The beautifully intricate call of the songbird is a uncommon presence in Britain nowadays, but it's different at this rural location. Four years ago, a solitary nightingale could be noticed at this hidden spot in rural Surrey; recently, they were in multiple locations. “We were listening to them calling all night, from several zones,” says one ecologist, lead ecologist for the youth rewilding group. A group of participants were camping out at the site, yet the birds were so loud, “we couldn’t sleep all night,” says a project coordinator. “We were all exhausted the next day, but it was so incredible.” An professional from the Surrey Wildlife Trust came to help them net and ring one of the nightingales the next morning, the ecologist recalls: “He’d never touched a nightingale in his hands before. He was teary.”
Ecological Restoration Accelerates at the Surrey Site
Nature recovery is by nature a slow process, but at this site at this property, after only several seasons, the results are already apparent, and noticeable. The farm was once a retirement home for equines. Today it’s a example for the youth-led mission: to speed up ecological restoration, in one of the ecologically impoverished countries in the world, and to connect youth (18-30-year-olds) with a ecosystem they are often denied access to, and a environmental emergency they are often powerless to halt. Global heating continues, tree clearing destroys natural habitats, and one more climate conference draws to a unsatisfactory outcome in abroad – so what person could criticize youth for wishing to take matters into their own hands?
The organisation was based on the belief that there were people willing to let a collection of youthful idiots on to their land
“The youth is the best educated environmentally that there’s historically,” states the Youngwilders’ co-director, Jack Durant. They are also “the most emotionally involved in the problems, and have added the minimal role to their creation, and, then, are also going to experience consequences the worst as a consequence.”
Transformation of the Site
Currently, the group is expanding across the UK – and this location was the beginning, in every sense. “It’s where we started, and the place we created our connections,” says a founding member, as she offers a tour of the expansive site. “This once consisted of multiple separate areas,” she says, as we move through long grass filled with low scrub, hemmed by forest. “The primary visual difference is that we’ve taken out all the fencing, over a kilometer of it, to make it feel like one environment.” In the recent season, they wore special clothing and cleared significant quantities of giant hogweed, an aggressive flora that can irritate the skin. “We’ve established numerous of bush lines,” notes Easton. “But the primary focus is we’ve just let it breathe for a short time. We’ve removed a large part of animal feeding and seen what’s sprung up.”
Low scrub and natural fences are a ideal songbird home, she comments, however now they’re managing some of the thorny plants to develop a more range of environments and to connect two parts of the site. Fresh plantings will take much more time to establish, but young trees from the nearby oaks are already establishing themselves in the open areas; the group have been setting up barriers to safeguard them from animals.
Animals Returns in Abundance
It’s not just the nightingales – fauna is returning in droves. Recently they’ve seen grass snakes, creatures, bats and insects, notes another co-director, as he uncovers one of their reptile mats (such as a doormat over a small hollow in the ground). “You find reptiles and wildlife sheltering under there, but it’s probably a slightly cool for them now.” Natural beehives, constructed from carved pieces of timber and active with insects, are attached to some of the plants. The absence of animals has given small creatures room to flourish in the long grass. When they came to this summer, says the director, “I’d not ever observed so numerous lepidoptera. There were just swarms of them. We were like, ‘What is occurring?’”
Beginnings of the Project
The original founders – Bennett, Durant, Easton and additional members – formed as youth, pursuing or expressing an interest in ecology. In that year, the IPCC was forecasting that the acceptable threshold of 1.5C of warming was looking impossible, a prominent figure was leading the demonstrations for climate movement, and campaigner a speaker was addressing young people experiencing “eco-worry”. It was also the era of a writer's book, on rewilding, on how they transformed the a Sussex location from a unsuccessful farm into a successful wildlife haven. “We were highly motivated by the Knepp story, but what was the function for young people?” questions Easton. “So we developed a website and rang up many of wildlife trusts and were asking, ‘Do you ever get your landowners wanting to make changes and you are short on resources?’”
Durant explains the account: “Our complete organisation was fundamentally premised on the belief that there were people who were prepared to allow a group of young enthusiasts on to their land indiscriminately, to take major choices that would impact land value
