That beautifully intricate call of the nightingale is a rare sound in the UK these days, but not at the Surrey site. Back in 2020, a single nightingale could be detected at this hidden location in the countryside of Surrey; this summer, they were all around. “We were hearing them singing all night, from multiple areas,” explains one ecologist, chief environmental expert for the eco-activist organization. A team of Youngwilders were camping out at the property, however the birds were so loud, “we were unable to rest all night,” comments an engagement lead. “We were all exhausted the next day, but it was so incredible.” An professional from the Surrey Wildlife Trust came to help them capture and tag one of the nightingales the next morning, the ecologist recalls: “He’d never handled a songbird in his hands before. He was crying.”
Rewilding Speeds Up at This Location
Rewilding is by its very essence a lengthy process, but here at this property, after just several seasons, the changes are already apparent, and audible. The farm used to be a haven for horses. Currently it’s a showpiece for the youth-led mission: to accelerate ecological restoration, in one of the biodiversity-poor regions in the planet, and to link young people (18-30-year-olds) with a natural world they are often shut out of, and a environmental emergency they are often ineffectual to stop. Global heating persists, habitat loss destroys wildlife homes, and yet another international meeting draws to a disappointing conclusion in Brazil – so who could fault youth for wanting to initiate change themselves?
The project was premised on the notion that there were individuals ready to let a bunch of youthful amateurs on to their land
“The youth is the most informed ecologically that there’s ever been,” explains the Youngwilders’ founder, a key figure. They are also “the deeply concerned in the challenges, and have played the least to their origin, and, then, are also going to suffer most as a outcome.”
Change of the Property
Now, the initiative is expanding across the Britain – and the original site planted the seed, in multiple ways. “It’s the initial project, and where we built our network,” notes Molly Easton, as she offers a tour of the expansive land. “This used to be multiple separate areas,” she says, as we walk through overgrown meadows dotted with bushes, surrounded by mature woodland. “The main visual change is that we’ve taken out all the enclosures, 1.2km of it, to create the impression like a single area.” In the summer, they donned hazmat suits and removed large amounts of giant hogweed, an non-native plant that can irritate the skin. “We’ve introduced many of hedgerows,” says she. “But the key action is we’ve just given it space for a brief period. We’ve eliminated a lot of livestock impact and seen what’s emerged.”
Bushes and shrub lines are a excellent songbird home, she explains, however now they’re managing some of the brambles to create a more range of habitats and to connect two parts of the property. New trees will take a while to grow, but new growth from the nearby trees are already establishing themselves in the fields; the team have been installing guards to protect them from animals.
Wildlife Comes Back in Abundance
In addition to the songbirds – animals is coming back in large numbers. This year they’ve spotted serpents, legless lizards, flyers and insects, notes a team member, as he uncovers one of their survey equipment (similar to a mat over a indentation in the ground). “You get creatures and wildlife sheltering under there, but it’s possibly a bit cool for them now.” Organic homes, constructed from carved sections of tree trunk and active with insects, are fixed to some of the plants. The lack of livestock has given invertebrates opportunity to prosper in the meadows. When they explored this summer, says Bennett, “I’d not once seen so countless butterflies. There were just masses of them. We were saying, ‘What is happening?’”
Inception of the Movement
The original Youngwilders – Bennett, Durant, Easton and more individuals – came together as youth, focusing on or having an passion in environmental science. In 2019, the IPCC was predicting that the safe limit of 1.5C of global heating was looking impossible, a prominent figure was guiding the demonstrations for climate movement, and activist a speaker was discussing youth experiencing “environmental stress”. It was also the period of the author's book, about nature recovery, on how she and her husband revitalized the a Sussex location from a unsuccessful farm into a flourishing ecosystem. “We were deeply influenced by the case study, but what was the function for youth?” says Easton. “So we created a platform and called many of wildlife trusts and were saying, ‘Do you ever get your property owners wanting to do something and you don’t have resources?’”
Durant continues the story: “Our complete project was essentially premised on the belief that there were people who were ready to permit a group of youthful idiots on to their estate without strict rules, to take fairly massive choices that would change land value
