Pete Cooper’s blog has a wide range of feature articles. Recent ones have had a rewilding theme and build on Steve Carver’s post last January which we reported on then:
- REWILDING AT RAU/CIRENCESTER COLLEGE – BUILDING BRIDGES?
- NICE (TO LIVE WITH) BEAVER: ADVENTURES IN BAVARIA
- SILENT FIELDS REVISITED: DON’T LET SHIFTING BASELINES TELL US HOW MUCH NATURE WE CAN HAVE
- WHAT IS REWILDING ANYWAY? EPISODE 3: NEIL HESELTINE
- NATURE DIARY: NORTH DEVON, 8TH FEBRUARY
- WHAT IS REWILDING ANYWAY? EPISODE 2: DR STEVE CARVER
The most recent begins:
“It’s pretty amazing how quickly my childhood daydreams are growing into conservation’s zeitgeist. While I didn’t know the word ‘rewilding’ when I was eight years old, I would never have guessed optimistic hopes of having beavers back in the local stream would be a tenable prospect by the time I was at university, yet alone a middle-aged adult.
The change is dramatic even in the space of a few years. In 2015 I ran a rewilding workshop for young people from our youth nature network A Focus on Nature, not long after George Monbiot’s ‘Feral’ really brought rewilding into the mainstream. At the time I thought there were few outlets to explore the topic: but cut to late 2018/early 2019 and there are five rewilding conferences and workshops alone that I know of.
I was kindly invited to attend and write about the most recent of these, hosted at what you might think to be a pretty surprising venue – the Royal Agricultural University, with co-hosts Cirencester College. It’s fair to say farmers have not been the most supportive of rewilding; Monbiot has done much for pushing forward the agenda, but it’s fair to say for many of those who manage 72% of Britain, his views have been about as welcome as hair in your soup. So to have an opportunity where the agricultural sector are willing to engage with the idea, rather than stomping it into the ground in the hope it’ll shut up, is very positive to see. … .”