Wilding or rewilding schemes

I'm totally in favour of rewilding but it does sound as if the piece of land in question would be better left as it is. It does sound as if you live in a lovely place Primrose53.

The council have done this with large areas where I live. They look stunning for a short period of time and then rather sad.. It doesn't sound necessary where you live.. perhaps start a debate on Nextdoor or Facebook and see what everyone thinks.

Oh the term re wilding. I do wonder if some councils view it as a cheap option
A wild environment does need some management
We bought out present home in 2014. The grounds had been rewarded
Couldn’t get down the drive. Fallen trees
Some of the ivy and brambles were trying to get through the windows
We didn’t know where the oil tank or static caravan was
Brambles were in abundance some must have been 12 foot high Couldn’t get to the apple trees to go with the blackberries
Locals told us of the lovely banks of snowdrops blue bell primroses daffodils wild strawberries. I could go on
You can imagine how disappointed we were when the brambles were cleared but nothing was there
Gradually over the following few years all the wild flowers returned
Yes it sometimes looks really wild as we are careful when things are none
Think you might call it managed wildness
Not neglected or abandoned

Neglected not rewarded

I agree we have a lovely upper promenade with big overgrown wild grass etc between it and the beach, it used to be kept very tidy and although I m all for rewilding it looks awful in the summer just the time holiday makers maybe around
Also our cemeteries are now left wild in the summer and you can barely see the graves between awful dried looking grass
I ve not seen any wild flowers or butterflies etc

BlueBelle

I agree we have a lovely upper promenade with big overgrown wild grass etc between it and the beach, it used to be kept very tidy and although I m all for rewilding it looks awful in the summer just the time holiday makers maybe around
Also our cemeteries are now left wild in the summer and you can barely see the graves between awful dried looking grass
I ve not seen any wild flowers or butterflies etc

Part of the churchyard where my parents are buried together was taken over as God’s Acre several years ago and was allowed to grow wild.

I was horrified and upset when I went to see the newly erected joint headstone in 2021. That whole area was thigh high in long grass, thistles and weeds which the stonemasons had had to wade through to install it. It looked awful. I discovered they had allowed that area to be rewilded too. I complained to the Vicar that all that area is for most recently deceased people and after spending a lot of money on headstones, people should be able to tend them without wading through long, wet grass.

It’s pennypinching and laziness in many cases.

I agree that rewilding isn’t just leaving the land to do what it wants - management is necessary.

We have lots of re-wilding spaces on the park at the end of the garden. Generally I don't mind the look of it & it is managed here, albeit by volunteers. So I'm in favour, but I do worry that there are more rats about than there used to be. With all the scrub & wood piles & sawdust heaps just left, there're so many places for them, & in a suburban environment they're never short of food. It's not uncommon to come across a dead rat on our walks - 3 times last year. They were always there I know, just not in such numbers. I guess it proves it's good for wildlife.

If management is necessary, it is not rewilding.

There is a lot of nonsense talked about rewilding. There has been little or no genuine wild landscape in England for a thousand years or more. Even much of our moorland is the result of Bronze Age agriculture that farmed the light soils and exhausted them. Our woodland, forests and hedgerow are all man mad.

'Rewilding' is just replacing one manage landscape with another managed landscape.

It's just a buzz word isn't it, in practice think it means leaving public spaces to grow /tangle rather than manicuring them. We have a very extensive scheme in the village where huge amounts of earth have been moved on a 12 acre site to create a sort of wetland with meandering streams & lakes. As we're low-lying moorland anyway & have an wildfowl reserve close by, it has a good chance of naturalising & becoming a wildfowl haven, rather than boggy pasture.It will probably need asmuch managingas the pasture did, though.

Our penny pinching council has decided to rewild grass verges alongside some of our pavements. Result: nettles and thistles growing right over the pavements. Since half of each pavement has been designated and marked for bikes only, only a couple of feet of pavement is actually left and now those couple of feet have been overgrown with weeds, thistles, and nettles. My grandson was stung all over his legs by the nettles as we walked past them. Pavement verges are not suitable for rewilding schemes in my opinion.

Vision splays at junctions are also left to grow, so that, if turning out from a minor to amajor road, you cannot see oncoming traffic.

