That beautifully intricate call of the songbird is a scarce presence in Britain nowadays, but it's different at Maple Farm. Four years ago, a lone bird could be detected at this remote spot in the countryside of Surrey; recently, they were everywhere. “We were listening to them chirping all night, from several zones,” explains one ecologist, lead ecologist for the youth rewilding group. A band of volunteers were residing temporarily at the site, yet the birds were so boisterous, “we were unable to rest all night,” comments a project coordinator. “We were all knackered the next day, but it was so incredible.” An expert from the Surrey Wildlife Trust came to help them trap and mark one of the birds the next morning, the ecologist recalls: “He’d never touched a nightingale in his care before. He was crying.”
Rewilding Accelerates at This Location
Ecological restoration is by nature a lengthy process, but at this site at this property, after just a short period, the results are already visible, and audible. The land was once a retirement home for animals. Currently it’s a model for the Youngwilders’ goal: to speed up habitat revival, in one of the biodiversity-poor nations in the planet, and to engage the younger generation (18-30-year-olds) with a natural world they are often shut out of, and a climate crisis they are often powerless to stop. Global heating continues, habitat loss destroys wildlife homes, and yet another Cop summit ends with a disappointing conclusion in abroad – so what person could criticize the younger generation for wanting to take matters into their own hands?
Our initiative was based on the idea that there were people prepared to let a group of youthful amateurs on to their property
“The younger generation is the most informed in terms of nature that there’s ever been,” says the Youngwilders’ co-director, a key figure. They are also “the highly invested in the challenges, and have played the minimal role to their causing, and, then, are also going to suffer most as a consequence.”
Revitalization of the Property
Now, the organisation is growing across the United Kingdom – and this location was the beginning, in all respects. “It’s our origin point, and where we created our community,” notes Molly Easton, as she offers a walkthrough of the expansive site. “This used to be six different fields,” she says, as we walk through long grass filled with bushes, hemmed by established trees. “The key visible change is that we’ve taken out all the barriers, a significant length of it, to create the impression like one environment.” In the warmer months, they wore protective gear and cleared significant quantities of giant hogweed, an non-native plant that can burn the skin. “We’ve established numerous of natural barriers,” explains she. “But the primary focus is we’ve just let it breathe for a short time. We’ve reduced a significant amount of animal feeding and observed what’s sprung up.”
Low scrub and natural fences are a ideal nightingale environment, she says, but now they’re trimming some of the brambles to develop a more variety of habitats and to link up different sections of the site. Young saplings will take a while to take root, but new growth from the surrounding oaks are already taking root in the open areas; the group have been setting up guards to protect them from wildlife.
Animals Reappears in Large Numbers
In addition to the songbirds – animals is reappearing in droves. Lately they’ve seen grass snakes, creatures, bats and insects, says another co-director, as he raises one of their monitoring tools (like a cover over a small hollow in the earth). “You get creatures and animals hiding under there, but it’s likely a bit chilly for them now.” Natural beehives, made from empty parts of tree trunk and humming with wild bees, are attached to some of the trees. The lack of animals has provided small creatures space to flourish in the long grass. When they explored this season, says Bennett, “I’d never encountered so countless lepidoptera. There were just masses of them. We were like, ‘What is going on?’”
Inception of the Project
The initial founders – Bennett, Durant, Molly and more individuals – came together as youth, studying or expressing an interest in nature. In that year, the IPCC was predicting that the acceptable threshold of one and a half degrees of warming was looking out of reach, Greta Thunberg was leading the school strikes for eco-awareness, and advocate Clover Hogan was discussing the generation suffering from “climate anxiety”. It was also the time of Isabella Tree’s book, Wilding, on how they revitalized the a nearby property from a struggling farm into a successful wildlife haven. “We were deeply influenced by the example, but what could be the role for young people?” says Easton. “So we created a online presence and called many of environmental organizations and were like, ‘Do you occasionally get your landowners wanting to make changes and you are short on resources?’”
Jack continues the narrative: “Our whole project was essentially founded on the notion that there were people who were willing to allow a bunch of youthful enthusiasts on to their property freely, to decide on fairly massive decisions that would impact land value
