The manically melodic melody of the nightingale is a rare sound in Britain nowadays, yet not at the Surrey site. Back in 2020, a single nightingale could be noticed at this hidden place in rural Surrey; lately, they were in multiple locations. “We were hearing them singing all night, from five different territories,” explains Meg Cookson, lead ecologist for the Youngwilders. A band of volunteers were staying overnight at the location, yet the birds were so loud, “we were unable to rest all night,” comments a project coordinator. “We were all exhausted the next day, but it was so cool.” An expert from the Surrey Wildlife Trust came to help them net and ring one of the nightingales the next morning, Cookson remembers: “He’d never handled a songbird in his care before. He was emotional.”
Rewilding Progresses at This Location
Rewilding is by nature a gradual process, but in this place at Maple Farm, after only a short period, the changes are already visible, and hearable. The land was once a retirement home for horses. Today it’s a example for the Youngwilders’ purpose: to hasten habitat revival, in one of the biodiversity-poor regions in the planet, and to connect youth (18-30-year-olds) with a ecosystem they are often denied access to, and a climate crisis they are often ineffectual to stop. Rising temperatures persists, tree clearing damages natural habitats, and one more climate conference draws to a unsatisfactory end in abroad – so what person could blame youth for choosing to initiate change themselves?
The project was founded on the idea that there were landowners willing to permit a bunch of young enthusiasts on to their property
“The newer cohort is the most informed ecologically that there’s previously,” explains the group's founder, a key figure. They are also “the highly invested in the issues, and have added the minimal role to their origin, and, then, are also going to be affected the greatest as a result.”
Change of the Site
Today, the organisation is growing across the UK – and Maple Farm started it all, in every sense. “It’s the initial project, and where we established our connections,” notes another co-director, as she offers a walkthrough of the expansive land. “This once consisted of divided plots,” she says, as we move through overgrown meadows dotted with low scrub, bordered by established trees. “The main noticeable transformation is that we’ve removed all the fencing, a significant length of it, to give the sense like a unified area.” In the summer, they used protective gear and cleared large amounts of giant hogweed, an invasive species that can burn the flesh. “We’ve planted many of natural barriers,” notes the director. “But the main thing is we’ve just let it breathe for a little bit. We’ve reduced a large part of animal feeding and noticed what’s come up.”
Underbrush and natural fences are a ideal nightingale home, she explains, but today they’re trimming some of the brambles to establish a more diversity of ecosystems and to join two parts of the property. New trees will take much more time to establish, but saplings from the nearby oaks are already establishing themselves in the meadows; the group have been placing barriers to shield them from animals.
Animals Reappears in Large Numbers
It’s not just the songbirds – fauna is returning in large numbers. Lately they’ve observed serpents, legless lizards, bats and invertebrates, notes another co-director, as he raises one of their monitoring tools (similar to a doormat over a depression in the ground). “You discover creatures and wildlife residing under there, but it’s possibly a somewhat cool for them now.” Wild homes, made from hollowed-out sections of wood and buzzing with insects, are fixed to some of the plants. The lack of livestock has provided invertebrates room to prosper in the long grass. When they came to this time, comments he, “I’d not once seen so many butterflies. There were just clouds of them. We were saying, ‘What is occurring?’”
Origins of the Initiative
The original Youngwilders – Bennett, Durant, Easton and additional members – united as learners, studying or having an interest in nature. In 2019, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was indicating that the safe limit of one and a half degrees of global heating was seeming out of reach, the activist was spearheading the school strikes for eco-awareness, and campaigner Clover Hogan was discussing youth feeling “environmental stress”. It was also the era of a writer's book, Wilding, on how the authors transformed the Knepp Estate from a failing agricultural business into a flourishing wildlife haven. “We were super-inspired by the case study, but what could be the part for young people?” questions Molly. “So we created a website and contacted many of conservation groups and were asking, ‘Do you occasionally get your property owners wanting to make changes and you lack resources?’”
Jack continues the story: “Our entire organisation was essentially founded on the notion that there were individuals who were prepared to permit a group of youthful amateurs on to their estate without strict rules, to take major actions that would change land value