It’s alway been wild around me, the hedges go to the road, I can’t even think of a nearby grass verge. Hedge management is down to the relevant farmers, who chop them back three times a year so they don’t obscure the road. There are clippings left on the road afterwards, and we all regularly get flat tyres as a result, but I still count myself lucky.

Casdon

It’s alway been wild around me, the hedges go to the road, I can’t even think of a nearby grass verge. Hedge management is down to the relevant farmers, who chop them back three times a year so they don’t obscure the road. There are clippings left on the road afterwards, and we all regularly get flat tyres as a result, but I still count myself lucky.

You are lucky Casdon.. naturally wild places seem to be more varied and have a lovely long periods of renaturing of flowers etc.. the artificially constructed rewilding where I live ends up looking like dried grass for most of the year..

Half the oak trees in our native woodlands were planted by Jays. I love this.

I think and hope that children growing up today will have a much better understanding of the natural world than my generation had.

What saddens me is when Councils sprinkle wildflower seeds to prettify roundabouts not knowing or caring that these non native seeds are not food for the native wildlife.

Daffodils may look nice but again the bees prefer dandelions.
Rewilding definitely needs management.

Germanshepherdsmum

I agree that rewilding isn’t just leaving the land to do what it wants - management is necessary.

It takes far more management to "wild" or "rewild" an area than to keep it tidy with grass, shrubs and other perennials.

There's a large wild area near a new housing estate near here - very pretty when the wildflowers were all out but now a complete mess and full of dog poo from irresponsible dog owners.

We've very large areas of grasses, wild flowers some parts to the year, mowed down 2 times a year, I find it quite pretty.

Rewilding to me is claiming back land that had previously been either industrial or mining use. We live in a semi rural area of mixed farming and woodland but which had also until the 1980s, been mined for coal. Those mines, now closed, have water which percolates to the surface and stagnates. We now have, on our doorstep, a burgeoning reed bed that serve to sweeten the water and also provide a habitat for birds such as reed warblers, water fowl, and for dragonflies. It’s a great joy to see the reed warblers visit annually, form pairs and nest. They are shy birds and sensitive to human disturbance. Some of the land has also been left as natural heath and scrub and stands of silver birch. There are other such rewilding projects in similar areas.

We have a re-wilding scheme near us of 3600 acres - Knepp -
which as been outstandingly successful.

The increase in biodiversity is enormous and this wealth is obvious as you enter the area.

Of course it is managed, but only to the extent that it can encourage nature to recover and show us what she is capable of given the chance.

So untold species are now thriving - think warm summer nights and glow worms, nightingales, owls etc. Think spring and the clattering of returning storks wild flowers and young animals, like the ancient long horn breed. Think hot summer days and purple emperors and myriad bees and flowers. Beavers doing their thing providing habitat for so many species, who in turn provide food for the birds etc.

Honestly - it is an absolute joy - it should be emulated wherever possible.

It's true that the term rewilding is being misused to describe what should be better described as managed nature.
Rewilding isn't something that is done to make somewhere look pretty; it's for replacing some of the damaged habitats and allowing species to survive. That includes some pretty things but a lot more bugs and creepy crawlies

Totally agree if it is carried out intellectually and knowledgeably. Ideally the grass shouldn’t need cutting as it should be food for the wildlife etc.
BALANCE so difficult to culture.
But majority of people then complain when their plants and vegetables get eaten
The plants that move in tend to be the unfavourable and disproportionate such as brambles nettles etc because it lacks balance

As a matter of curiousity 27 years ago when qwe moved o our current house I decided to let a piece of lawn about 20 foot square rewild.

It has been a very depressing experience as one after the other coarse bully plants have taken over. In fact several times I have interfered. I pulled out all the nettles when the project started, later on I pulled a lot of buttercup up and for the last 10 years I have deadheaded most of the dandelions.

"7 years on, what do I have? a 20foot square of scrub and course plants. I have yet to see any kind of plant that is unusual

27 years on.

There’s a lovely hedge near me that is over 500 years old Monica, you can apparently tell by the number of different native species in it - in the scheme of things I guess 27 years isn’t very long at all.
I’m all for rewilding, even if it’s managed. I don’t know how many people have visited the gardens at Highgrove, if not it’s really worth a visit, if only to see the stump garden, which is an excellent example.