The beautifully intricate call of the nightingale is a rare presence in the UK today, however it's different at Maple Farm. Four years ago, a lone bird could be detected at this secluded spot in rural Surrey; lately, they were everywhere. “We were listening to them chirping all night, from several zones,” says Meg Cookson, chief environmental expert for the Youngwilders. A group of Youngwilders were staying overnight at the location, yet the nightingales were so boisterous, “we couldn’t sleep all night,” says a project coordinator. “We were all worn out the next day, but it was so cool.” An specialist from the Surrey Wildlife Trust came to help them net and ring one of the songbirds the next morning, she remembers: “He’d never held a nightingale in his possession before. He was crying.”
Ecological Restoration Accelerates at the Surrey Site
Ecological restoration is by nature a slow endeavor, but in this place at the farm, after just four years, the changes are already apparent, and noticeable. The property used to be a sanctuary for horses. Today it’s a showpiece for the Youngwilders’ purpose: to speed up habitat revival, in one of the most nature-depleted countries in the planet, and to connect young people (18-30-year-olds) with a environment they are often shut out of, and a environmental emergency they are often unable to prevent. Global heating continues, tree clearing eliminates wildlife homes, and yet another climate conference draws to a disappointing conclusion in Brazil – so who could fault the younger generation for choosing to take matters into their own hands?
The project was based on the idea that there were landowners ready to let a bunch of youthful amateurs on to their land
“The youth is the best educated in terms of nature that there’s previously,” says the group's co-director, a key figure. They are also “the most emotionally involved in the issues, and have contributed the smallest part to their creation, and, then, are also going to be affected the greatest as a outcome.”
Change of the Site
Now, the initiative is taking root across the Britain – and the original site planted the seed, in all respects. “It’s where we started, and where we created our network,” says another co-director, as she offers a overview of the 12-hectare site. “This was previously divided plots,” she comments, as we walk through tall vegetation filled with bushes, surrounded by forest. “The key visible change is that we’ve taken out all the fencing, a significant length of it, to make it feel like a single landscape.” In the warmer months, they donned protective gear and eradicated significant quantities of giant hogweed, an invasive species that can burn the body. “We’ve introduced many of bush lines,” says she. “But the main thing is we’ve just given it space for a brief period. We’ve reduced a significant amount of grazing pressure and noticed what’s emerged.”
Underbrush and shrub lines are a excellent songbird environment, she says, although now they’re trimming some of the wild growth to create a more diversity of habitats and to link up two parts of the property. New trees will take a while to grow, but saplings from the adjacent woodland are already taking root in the fields; the team have been installing protectors to protect them from wildlife.
Animals Comes Back in Large Numbers
It’s not just the nightingales – wildlife is reappearing in abundance. This year they’ve seen serpents, creatures, nocturnal mammals and bugs, notes a team member, as he lifts up one of their monitoring tools (such as a mat over a depression in the earth). “You find snakes and things hiding under there, but it’s probably a somewhat cold for them now.” Organic beehives, built using hollowed-out parts of wood and buzzing with insects, are attached to some of the trees. The lack of animals has allowed invertebrates opportunity to thrive in the meadows. When they visited this time, states the director, “I’d not once observed so many insects. There were just masses of them. We were wondering, ‘What is happening?’”
Beginnings of the Project
The first participants – Bennett, Jack, Molly and two others – came together as learners, studying or expressing an passion in ecology. In 2019, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was forecasting that the safe limit of 1.5C of climate change was seeming impossible, a prominent figure was guiding the demonstrations for climate movement, and campaigner Clover Hogan was addressing young people feeling “eco-worry”. It was also the period of a writer's book, Wilding, on how the authors revitalized the a Sussex location from a struggling farm into a thriving wildlife haven. “We were super-inspired by the example, but what could be the role for young people?” says Molly. “So we developed a website and rang up loads of wildlife trusts and were asking, ‘Do you sometimes get your landowners wishing to do something and you lack capacity?’”
Jack continues the story: “Our whole organisation was basically premised on the belief that there were landowners who were willing to allow a bunch of young idiots on to their estate without strict rules, to decide on fairly massive choices that would change land value
