The richly complex melody of the songbird is a scarce sound in the UK nowadays, but it's different at the Surrey site. Back in 2020, a solitary bird could be noticed at this hidden spot in the countryside of Surrey; recently, they were all around. “We were listening to them chirping all night, from five different territories,” explains one ecologist, top biologist for the Youngwilders. A band of Youngwilders were staying overnight at the site, but the nightingales were so noisy, “we stayed awake all night,” remarks a project coordinator. “We were all knackered the next day, but it was so cool.” An professional from the Surrey Wildlife Trust came to help them capture and tag one of the nightingales the next morning, she states: “He’d never held a songbird in his care before. He was teary.”
Ecological Restoration Speeds Up at This Location
Rewilding is by its very essence a slow process, but in this place at this property, after only a short period, the changes are already visible, and audible. The farm used to be a sanctuary for animals. Currently it’s a model for the youth-led mission: to hasten nature recovery, in one of the most nature-depleted regions in the planet, and to connect the younger generation (18-30-year-olds) with a ecosystem they are often denied access to, and a environmental emergency they are often ineffectual to stop. Rising temperatures advances, tree clearing eliminates ecosystems, and yet another international meeting ends with a disappointing conclusion in the host country – so what person could fault the younger generation for wanting to act independently?
Our organisation was founded on the idea that there were landowners prepared to permit a collection of young amateurs on to their land
“The newer cohort is the best educated ecologically that there’s previously,” explains the Youngwilders’ leader, 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 suffer the greatest as a result.”
Change of the Landscape
Now, the group is growing across the United Kingdom – and this location was the beginning, in every sense. “It’s where we started, and the place we built our network,” explains Molly Easton, as she gives a walkthrough of the 12-hectare land. “This used to be multiple separate areas,” she says, as we stroll through overgrown meadows dotted with low scrub, hemmed by mature woodland. “The main visible change is that we’ve removed all the barriers, 1.2km of it, to give the sense like one environment.” In the warmer months, they wore hazmat suits and eradicated large amounts of giant hogweed, an invasive species that can irritate the flesh. “We’ve introduced loads of hedgerows,” explains the director. “But the key action is we’ve just allowed it to rest for a short time. We’ve eliminated a large part of grazing pressure and observed what’s emerged.”
Underbrush and shrub lines are a perfect nightingale habitat, she comments, but currently they’re cutting back some of the thorny plants to establish a greater variety of habitats and to link up different sections of the site. Young saplings will take considerably longer to establish, but young trees from the surrounding woodland are already taking root in the meadows; the group have been placing protectors to shield them from animals.
Nature Comes Back in Droves
In addition to the songbirds – wildlife is returning in droves. This year they’ve observed grass snakes, slowworms, nocturnal mammals and bugs, notes a team member, as he lifts up one of their monitoring tools (similar to a cover over a depression in the ground). “You find creatures and things residing under there, but it’s possibly a somewhat cool for them now.” Wild beehives, constructed from empty parts of timber and humming with insects, are fixed to some of the trees. The lack of grazing horses has provided small creatures space to flourish in the long grass. When they came to this time, comments the director, “I’d not ever encountered so numerous insects. There were just clouds of them. We were wondering, ‘What is going on?’”
Beginnings of the Initiative
The initial Youngwilders – Bennett, Durant, Molly and more individuals – formed as students, focusing on or having an concern in nature. In that year, the climate experts was predicting that the acceptable threshold of one and a half degrees of climate change was appearing unachievable, Greta Thunberg was leading the school strikes for environmental action, and campaigner another voice was talking about the generation feeling “eco-worry”. It was also the period of the author's publication, about nature recovery, on how they changed the a Sussex location from a failing agricultural business into a thriving wildlife haven. “We were super-inspired by the example, but what was the part for the next generation?” says Molly. “So we created a platform and called many of environmental organizations and were saying, ‘Do you occasionally get your landowners wishing to take action and you are short on resources?’”
Jack adds the narrative: “Our whole organisation was fundamentally premised on the belief that there were people who were prepared to allow a group of youthful amateurs on to their land indiscriminately, to take major actions that would change land value
