That manically melodic call of the songbird is a rare occurrence in Britain today, however not at the Surrey site. Back in 2020, a lone nightingale could be noticed at this remote location in rural Surrey; recently, they were in multiple locations. “We were hearing them singing all night, from several zones,” notes one ecologist, chief environmental expert for the youth rewilding group. A team of Youngwilders were residing temporarily at the site, yet the nightingales were so noisy, “we were unable to rest all night,” remarks an engagement lead. “We were all exhausted the next day, but it was so incredible.” An specialist from the local conservation group came to help them capture and tag one of the birds the next morning, Cookson remembers: “He’d never touched a songbird in his care before. He was teary.”
Ecological Restoration Progresses at the Surrey Site
Nature recovery is by nature a slow process, but here at Maple Farm, after just a short period, the outcomes are already apparent, and hearable. The farm previously served as a retirement home for animals. Now it’s a showpiece for the Youngwilders’ mission: to accelerate ecological restoration, in one of the most nature-depleted countries in the planet, and to link youth (18-30-year-olds) with a natural world they are often excluded from, and a global warming issue they are often unable to stop. Climate change continues, habitat loss damages natural habitats, and one more Cop summit draws to a frustrating outcome in the host country – so who could criticize youth for wishing to take matters into their own hands?
Our initiative was founded on the notion that there were individuals willing to permit a bunch of young idiots on to their land
“The younger generation is the best educated environmentally that there’s historically,” explains the group's co-director, Jack Durant. They are also “the most emotionally involved in the challenges, and have contributed the least to their causing, and, then, are also going to be affected the greatest as a consequence.”
Revitalization of the Site
Currently, the group is expanding across the United Kingdom – and Maple Farm started it all, in every sense. “It’s where we started, and where we created our community,” explains another co-director, as she offers a overview of the expansive site. “This used to be multiple separate areas,” she says, as we walk through tall vegetation filled with shrubs, bordered by forest. “The main visible transformation is that we’ve taken out all the fencing, 1.2km of it, to give the sense like a unified area.” In the summer, they donned hazmat suits and removed large amounts of invasive plants, an aggressive flora that can irritate the skin. “We’ve planted numerous of bush lines,” explains the director. “But the primary focus is we’ve just let it breathe for a little bit. We’ve removed a significant amount of animal feeding and observed what’s sprung up.”
Low scrub and natural fences are a perfect songbird environment, she comments, but currently they’re cutting back some of the wild growth to create a more range of ecosystems and to connect separate areas of the land. Fresh plantings will take a while to take root, but young trees from the adjacent oaks are already growing in the fields; the crew have been placing barriers to shield them from grazing deer.
Nature Comes Back in Droves
In addition to the songbirds – wildlife is coming back in abundance. Recently they’ve observed reptiles, slowworms, nocturnal mammals and bugs, notes a team member, as he raises one of their monitoring tools (like a mat over a depression in the earth). “You get creatures and animals residing under there, but it’s likely a bit cool for them now.” Natural nests, built using empty sections of timber and active with pollinators, are strapped to some of the trees. The lack of grazing horses has allowed invertebrates opportunity to thrive in the meadows. When they came to this season, comments he, “I’d not once encountered so numerous lepidoptera. There were just masses of them. We were like, ‘What is happening?’”
Beginnings of the Movement
The first participants – Noah, Jack, Molly and more individuals – united as learners, pursuing or expressing an passion in ecology. In that year, the IPCC was indicating that the acceptable threshold of 1.5C of warming was seeming unachievable, the activist was leading the school strikes for environmental action, and advocate Clover Hogan was discussing young people feeling “eco-worry”. It was also the era of Isabella Tree’s book, Wilding, on how the authors changed the a nearby property from a struggling dairy farm into a successful ecosystem. “We were highly motivated by the Knepp story, but what was the part for youth?” questions Easton. “So we made a website and rang up many of wildlife trusts and were asking, ‘Do you ever get your landowners wanting to take action and you don’t have time?’”
Durant continues the narrative: “Our complete initiative was essentially premised on the notion that there were people who were ready to permit a collection of young idiots on to their estate freely, to decide on major decisions that would affect land value
