The manically melodic call of the songbird is a scarce occurrence in Britain today, but it's different at this rural location. Back in 2020, a lone nightingale could be heard at this secluded spot in rural Surrey; recently, they were all around. “We were listening to them singing all night, from five different territories,” notes a lead scientist, chief environmental expert for the Youngwilders. A group of participants were staying overnight at the location, yet the birds were so loud, “we stayed awake all night,” comments a project coordinator. “We were all exhausted the next day, but it was so cool.” An professional from the Surrey Wildlife Trust came to help them net and ring one of the nightingales the next morning, she recalls: “He’d never held a songbird in his possession before. He was teary.”
Ecological Restoration Speeds Up at Maple Farm
Ecological restoration is by its very essence a slow process, but here at this property, after just several seasons, the results are already visible, and audible. The farm previously served as a sanctuary for horses. Currently it’s a showpiece for the Youngwilders’ mission: to speed up nature recovery, in one of the most nature-depleted countries in the globe, and to connect young people (18-30-year-olds) with a environment they are often denied access to, and a climate crisis they are often powerless to stop. Rising temperatures advances, tree clearing eliminates wildlife homes, and one more climate conference ends with a frustrating end in the host country – so what person could blame youth for choosing to act independently?
Our organisation was based on the notion that there were people willing to allow a collection of youthful enthusiasts on to their land
“The youth is the most informed in terms of nature that there’s historically,” says the group's founder, a key figure. They are also “the most emotionally involved in the problems, and have added the minimal role to their origin, and, then, are also going to be affected most as a result.”
Transformation of the Property
Now, the group is growing across the UK – and Maple Farm was the beginning, in multiple ways. “It’s where we started, and the place we built our community,” explains Molly Easton, as she gives a overview of the expansive site. “This used to be six different fields,” she says, as we move through long grass filled with low scrub, bordered by mature woodland. “The key noticeable change is that we’ve taken out all the barriers, 1.2km of it, to make it feel like one landscape.” In the summer, they donned special clothing and cleared large amounts of invasive plants, an invasive species that can harm the flesh. “We’ve planted many of natural barriers,” explains the director. “But the primary focus is we’ve just allowed it to rest for a short time. We’ve removed a lot of grazing pressure and noticed what’s sprung up.”
Bushes and natural fences are a perfect songbird home, she comments, but now they’re trimming some of the thorny plants to establish a more variety of ecosystems and to connect two parts of the property. Young saplings will take much more time to take root, but new growth from the nearby oaks are already establishing themselves in the meadows; the team have been placing barriers to protect them from animals.
Nature Returns in Abundance
In addition to the nightingales – wildlife is returning in large numbers. This year they’ve spotted reptiles, slowworms, flyers and bugs, explains another co-director, as he raises one of their monitoring tools (like a doormat over a indentation in the earth). “You get creatures and things residing under there, but it’s likely a bit cool for them now.” Wild beehives, built using carved parts of timber and buzzing with insects, are attached to some of the trees. The absence of grazing horses has allowed invertebrates room to flourish in the long grass. When they visited this time, comments the director, “I’d not ever observed so countless insects. There were just clouds of them. We were like, ‘What is happening?’”
Inception of the Project
The first Youngwilders – Noah, Durant, Easton and additional members – united as youth, studying or expressing an concern in environmental science. In 2019, the IPCC was predicting that the safe limit of 1.5C of warming was looking unachievable, the activist was leading the youth protests for environmental action, and campaigner a speaker was talking about the generation experiencing “environmental stress”. It was also the period of a writer's book, Wilding, on how the authors revitalized the a nearby property from a unsuccessful agricultural business into a successful ecosystem. “We were super-inspired by the Knepp story, but what could be the role for youth?” says Molly. “So we created a online presence and rang up loads of conservation groups and were like, ‘Do you occasionally get your estate holders seeking to take action and you don’t have capacity?’”
Jack explains the account: “Our whole project was essentially founded on the idea that there were individuals who were prepared to allow a collection of young enthusiasts on to their estate freely, to decide on major choices that would change land value
