🔗 Share this article

The beautifully intricate call of the songbird is a scarce presence in Britain today, however it's different at this rural location. Back in 2020, a solitary bird could be noticed at this hidden spot in rural Surrey; lately, they were everywhere. “We were hearing them singing all night, from several zones,” says a lead scientist, top biologist for the youth rewilding group. A group of Youngwilders were staying overnight at the location, but the nightingales were so noisy, “we stayed awake all night,” says an engagement lead. “We were all worn out the next day, but it was so cool.” An expert from the Surrey Wildlife Trust came to help them trap and mark one of the birds the next morning, Cookson states: “He’d never touched a songbird in his hands before. He was crying.”

Ecological Restoration Progresses at Maple Farm

Rewilding is by nature a lengthy process, but at this site at the farm, after merely four years, the results are already visible, and hearable. The property used to be a haven for equines. Now it’s a showpiece for the Youngwilders’ purpose: to hasten ecological restoration, in one of the most nature-depleted countries in the globe, and to engage youth (18-30-year-olds) with a natural world they are often denied access to, and a climate crisis they are often unable to stop. Rising temperatures continues, deforestation damages natural habitats, and another international meeting draws to a unsatisfactory end in the host country – so who could criticize youth for wishing to initiate change themselves?

Our organisation was founded on the idea that there were landowners ready to let a bunch of young amateurs on to their estate

“The youth is the best educated ecologically that there’s ever been,” explains the Youngwilders’ co-director, one organizer. They are also “the deeply concerned in the challenges, and have contributed the minimal role to their origin, and, then, are also going to experience consequences the worst as a result.”

Change of the Property

Today, the group is expanding across the Britain – and this location started it all, in every sense. “It’s our origin point, and where we built our connections,” notes another co-director, as she provides a overview of the 12-hectare land. “This once consisted of six different fields,” she states, as we walk through overgrown meadows filled with bushes, surrounded by mature woodland. “The key noticeable difference is that we’ve removed all the barriers, over a kilometer of it, to give the sense like a unified landscape.” In the summer, they donned special clothing and cleared large amounts of giant hogweed, an non-native plant that can irritate the body. “We’ve introduced numerous of natural barriers,” says Easton. “But the key action is we’ve just given it space for a short time. We’ve eliminated a large part of livestock impact and observed what’s come up.”

Underbrush and shrub lines are a perfect songbird environment, she explains, but today they’re cutting back some of the thorny plants to develop a more diversity of environments and to join two parts of the site. Young saplings will take much more time to establish, but saplings from the surrounding oaks are already taking root in the meadows; the group have been setting up barriers to safeguard them from grazing deer.

Animals Comes Back in Large Numbers

There's more than the nightingales – animals is coming back in droves. Recently they’ve spotted serpents, legless lizards, nocturnal mammals and bugs, notes a team member, as he uncovers one of their monitoring tools (like a mat over a small hollow in the ground). “You get snakes and wildlife sheltering under there, but it’s probably a bit chilly for them now.” Organic nests, built using carved sections of timber and buzzing with wild bees, are fixed to some of the plants. The removal of grazing horses has allowed invertebrates opportunity to flourish in the meadows. When they came to this summer, comments he, “I’d never observed so numerous butterflies. There were just masses of them. We were wondering, ‘What is happening?’”

Origins of the Project

The original founders – Noah, Jack, Easton and two others – formed as students, focusing on or expressing an interest in environmental science. In 2019, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was forecasting that the target of one and a half degrees of global heating was looking out of reach, a prominent figure was guiding the youth protests for climate movement, and advocate Clover Hogan was discussing young people suffering from “environmental stress”. It was also the era of a writer's book, Wilding, on how she and her husband changed the Knepp Estate from a failing agricultural business into a successful ecosystem. “We were highly motivated by the example, but what could be the role for youth?” asks Easton. “So we created a website and contacted numerous of environmental organizations and were asking, ‘Do you occasionally get your estate holders wanting to make changes and you lack time?’”

Jack adds the story: “Our entire organisation was fundamentally founded on the notion that there were individuals who were willing to allow a group of young enthusiasts on to their land without strict rules, to make significant decisions that would affect land value