The Rewilders

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So, humans still are a crucial part of the rewilded landscape – not just because we need community support for projects to be successful – but also because we ourselves are agents of ecosystem engineering, and we need to continue this role in the absence of the creatures we have replaced. What if Sadie and Jean, two elderly ladies on a Women’s Rural outing to a Highland Estate, discovered a wet, bedraggled kitten, missed the big-paws clue and took the animal home, believing it to be an ordinary moggie? What problems would ensue as the lynx grew bigger and how could they be resolved? Adult Eurasian lynx are large cats, Europe’s third-largest predator after brown bears and wolves. Being solitary, reclusive wild animals, a domestic setting is completely unsuitable. In T he Rewilders, Cora the lynx kitten is causing chaos, as Esme and Callum discover when they visit Jean’s house. So rather than pitch in with detailed plans, the project started off with ​ “a lot of learning, and alot of listening. Ihad to educate myself, and talk to the experts – as many as Icould.” And there was alot of listening to local people too.

In the past, rewilders earned a poor reputation for excluding people from natural spaces – some projects were designed without the community in mind, or even a thought for the economics. But those projects had such a negative impact on the public perception of rewilding (a term which is still toxic in certain cultures) that modern rewilders have, understandably, put people at the heart of project design and rewilding principles. After all, a project’s success is a matter of public opinion, so it’s crucial to keep the public in mind when you’re designing a project. In recent decades, the world population of the species has declined to as few as 12,000. The vulture’s status has recently been downgraded to “endangered” – two steps away from global extinction. In Europe, numbers have fallen by more than half in the past 50 years, with most found in Spain and Portugal. Ecotones’ are a key principle in rewilding – they’re the gradual shift in plant life (and associated animals etc) which you find at the edge of a habitat. A pond edge is a good example – some plants spend their whole lives underwater, while others only tolerate wet roots. If pond levels change over time (which they do in dynamic systems) and new ponds are created (think pig wallows), then ecotones are shifting and forming constantly. This is the same at the edge of habitats like woodland, which advance and recede over time. In rewilding, this movement is not only natural – it is to be encouraged – we celebrate the value it has for biodiversity, creating many new environmental niches. Esme and Callum’s relationship handled with great skill by the author. Esme is part of a group of ‘friends’ who torment Callum at school. These ‘good’ girls provoke him, causing him to end up in trouble whilst they escape without blame. Callum lives with foster mother, Sadie, feeling settled at last after a series of unhappy placements. Supportive and nurturing, this has been his longest-and happiest- placement, if not for school. The narrative is told from alternating perspectives and Esme is forced to consider her attitude towards Callum and through this to re-evaluate her friendship with the other girls in her class, particularly Isobel. Sadly, there are sure to be many readers who will empathise with her concern about getting on the wrong side of this ‘friend’, hopefully leading to discussions and better understanding of the negative nature of this type of ‘friendship’.In time, that took him to Cumbria; his wife is from the county, and as their first child came along, it made sense to be near her family. Aspell with the local Wildlife Trust, leading the restoration of araised bog on the Solway, served as agood apprenticeship for the Haweswater job, as it included partnering with local farmers who held commoners’ rights.

By the late 2010s, it was becoming clear that the American definition of rewilding was increasingly irrelevant. So a team of researchers (Perino et al) published a new paper in the acclaimed journal Science, to set out a new definition for European rewilding. Their 2019 paper is one of the most highly cited journal articles in rewilding – within just a few years, it has become a touchstone for rewilders. The inspiration for The Rewilders came from an article I read online about a Canadian man who was riding his bike along a wooded trail in Quebec when he found a tiny, abandoned kitten. At first he thought the little creature was a domestic cat, but realised by the size of its paws that it was actually a lynx, so he took the starving animal home, fed it milk from a dropper and called wildlife experts to come and collect it. Intrigued by the fact lynx kittens could be mistaken for domestic cats, I asked the question, What if? Of course, not everybody agrees that reintroducing lynx and wolves is a feasible idea, and in The Rewilders I’ve tried to show that different points of view are valid and that compromise and consensus will be necessary if large predators are ever going to be successfully reintroduced to Scotland. That’s good news for the twitchers. The bad news is that the vulture appears to have left the islands, heading who knows where. So, if you live in southern Britain, it’s worth looking up over the next few days, in search of one of the rarest birds ever to fly through UK airspace.Landscape-scale’ – many people believe that rewilding is a landscape-scale process. But not everyone. For example, in 2022, Rewilding Britain’s ‘rewilded garden’ at the Chelsea Flower Show won ‘Best in Show’, which was the biggest rewilding news story of the year, changing the narrative around what is rewilding and what isn’t. I believe that rewilding is, to a large extent, what most people believe it is, so it’s important to take note of public sentiment. Joking aside, they met their neighbours to tell them what they were up to, found little in the way of active opposition, and as Dorette puts it, ​ “what there is, is verynice.” Deer browse on sapling and so stop trees growing – and obstacle to rewilding (Photo: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty) Deer, bears and wolves Esme and Callum have both been either involved in, or victim of, bullying, and the story invites the reader to consider this important issue from both sides, including the pressure a bully can exert over their extended, and sometimes reluctant, peers. Not everyone precisely agrees on the definition of rewilding, but, thankfully, most people agree on some aspects of it. Here is one thing which didn’t make it into our definition above:

