Category Archives: Rewilding

Chelsea flower show seeks new charity sponsors after mystery donors end support

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Exclusive: Project Giving Back, set up in 2022 to help charities exhibit show gardens, says this year will be its last

Chelsea flower show is looking for new charity sponsors after the mystery philanthropic couple who have spent more than £23m on show gardens end their support.

Project Giving Back was set up by two anonymous donors in 2022, and since then it has paid for 63 gardens at the most prestigious horticultural event in the world, held each summer at the Royal Hospital gardens in south-west London.

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Lynx could thrive in Northumberland with most in area supporting return, study finds

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Release of 20 lynx over several years into Kielder Forest area would create population of about 50 animals

Releasing just 20 lynx in Northumberland would be enough to create a healthy wild population, research has found, and most people in the area would support the practice.

Northumberland Wildlife Trust has been working to see if the wild cats, which became extinct in Britain about 1,300 years ago as a result of hunting and habitat loss, could be returned to the area.

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Elk could return to UK after 3,000 years in rewilding project

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First stage of initiative will introduce ‘keystone’ species to beaver enclosures in Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire

Elk could return to the UK after 3,000 years under plans by the Wildlife Trusts to reintroduce the “keystone” species into Britain’s landscapes.

The Derbyshire Wildlife Trust wants to introduce elk into two existing beaver enclosures in Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire, with the hope of demonstrating that the large semiaquatic deer should be released to roam free in the wild.

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Storrington in West Sussex named UK’s first European stork village

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Village joins continental network alongside nearby Knepp estate, as birds previously extinct in Britain flourish

The Saxons knew the West Sussex village of Storrington as Estorchestone, the “abode of the storks”.

But the graceful white birds disappeared from its skies more than 600 years ago, when they became extinct in Britain.

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Spain’s rewilding of Iberian lynx at risk after lobbying by hunters and farmers

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Regional governments bow to pressure from agricultural industry, often amplified by far-right Vox party

Only last year it was hailed as a conservation success story: the Iberian lynx, which had been close to extinction, had sprung back to life thanks to a two-decade-long effort to expand the population.

Now, however, that progress is at risk after several regional governments in Spain acceded to pressure from farmers and hunters to block the reintroduction of the species into the wild.

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Mystery donor’s £17.5m gift could turn Scottish estate into rewilding showcase

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Scottish Wildlife Trust plans to create rainforest, restore peatland and end deer stalking on Highland sporting estate

Scottish conservationists hope to convert a Highland sporting estate into a rewilding showcase after a mystery benefactor gave them more than £17.5m to buy it.

The Scottish Wildlife Trust (SWT), best known for its small nature reserves, has bought Inverbroom estate near Ullapool in north-west Scotland, complete with an 11-bedroom lodge that boasts an indoor swimming pool.

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How a fatal bear attack led an Italian commune to rally against rewilding

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Brown bears, introduced into Trentino province 20 years ago, have begun to clash with the local human population

Franca Gherardini used to cherish the sublime views from her home in Caldes, a village surrounded by forests on the slopes of the Brenta Dolomites in northern Italy’s Trentino province.

But now she tries to shut out the scene as much as possible, rolling down the window canopy in the morning to avoid looking towards the area where her son, Andrea Papi, 26, was killed by a bear.

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‘Really special’: Farm near London to be rewilded to enable new housing in Essex

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Farm north of London to be returned to something like pasture once enjoyed by Anglo-Saxon king

It was once woodland where Harold Godwinson, the last crowned Anglo-Saxon king, rode in pursuit of deer. Over recent decades, the hillside with a panoramic view of London has become arable fields, pony paddocks and a Christmas tree plantation.

But now Harold’s Park, a 200-hectare (500 acre) farm just north of the M25 on the edge of the capital, is to be rewilded and returned to something like the tangled wood pasture once enjoyed by King Harold.

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Backpack-wearing dogs enlisted to rewild urban nature reserve in Lewes

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Organisers hope dogs will mimic behaviour of wolves that in past would have helped disperse wildflower seeds

Backpack-wearing dogs are being enlisted to “act like wolves” to help rewild an urban nature reserve in the East Sussex town of Lewes.

Before wolves were persecuted to extinction in the UK in about 1760, they were known to roam large areas, typically covering 12 miles (20km) or more each night.

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The gardener who took a Canadian city to court for the right to not mow his lawn

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Missisauga officials have twice forcibly cut Wolf Ruck’s grass and billed him, after he decided to rewild his garden

Most mornings, Wolf Ruck walks the mown paths in his yard in Mississauga, Ontario, watching for insects landing on the goldenrod, birds feeding on native seed heads, and chipmunk kits playing in the tall grass.

The septuagenarian artist, film-maker and former Olympic canoeist began rewilding his garden with native plants three years ago, as part of a growing movement across Canada towards replacing water-thirsty lawns with “naturalised gardens”.

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EU passes law to restore 20% of bloc’s land and sea by end of decade

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Narrow win for supporters after fierce farmers’ protests, loss of green seats to far right and political wrangling

The EU has passed a landmark law to protect nature after a knife-edge vote, ending a months-long deadlock among member states spooked by fierce protests from farmers.

