The manically melodic song of the nightingale is a uncommon occurrence in the UK today, but not at the Surrey site. Back in 2020, a single bird could be heard at this remote location in rural Surrey; recently, they were everywhere. “We were hearing them calling all night, from five different territories,” explains Meg Cookson, lead ecologist for the Youngwilders. A band of volunteers were residing temporarily at the property, yet the birds were so boisterous, “we couldn’t sleep all night,” comments Layla Mapemba. “We were all knackered the next day, but it was so amazing.” An professional from the Surrey Wildlife Trust came to help them capture and tag one of the birds the next morning, Cookson recalls: “He’d never touched a songbird in his hands before. He was crying.”
Rewilding Speeds Up at Maple Farm
Rewilding is by nature a gradual endeavor, but in this place at this property, after only several seasons, the results are already evident, and noticeable. The property used to be a sanctuary for equines. Now it’s a showpiece for the youth-led goal: to speed up ecological restoration, in one of the biodiversity-poor nations in the world, and to engage the younger generation (18-30-year-olds) with a ecosystem they are often shut out of, and a environmental emergency they are often ineffectual to stop. Climate change persists, tree clearing destroys wildlife homes, and one more Cop summit comes to a disappointing outcome in Brazil – so who could blame young people for wishing to take matters into their own hands?
The initiative was premised on the notion that there were landowners ready to permit a collection of youthful enthusiasts on to their estate
“The younger generation is the most knowledgeable in terms of nature that there’s ever been,” explains the Youngwilders’ founder, one organizer. They are also “the highly invested in the challenges, and have played the least to their origin, and, then, are also going to suffer the worst as a consequence.”
Revitalization of the Property
Now, the group is growing across the UK – and this location started it all, in all respects. “It’s where we started, and where we established our community,” explains Molly Easton, as she offers a walkthrough of the 30-acre property. “This once consisted of six different fields,” she states, as we walk through overgrown meadows featuring bushes, bordered by forest. “The main visible change is that we’ve taken out all the fencing, over a kilometer of it, to give the sense like one environment.” In the warmer months, they used protective gear and removed large amounts of harmful weeds, an non-native plant that can harm the flesh. “We’ve introduced loads of natural barriers,” explains Easton. “But the main thing is we’ve just let it breathe for a brief period. We’ve removed a large part of animal feeding and noticed what’s come up.”
Bushes and shrub lines are a perfect songbird habitat, she explains, although today they’re cutting back some of the wild growth to create a increased diversity of habitats and to join different sections of the site. Young saplings will take considerably longer to establish, but saplings from the surrounding oaks are already taking root in the open areas; the team have been setting up barriers to protect them from wildlife.
Nature Returns in Abundance
In addition to the songbirds – animals is reappearing in large numbers. Lately they’ve observed grass snakes, creatures, nocturnal mammals and bugs, says another co-director, as he raises one of their survey equipment (like a mat over a small hollow in the ground). “You find reptiles and animals hiding under there, but it’s possibly a slightly chilly for them now.” Organic nests, made from carved parts of wood and active with pollinators, are strapped to some of the plants. The lack of animals has provided insects opportunity to prosper in the long grass. When they came to this summer, says the director, “I’d not once observed so many butterflies. There were just clouds of them. We were like, ‘What is going on?’”
Inception of the Project
The first participants – Bennett, Durant, Molly and two others – came together as students, studying or expressing an concern in ecology. In the recent past, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was forecasting that the target of one and a half degrees of warming was appearing out of reach, Greta Thunberg was leading the school strikes for eco-awareness, and activist another voice was talking about youth suffering from “environmental stress”. It was also the period of a writer's book, about nature recovery, on how the authors changed the Knepp Estate from a struggling agricultural business into a thriving natural habitat. “We were deeply influenced by the example, but what could be the function for youth?” says Molly. “So we developed a online presence and contacted loads of environmental organizations and were saying, ‘Do you sometimes get your landowners wanting to take action and you are short on time?’”
Jack adds the narrative: “Our complete organisation was essentially premised on the belief that there were landowners who were ready to permit a collection of young amateurs on to their estate indiscriminately, to make fairly massive decisions that would impact land value
