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Rewilding is the large-scale restoration of ecosystems to the point where nature can take care of itself. It’s not about leaving nature to its own devices, or releasing packs of real wolves into our cities, but about humans carefully intervening to recreate the conditions for nature to thrive in a healthy way for everyone. To find out more, Speak Up contacted expert Sara King. King is an ecologist who works as rewilding manager with the environmental charity Rewilding Britain. We began by asking her what exactly rewilding is and what it involves in practice.

Sara King (English accent): It’s definitely not about closing the gate and walking away. [Our] ecosystems and our natural processes are so out of balance that if you did that in a lot of places, you probably would just get a whole load of bramble scrub or something like that. So there’s a lot of intervention that people need to take at the start to almost reset and restart those natural processes. So re-wiggling rivers, peatland restoration, sometimes tree planting, sometimes changing grazing levels and different grazing types to then kickstart natural processes, so that maybe in twenty, thirty, fifty years’ time, nature can then start to lead the way a little bit more

european influence

Many people believe that rewilding is simply a trendy term for an old practice. King explains that in Britain at least, it is a novel approach to the natural world.

Sara King: I see it as being quite new, especially in Britain. It’s something that’s been happening in North America and mainland Europe for probably quite a few years now. We’re probably about, I don’t know, twenty, thirty years behind mainland Europe with our rewilding. We look back in the past and what we used to have here is kind of inspiration for what might be missing. Maybe there were lynx here once, wildcats, pine martens, that gives us an idea of how many species and natural processes are maybe missing. But it’s very much a new concept, looking at trying to change that viewpoint of letting nature lead the way rather than the more outcome-focused approach that we’ve traditionally taken. So I think in Britain in particular, it’s still quite new, which is why we set up the network to try and help to support practitioners. Because it is such a new concept, it’s difficult, there’s no off-the-shelf solution that you can just put the blueprints together, and that’s how you do it. It’s very unique to each site, which makes it really exciting, but also very tricky for those landowners who are trying to develop a strategy for what they want to do.

JURASSIC PARK

Many people also assume that rewilding means reintroducing worrying species, such as bears and wolves, beavers, wildcats, lynxes and bison to every area, and placing them in giant enclosures like the movie Jurassic Park.

Sara King: It’s definitely not the ambition of rewilding, and I think I would love us to have a landscape where you don’t have that fencing you can walk through an area where there’s bison and there’s semi-wild horses acting as they should, and there’s semi-wild cattle and there’s maybe wild boar, or pigs as a proxy, roaming within that area... there’s beavers there. And we learn how to reconnect with these animals and keep our distance from them, because it happens in mainland Europe; you can walk through these areas and people don’t really get attacked.

THE NETWORK

King manages and coordinates the Rewilding Network across Britain, which includes some exciting marine projects. The network provides inspiration, expertise and knowledge exchange from members, and although it only covers about one per cent of available UK land at present, it involves a large number of people. Nature needs many helping hands, as King explains.

Sara King: I think there will always be a role for people in there, even in a hundred years’ time, and definitely in the next ten, twenty, thirty years. We do need to be involved in these projects to reset and restore some of the habitats that have been degraded so much. So yeah, I think there will always be a role for people. And we are part of nature and we shouldn’t forget that we are also part of it. We’re not separate from it. 

GET INVOLVED

Not everyone has the resources or time to commit to rewilding. But we can all play our role, says King.

Sara King: Lots of rewilding projects have opportunities for people to visit for free on public footpaths or to get involved with programmes or walks that they do. So have a look on our network map and see where your nearest project is and get involved with it, go and visit it, go and experience rewilding. Because you can read all the books that you like, but if you can go and visit a project, that’s how you really connect with the magic of rewilding.

GOOD FOR HUMANS 

In our age of information gone wild, there are many more assumptions made about rewilding that are embellished or simply not true. King addresses the main ones.

Sara King: The main one is that people think it’s about excluding people, it’s about closing the gate and walking away, it’s about land abandonment and pushing people off the land. We also get the misconceptions that it’s all about wolves and bears and lynx, or you just want to rewild everywhere, and then we won’t have any food production… But they’re all false, really, and I think through showcasing real examples, we can then start to push back on some of those. Because actually in a lot of cases, it’s about bringing more people onto the land rather than pushing people off. Because you’re bringing people on to help with ecology surveys, with livestock management, you’re bringing in new enterprises, tourism. You actually end up with more jobs and more volunteers, so actually more people there rather than excluding people.  

www.rewildingbritain.org.uk