The law, which has proven to be the most controversial pillar of the European Green Deal and nearly failed at the final hurdle, sets a target to restore at least 20% of the EU’s land and sea by the end of the decade.

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Campaigners urge Prince William to rewild Dartmoor farmland

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William became largest private landholder in the national park when he inherited Duchy of Cornwall

Campaigners are urging Prince William to invest in significant rewilding across swathes of Dartmoor’s predominantly farmed land.

The land became William’s after he inherited the Duchy of Cornwall, an extensive landholding including the largest privately owned area of Dartmoor national park, from his father, King Charles, when he succeeded to the throne.

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‘They were chilled’: bated breath as beavers released in Northumberland

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Animals make first return to the county in 400 years as National Trust introduces family of four to Wallington estate

It was a genuinely tense tale of the riverbank as a family of four beavers were released into the Northumberland countryside on Wednesday, the first time in more than 400 years that the animals are making the county their home.

Would they even come out of their cages? Would they be as feisty coming out as they apparently were going in? Would they be happy with their new surroundings?

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Dancing Capercaillie bird makes a tentative comeback in Scotland

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Exclusive: Ecologists say there are early signs that the population is recovering in remote forests

It is a discotheque for Britain’s biggest type of grouse. Before dawn, male capercaillie will begin their courtship rituals, their black tail feathers erect and fanning out, chests puffed out, their heads thrust high into the cold spring air.

Their dancefloors are forest clearings in the Highlands which echo the males’ wheezing, popping and clattering mating calls. Often perched in surrounding pine trees, hens will carefully watch as their potential mates compete to win their affection.

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Britain is not ready for reintroduction of lynx and wolves, Ray Mears warns

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Better management of existing apex predators and compensation schemes for farmers and gamekeepers needed, broadcaster says

Lynx and wolves are likely to become feared and hated if they are reintroduced into Britain’s forests, the adventurer and broadcaster Ray Mears has warned.

Speaking at Cheltenham science festival, he said Britain was not ready for such rewilding schemes, despite the potential ecological benefits.

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Number of ‘coronation meadows’ marking queen’s reign tops 100

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Scheme that began to celebrate Queen Elizabeth II’s diamond jubilee in 2012 has thrived, project audit finds

Wildflower meadows planted a decade ago to celebrate 60 years of the late queen’s reign have thrived, with 101 new fields of flowers created since the scheme was launched.

King Charles, then the Prince of Wales, worked with Plantlife and the Wildlife Trusts to launch ”coronation meadows”, identifying 60 species-rich meadows from which to take donor seeds – one meadow for each year of the queen’s reign at the time.

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Field of fresh cow pats welcomes first dung beetles to be rewilded in France

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Sixty of the keystone species released near Bordeaux to feast on waste from wild cattle and help restore a vital habitat on the Atlantic coast

In a forest clearing filled with cowpats, French history is being made: the country’s first translocation of dung beetles in a nature reserve near Bordeaux.

With the same pomp and ceremony afforded to the release of an Iberian lynx or a European bison, about 60 “ball rolling” insects were brought to the marshy forests of Étang de Cousseau in south-west France on Wednesday to restore a vital ecosystem function on the Atlantic coast.

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BBC will not broadcast Attenborough episode over fear of ‘rightwing backlash’

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Exclusive: Decision to make episode about natural destruction available only on iPlayer angers programme-makers

The BBC has decided not to broadcast an episode of Sir David Attenborough’s flagship new series on British wildlife because of fears its themes of the destruction of nature would risk a backlash from Tory politicians and the rightwing press, the Guardian has been told.

The decision has angered the programme-makers and some insiders at the BBC, who fear the corporation has bowed to pressure from lobbying groups with “dinosaurian ways”.

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Tories will not reach ‘embarrassingly poor’ nature targets by 2030, Labour says

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Opposition to unveil plan to reverse biodiversity loss rather than simply halting it, which is government’s current target

The government will not be able to achieve its nature targets by 2030, even though they are “embarrassingly poor”, the shadow environment minister and leading wildlife groups have said.

Next week at the Cop15 biodiversity conference in Montreal, Alex Sobel will be discussing Labour’s “science-led, joined-up plan to tackle the climate and ecological emergency”. The plan will aim to reverse biodiversity loss by 2030, rather than simply halting it, which is the government’s current target.

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‘It’s like winning the lottery’: Lincolnshire rewilding plan welcomed by some… others not so happy

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Project promises to create jobs and restore biodiversity, but locals say it is taking food-growing land out of production

The rolling fields south of Grantham are scenic, but these huge expanses of wheat and beans are almost bereft of insects in summer. In autumn, a few skylarks sing and the occasional buzzard soars, but there is precious little life in the landscape.

But soon a 1,525-acre swath of this productive Lincolnshire farmland will be brimming with wildlife, according to a new company that aims to restore biodiversity and make money by rewilding farmland.

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