The ​ ‘repeopling’ is already under way. ​ “This [Bunloit] estate used to have no-one working on it; now there’s around 20.” The goal isn’t just direct employment, either. Kirsty points out ruins of abandoned crofts, evidence that the land was once indeed more ​ ‘peopled’ than now, and which they’d love to restore and see reoccupied. Which is where the cluster idea may help, since it looks as though funding will increasingly be directed to larger areas of nature restoration than asingle farm. The Dayshul Brake crew are already looking beyond their patch too, starting to talk to neighbouring farmers and landowners about creating anatural corridor between Devon’s two great moors, Dartmoor and Exmoor. They feel there’s ample potential for collaborating to nurture amosaic patchwork of alandscape, brimming with ecosystem services. I just wanted to say thank you for the privilege of doing the Rewilding course with you. The weekend was incredible and I could probably say life changing. I see the three principles everywhere and can see the transformation the understanding is bringing. Sometimes I am feeling joy I haven't felt since I was a child and I find myself laughing, singing and just smiling for no apparent reason. It’s this sort of finger-in-the-air exploration which appeals to Dorette. ​ “Wilding is experimental. That’s what Ilike about it. Ilove the idea of creating aspace, and seeing what it needs. Moving forward without following astrict guideline. Ireally wanted toplay.” A hook letter about the real-life inspirations behind the novel is available here: Rewilders Letter

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Rohini co-founded The Rewilders, with her husband, Angus Ross. They offer private intensive retreats for individuals and couples, host The Rewilders' Membership Community, and facilitate the six-month Rewilders' Guide Practitioner Training.

But rewilding is more than just focusing on local communities, and, when it comes to people, there are quite a lot of different ideas about what ‘rewilding’ really means. In fact, Rewilding Europe lists a somewhat astonishing 11 different principles which they describe as the foundations of rewilding. Many of these focus on people, from ‘providing hope and purpose’ to ‘building nature-based economies’ and ‘working together’. The Rewilders’ is a wonderful read, a compelling mixture of adventure and the importance of true friendship with a healthy dose of environmental and conservation issues, offering the reader plenty to think about. Yet whether these species’ range expansions can truly be described as “natural” is open to debate, given that climate change is known to be anthropogenic – caused by our profligate use of fossil fuels. It’s still not yet all sweetness and light between them and Wild Haweswater, but adecade on from those initial bruising encounters, ​ “we have kind of become part of the furniture… Even our strongest opponents accept that we’re not going anywhere.” Meanwhile, Lee is cheered by the way other landowners in the region are already transforming their holdings, including the Lowther Estate, ​ “which is fast becoming the ​ ‘Knepp of the North’”. They are collaborating together, along with United Utilities and Natural England, on anew nature restoration project, the Cumbrian Landscape Partnership, under the auspices of the Endangered Landscapes Programme.

This gripping and tense read explores the debate about the reintroduction of the Eurasian lynx in Scotland. City Kids Magazine Instead of trophic cascades created by predators, in Europe, the herbivores were restoring ecosystems, making wallows and burrows, eating small trees or damming up waterways. Each of these activities created new habitats like ponds, meadows and coppices, where a whole range of biodiversity flourished. Their collaboration is still in its early days. As Eti puts it: ​ “We’re exploring our joint vision and what it means to be acluster. So far, it’s happened quite organically.” Lee Schofield had enjoyed avaried career in conservation by the time he took up his position at the RSPB’s Wild Haweswater reserve. He’d worked with local communities, including farmers, elsewhere in Cumbria, and was enthusiastic about the journey ahead.