It will be really a really interesting area to watch. Keep your eyes peeled for more and more landowners coming on board across the UK - they are leading this process.
Thanks for the links, @Fire. The Irish projects are particularly interesting to me, naturally... there's a delicate balance to be struck somewhere like the Burren, however, which - though it's a man-made landscape resulting from clearing of forest for fuel - is a unique habitat for a wide variety of interesting flora living on the limestone pavement, which would be lost if it were "re-wilded".
We have red squirrels and pine marten in this area now, though we haven't been lucky enough to see any yet.
Since 2019 I've lived in east Clare, in the west of Ireland.
We'd be happy to just hang on to the wildlife we had, instead of every carbon storing tree being chopped down to make way for nasty little houses that no one really wants unless they are desperate.
@Liriodendron I think the balances are of primary importance everywhere, which is why it's so important that the land owners and local people lead the whole process. It can't be imposed from outside or top down. It's built into the model. It's about people living in the environments too - not people versus nature - not trying to keep all areas "pristine" but more towards restorative farming - finding ways that lots of goals can be met together. Each project will be quite different from the others, with different excitements, particularly rare species and mosaics and histories.
Our grandparents would have known the landscapes with a much wider diversity of birds in much greater numbers; they would have known more wetlands unbuilt on and undrained; they would have know huge areas of unused scrubland and meadowland. Pre-war, even, is not that long ago, but Britian and the UK were very different, wilder even then. Fish numbers, farmland birds, marshland birds, small mammals like hedgehogs, amphibians like toads - all have been decimated in numbers over the last 70 years. These have all disappeared fast, but can return fast too - that is the delight of the work.
I think that finally the penny is dropping that we don't have the time to piss about.
We'd be happy to just hang on to the wildlife we had, instead of every carbon storing tree being chopped down to make way for nasty little houses that no one really wants unless they are desperate.
Unfortunately there are a lot of people who are really desperate for a home … but while houses are seen as financial investments rather than homes they’ll probably remain desperate … 😭
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Unfortunately there are a lot of people who are really desperate for a home
In my view it's about regulating the insane housing market and misused housing stock, rather than slathering everything in concrete. People are desperate not because there is not stock, but because what we have, in places they want it, is ridiculously and purposely overpriced.
Unfortunately there are a lot of people who are really desperate for a home
In my view it's about regulating the insane housing market and misused housing stock, rather than slathering everything in concrete. People are desperate not because there is not stock, but because what we have, in places they want it, is ridiculously and purposely overpriced.
As I said … they’re building for financial reasons rather than to give folk homes.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
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We have red squirrels and pine marten in this area now, though we haven't been lucky enough to see any yet.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
https://takeaction.league.org.uk/page/90210/action/1
Thanks again for all your help!