We were all knackered the next day, but it was so incredible.” An professional from the local conservation group came to help them net and ring one of the nightingales the next morning, the ecologist remembers: “He’d never touched a songbird in his possession before. He was teary.”
Ecological Restoration Progresses at This Location
Rewilding is by nature a slow business, but at this site at this property, after only a short period, the results are already visible, and noticeable. The farm previously served as a retirement home for horses. Now it’s a showpiece for the youth-led purpose: to speed up ecological restoration, in one of the most nature-depleted regions in the planet, and to link young people (18-30-year-olds) with a ecosystem they are often denied access to, and a global warming issue they are often powerless to stop. Global heating advances, tree clearing destroys ecosystems, and one more international meeting comes to a frustrating conclusion in the host country – so who could blame the younger generation for wishing to initiate change themselves?
Our organisation was founded on the belief that there were landowners prepared to allow a collection of young amateurs on to their property
“The youth is the best educated environmentally that there’s historically,” says the Youngwilders’ leader, a key figure. They are also “the highly invested in the problems, and have contributed the smallest part to their creation, and, then, are also going to experience consequences the worst as a result.”
Change of the Site
Currently, the organisation is taking root across the Britain – and the original site was the beginning, in every sense. “It’s our origin point, and the place we built our community,” explains Molly Easton, as she offers a tour of the 12-hectare site. “This once consisted of multiple separate areas,” she comments, as we walk through tall vegetation filled with shrubs, bordered by established trees. “The key noticeable difference is that we’ve eliminated all the enclosures, a significant length of it, to create the impression like a unified landscape.” In the summer, they donned special clothing and cleared masses of invasive plants, an invasive species that can burn the body. “We’ve planted loads of hedgerows,” says Easton. “But the primary focus is we’ve just given it space for a brief period. We’ve eliminated a significant amount of animal feeding and seen what’s come up.”
Low scrub and natural fences are a excellent nightingale home, she comments, however now they’re managing some of the wild growth to establish a more diversity of habitats and to join two parts of the land. Young saplings will take a while to take root, but saplings from the adjacent oaks are already establishing themselves in the meadows; the group have been setting up protectors to protect them from grazing deer.
Wildlife Reappears in Droves
It’s not just the songbirds – wildlife is coming back in abundance. This year they’ve spotted serpents, legless lizards, flyers and insects, notes another co-director, as he uncovers one of their survey equipment (such as a mat over a small hollow in the ground). “You find creatures and wildlife hiding under there, but it’s likely a slightly cool for them now.” Natural homes, constructed from empty parts of timber and active with wild bees, are attached to some of the trees. The removal of animals has provided small creatures opportunity to thrive in the meadows. When they visited this season, says Bennett, “I’d never seen so numerous lepidoptera. There were just masses of them. We were wondering, ‘What is going on?’”
Inception of the Movement
The original participants – Bennett, Durant, Easton and two others – came together as students, focusing on or expressing an interest in nature. In the recent past, the IPCC was forecasting that the target of one and a half degrees of warming was appearing impossible, the activist was spearheading the school strikes for eco-awareness, and campaigner Clover Hogan was addressing the generation suffering from “eco-worry”. It was also the era of Isabella Tree’s publication, on rewilding, on how the authors transformed the a nearby property from a struggling farm into a successful wildlife haven. “We were deeply influenced by the Knepp story, but what was the part for youth?” questions Molly. “So we developed a online presence and called many of environmental organizations and were saying, ‘Do you occasionally get your estate holders wishing to do something and you are short on time?’”
Durant explains the account: “Our whole organisation was fundamentally based on the idea that there were landowners who were ready to allow a bunch of young amateurs on to their property freely, to make fairly massive choices that would affect land value
