Rewilding – What’s the Attraction?

By Olivia Hine and Marcus Kohler

Rewilding has become an increasingly popular method of habitat management. It aims to combat biodiversity decline and habitat loss. Rewilding shifts away from the traditional management of sites for nature conservation, where they have been managed to maintain a target habitat or species (POST, 2016). In contrast, rewilding has an increased emphasis on managing habitats at a landscape scale with no defined end state, which can respond to disturbances with limited human intervention (Corlett, 2016; Svenning et al., 2016; Pettorelli et al., 2018). Rewilding has developed to encompass a range of management activities including:

• Reintroducing keystone species (species that are essential for the functioning of an ecosystem) such as beavers and grazing herbivores;
• Removing manmade features and barriers such as weirs and re-meandering river channels;
• Allowing natural vegetation succession to take place (Hughes et al., 2012; Carver et al., 2021).

Due to the long time scales required for rewilding projects to generate outcomes, there has been limited research into the impact of rewilding in the UK. Longstanding projects have reported large successes. Knepp Wildland, one of the oldest rewilding projects in the UK starting in 2001, has seen an increase in the abundance and diversity of butterflies, birds, and bats since the project began, with notable increases from rare species that are otherwise declining such as turtle dove Streptopelia turtur and nightingale Luscinia megarhynchos. Additionally, the success of Eurasian beaver Castor fiber reintroductions and the ecological benefits they have demonstrated (Puttock et al., 2017) has led to further introductions across the UK, with several sites releasing Eurasian beavers under licence with approval from Natural England (Derbyshire Wildlife Trust, 2021).

However, outcomes of rewilding can be biased by outstandingly positive projects such as Knepp.   Many brownfield and arable sites retain very high nutrient levels in the soil, which are likely to lead to the dominance of fast-growing species of limited wildlife diversity if left to colonise naturally.  Moreover, as Knepp has illustrated, the concept of letting natural vegetation succession take place still requires intervention and decisions on the type, extent, and timing of grazing to ensure increased biodiversity is the outcome.

The idea that rewilding means no intervention at all is a common one when the truth is far more nuanced and timed intervention is often a prerequisite to the best possible outcomes. The intervention itself seems to contravene the rewilding concept, yet it still plays a vital role. However, it is undoubtedly true that there are important habitats we are no longer familiar with within the British countryside, such as extensive wood pasture and willow scrub, which have been re-created through bold acts of limited intervention. This has led to us understanding better our native fauna and that some species, such as Purple Emperor Apatura iris have been found to thrive in such habitats. The return of such unfamiliar habitats brings challenges to the non-ecological eye, an aesthetic shock almost (although not unattractive in itself), and yet, these lost stages of succession are where real positive benefits have been found to date.

Questions remain around the subject of rewilding; there is no scientifically agreed definition, and there is debate about which activities should be included and how much active management should take place, zero intervention is a bit of a fallacy and could lead to over-simplistic solutions. Additionally, while initially rewilding was used to refer to large-scale nature rejuvenation projects, the definition has evolved. It is commonly used to refer to smaller-scale projects, particularly in urban locations where space is a limiting factor (GLA, 2023).  Smaller sites can be important as they can form stepping stones to larger areas of natural space within the landscape; however, intervention in these areas is more challenging, especially for grazing, leading to the risk of creating areas dominated by common fast-growing species with limited biodiversity. Such sites will still create very high densities of common species, which may be of value in their own right in a country where invertebrate densities have crashed and with that the decline of many insectivorous species which feed upon them. These sites can help to provide social benefits in urban places by bringing people closer to nature; however, they can also appear to be overgrown and inaccessible.

Ecologists need to play an important role in the development and implementation of rewilding projects, through undertaking baseline ecological surveys, providing input into monitoring strategies, and assisting with making critical decisions on the timing or need for intervention. MKA Ecology has been involved in several such projects including the Bulwick Estate and smaller projects for private developers. The opportunities for large, contiguous projects are where we can make a difference in turning the tide of biodiversity loss in our beautiful countryside and restoring the landscape to one that is less anthropogenically dominated and more natural, diverse, and truly wild.

Carver, S., Convery, I., Hawkins, S., Beyers, R., Eagle, A., Kun, Z., Van Maanen, E., Cao, Y., Fisher, M. and Edwards, S.R. 2021. Guiding principles for rewilding. Conservation Biology. 35(6), pp.1882-1893.

Corlett, R.T. 2016. Restoration, reintroduction, and rewilding in a changing world. Trends in ecology & evolution. 31(6), pp.453-462.

Greater London Authority (GLA). 2023. Rewilding London – Final report of the London rewilding taskforce. Available at: J0224_GLA-Rewilding-Taskforce_Report_Web spreads_AW (1).pdf [Accessed 7 February 2024]

Hughes, F.M., Adams, W.M. and Stroh, P.A. 2012. When is open-endedness desirable in restoration projects? Restoration Ecology. 20(3), pp.291-295.

Pettorelli, N., Barlow, J., Stephens, P.A., Durant, S.M., Connor, B., Schulte to Bühne, H., Sandom, C.J., Wentworth, J. and du Toit, J.T. 2018. Making rewilding fit for policy. Journal of Applied Ecology. 55(3), pp.1114-1125.

POST. 2016. Rewilding and Ecosystem Services. [Online]. [Accessed 17 February 2022]. Available from: https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/POST-PN- 0537/POST-PN-0537.pdf

Puttock, A., Graham, H.A., Cunliffe, A.M., Elliott, M. and Brazier, R.E. 2017. Eurasian beaver activity increases water storage, attenuates flow and mitigates diffuse pollution from intensively-managed grasslands. Science of the total environment. 576, pp.430-443.

Svenning, J.-C., Pedersen, P.B., Donlan, C.J., Ejrnæs, R., Faurby, S., Galetti, M., Hansen, D.M., Sandel, B., Sandom, C.J. and Terborgh, J.W. 2016. Science for a wilder Anthropocene: Synthesis and future directions for trophic rewilding research. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 113(4), pp.898-906.

Derbyshire Wildlife Trust. 2021. 2021 will be a record year for beaver reintroductions. [Online]. Available at: https://www.derbyshirewildlifetrust.org.uk/news/2021-will-be-record-year-beaver-reintroductions#: [Accessed 10 June 2024]