UK: Campaign to restore the elk, wolf, lynx and bear of 10,000 years ago
“Rewilding is an idea whose time has come,” said Keith Kirby, a
woodland and forestry officer for Natural England. “For a long time
conservation has been fighting a rearguard battle, simply trying to
save species threatened with extinction and reduce the damage caused
by humans. Now we need to look at things more holistically, preserving
and recreating entire landscapes and habitats.” Such ideas may sound
attractive – but they raise many questions, especially in a country as
crowded as Britain. Will the public really accept sharing the
countryside with potentially dangerous mammals?
Down in the Lake
District, the neat fields and walls that make the area one of
Britain’s most manicured “wildernesses” are also changing. The native
woodlands of the Ennerdale valley are spreading, Highland cattle have
replaced sheep and there has even been talk of reintroducing beaver
and bison. Welcome to rewilding, a movement that is radicalising
conservation biology, turning what had been a scientific backwater
into one of its most controversial areas. What the rewilders want is
nothing less than the reversal of thousands of years of domestication,
returning vast tracts of countryside to the way they looked thousands
of years ago. They believe the best way to achieve this is by bringing
back the biggest and fiercest animals of all – the elk, wolves, lynx
and even bears that roamed Britain 10,000 years ago at the end of the
Pleistocene era. It sounds extreme but some of Britain’s most
respected wildlife and conservation organisations, including the
National Trust, are buying into the idea. This week the People’s Trust
for Endangered Species, which already supports the reintroduction of
beaver to Scotland, will suggest northern Britain could support about
450 lynx. Early next year Natural England, the government’s
conservation watchdog, will ask its board to consider making rewilding
part of its formal policy for protecting our natural heritage.
“Rewilding is an idea whose time has come,” said Keith Kirby, a
woodland and forestry officer for Natural England. “For a long time
conservation has been fighting a rearguard battle, simply trying to
save species threatened with extinction and reduce the damage caused
by humans. Now we need to look at things more holistically, preserving
and recreating entire landscapes and habitats.” Such ideas may sound
attractive – but they raise many questions, especially in a country as
crowded as Britain.
Will the public really accept sharing the
countryside with potentially dangerous mammals? Some of the answers
may be emerging from Alladale, a 23,000-acre estate in Sutherland,
northern Scotland, where Paul Lister is creating what he hopes will
become one of Europe’s best wildlife reserves. Lister, a
multi-millionaire, has already released wild boar on to the estate and
earlier this year imported two young European elk from Sweden to found
what he hopes will become a breeding herd. In coming years, he wants
to reintroduce beavers, wolves, lynx and brown bears. Lister has found
himself facing powerful opposition. Farmers worry that his animals
will escape; ramblers fear they will be blocked from Alladale’s
footpaths or attacked by wild animals. It shows that in Britain we may
profess a love of wildlife – but the idea of dealing with a real
wilderness is highly controversial. “The Highlands are considered one
of Europe’s last great areas of wilderness, yet much of the flora and
fauna that once thrived here has been driven to extinction by the
activities of man,” said Lister. Even the beautiful mountain-scapes of
northern and western Britain are unnatural, a result of ancient forest
clearances. Bears disappeared 900 years ago; lynx died out in medieval
times; and the last wolf was shot in Scotland in 1743.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article5404100.ece