The beautifully intricate song of the songbird is a rare presence in England today, but not at Maple Farm. Back in 2020, a single bird could be detected at this hidden spot in the countryside of Surrey; this summer, they were all around. “We were hearing them chirping all night, from five different territories,” explains one ecologist, lead ecologist for the Youngwilders. A band of participants were camping out at the site, however the birds were so loud, “we stayed awake all night,” comments an engagement lead. “We were all worn out the next day, but it was so amazing.” An professional from the Surrey Wildlife Trust came to help them capture and tag one of the songbirds the next morning, she recalls: “He’d never touched a songbird in his hands before. He was teary.”
Rewilding Speeds Up at Maple Farm
Nature recovery is by definition a gradual process, but in this place at this property, after merely a short period, the changes are already apparent, and audible. The property previously served as a haven for horses. Currently it’s a showpiece for the youth-led purpose: to speed up nature recovery, in one of the ecologically impoverished nations in the world, and to engage youth (18-30-year-olds) with a natural world they are often denied access to, and a climate crisis they are often powerless to halt. Rising temperatures continues, tree clearing destroys ecosystems, and yet another climate conference ends with a frustrating end in abroad – so who could criticize youth for wanting to act independently?
The project was founded on the notion that there were landowners ready to allow a bunch of young idiots on to their property
“The youth is the best educated environmentally that there’s ever been,” says the Youngwilders’ co-director, a key figure. They are also “the most emotionally involved in the challenges, and have contributed the least to their creation, and, then, are also going to experience consequences the greatest as a consequence.”
Transformation of the Property
Now, the initiative is expanding across the UK – and Maple Farm was the beginning, in every sense. “It’s the initial project, and the place we created our connections,” notes a founding member, as she provides a tour of the 12-hectare land. “This once consisted of six different fields,” she states, as we stroll through long grass dotted with bushes, bordered by mature woodland. “The key visual difference is that we’ve eliminated all the barriers, 1.2km of it, to create the impression like a single environment.” In the recent season, they used hazmat suits and eradicated large amounts of giant hogweed, an invasive species that can irritate the skin. “We’ve established loads of natural barriers,” says the director. “But the key action is we’ve just given it space for a brief period. We’ve reduced a significant amount of livestock impact and seen what’s sprung up.”
Underbrush and natural fences are a excellent nightingale home, she comments, but today they’re cutting back some of the brambles to create a increased variety of environments and to join different sections of the site. New trees will take much more time to establish, but young trees from the nearby woodland are already taking root in the meadows; the team have been installing protectors to shield them from animals.
Animals Comes Back in Droves
It’s not just the songbirds – wildlife is reappearing in large numbers. Lately they’ve spotted serpents, legless lizards, bats and bugs, notes Noah Bennett, as he raises one of their survey equipment (similar to a mat over a indentation in the earth). “You discover reptiles and things residing under there, but it’s probably a slightly chilly for them now.” Organic homes, constructed from carved sections of tree trunk and buzzing with insects, are strapped to some of the woodland. The removal of grazing horses has allowed insects space to thrive in the overgrown areas. When they visited this summer, comments the director, “I’d not ever encountered so countless lepidoptera. There were just masses of them. We were saying, ‘What is going on?’”
Beginnings of the Movement
The initial participants – Noah, Durant, Easton and two others – united as learners, studying or sharing an interest in nature. In that year, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was forecasting that the acceptable threshold of 1.5C of global heating was looking out of reach, Greta Thunberg was leading the demonstrations for eco-awareness, and advocate another voice was discussing youth feeling “eco-worry”. It was also the time of a writer's work, Wilding, on how she and her husband revitalized the a nearby property from a struggling dairy farm into a flourishing natural habitat. “We were highly motivated by the example, but what could be the role for youth?” asks Easton. “So we created a website and called numerous of environmental organizations and were asking, ‘Do you sometimes get your estate holders seeking to make changes and you are short on capacity?’”
Jack explains the narrative: “Our whole organisation was fundamentally based on the idea that there were landowners who were ready to permit a bunch of youthful amateurs on to their estate without strict rules, to decide on fairly massive decisions that would impact land value
