Has the time arrived for landscape scale re-wilding finally arrived?

The Safari saw a headline a couple of days ago.

English farmland could be cut by 9% to hit green targets

The article beneath the headline made for interesting reading and although it might seem like 'another' threat to farming from an already precieved as farming-unfriendly government there are fantastic opportunities to be had for our beleaguered wildlife, not forgetting the the UK is one of the most wildlife depleted countries on the planet. By coincidence for Christmas we had received this book and read it during the bad weather that prevented going out on safari in January.

We're a big fan of re-wildling and that doesn't mean land abandonment which many folk out there seem to think it does. To maximise the diversity of wildlife an area can hold there does need to be some management otherwise one vegetation type will tend to dominate (dependent  on local variations in soil composition/moisture etc). However, and this is the biggy, the management doesn't have to be done by man, although some works like stopping us peatland drains and removing invasive non-native species eg Rhododenron ponticum need to be done by us humans. What happened before us humans brought fire, axe and sheep? The answer is wild animals would have shaped the vegetation across landscape scale areas. 

Does anyone watch Wildearth TV? The reserves to highlight southern Africa's majestic animals they use all used to be farmland but now have fabulous ecosystems thanks to letting the land recover from cattle overgrazing and introducing larger native animals. We don't have Elephants and drove our nearest equivalent, Aurochs, to extinction many many years ago but we do still have plenty of proxy animals that would do the job of long lost wild cattle, horses and Wild Boars. We have deer two, although only two are native, two are naturalised and are 'probably?' OK the other two are definitely not OK - more about those later. 

Several of the reserves we visit use proxy animals to manage the habitats mainly for specific species/associations of birds although in a couple of cases it is shorter vegetation to enhance the overall diversity of wild flowers that is the target.  Here are some examples of our favourite management tools going about their work.

Longhorn Cattle

Redpoll Cattle

Mixed cattle including a Belted Galloway

Exmoor Pony

Redpoll Cattle

Redpoll Cattle

Redpoll bull

Highland Cattle

Highland Cattle

Carneddau Pony

 

We should have drawn the southern boundary line to include the steep Patterdale Common and the northern boundary line to include Matterdale Common too, basically taking in all the western watershed  into Ullswater from Grisedale Beck (= Wild Boar stream) to Aira Beck at Dockray. Arnison Crag (bottom right probably alludes to White Tailed Eagles, Whelp Side (bottom left) - Wolves, Hart Side (top centre) - deer possibly Fallow Deer as Red Deer males are known as stags not harts, Swineside Knott - Wild Boar. Now what do all these creatures have in common? They're all woodland species (the White Tailed Eagle is a wetland/coastal species but often requires big trees close by for nesting), yet if you were to climb to the top of Birks above Black Crag and looked slightly west of north you'd barely see a single bush never mind a whole tree. There's got to be an opportunity to relieve that area, 26 sq kms and at least probably that much again going up to Dockray, of its sheep, do some tree planting, allow some tree regeneration, prevent any non-natives establishing (need humans to do that), bring in suitable hardy cattle and pony species (there's an income stream for the farmers - who might no longer be called farmers but Landscape and Biodiversity Stewards (and hopefully be handsomely subsidised for becoming such) - - would 'Conservation Grade Meat' bring a premium price to their pockets?) The question of free-roaming pigs is a little more tricky but there could be the potential to use inobtusive electric fencing enclosures which can easily be moved around to prevent the pigs over-grazing, or better still what about good old fashioned proper job wild Wild Boar? Wild Boar could be controlled (in sustainable numbers) by those  members of society who like killing things, instead of shooting millions of tame non-native Pheasants how about learning how to stalk Wild Boar and use the meat...hmmm WB sausages - very nice indeedy. And therein lies another issue - how do you  prevent the cattle and ponies over grazing? In the old days those whelping Wolves would have kept our beasts on the move not lettin g them settle in any one area too long. Now there's no chance of bringing Wolves into this area and that could potentially be a problem, we're not sure what the answer is - someone walking behind them with a sharp stick??? Oh you mean a shepherd! 

Now all this might sound like pie in the sky but it is beginning to happen, even in the lake District NP with the new Skiddaw Forest Cumbria Wildlife Trust project, the more established Wild Ennerdale and the Restoring Hardknott Forest Project which aims to create and restore 630 ha native woodland and other wildlife rich habitats on what was recently one of the Lake District's largest commercial coniferous forests - there's another discussion as to whether or not foerestry plantations should have ever been allowed in a National Park in the first place but it is possible that the trees were planted before the NP status was confered - we don't know. Neither do we know if Skiddaw Forest or Hardknott intend to have proxy grazers, Wild Ennerdale and Wild Haweswater definitely do.

Not far to the south and west of the map above another exciting re-wildling project is afoot. This time it's not an area or a habitat but an iconic species that was extirpated from this area many years ago, namely White Tailed Sea Eagles aka Ernes (Heron Crag, on the main Ambleside to Keswick road, and Arnside Knott across the bay etc are place names that allude to their former presence). We can't wait to see this project get off the ground - if only to get WTE on our garden fly-over list. It would be great to watch them catching Mullet off the mouth of the River Wyre or plucking feral Canada Geese from the shores of Windermere in front of gobsmacked tourists. Let's hope it gets the go-ahead before too long but we do have some reservations about any potential impact on nearby seabird colonies at St Bee's Head and RSPB's Hodbarrow reserve and also on potential distubance to the eagles themselves just from the sheer numbers of people on the fells these days. Anyway fingers crossed it happens soon...and they don't 'disappear' like almost all of the re-introduced Red Kites have.

Moving on...our National Parks are probably where most of the effort should be concentrated and not only the upland  ones as there are other areas that would benefit such as some of the former Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty, our nearest one, the Forest of Bowland, is about as an unnatural area of little beauty as you can imagine, it could be so much better. There are three main land owners, the water authority who to give them their due are doing their but but the other two need a bit of persuading, one of whom is the King, Charles III, who allegedly has conservation running through his blue blooded veins - it certainly doesn't show up there on his hunting estate nor at Balmoral (in Scotland) where if he were to re-wild his estates rather than haveing them as killing grounds maybe some of his neighbours might follow his lead. Come on Charlie Boy grasp the Nettle what's stopping you?

9% of farmland given over to nature might sound like a very frightening amount to some folk but when you consider that much of that 'farmland' is barely productive at the moment and sheep aren't a necessary staple in our diets and that we pay heavily to subsidise them along with often paying through taxed to drain land for them, then pay again for flood defences to cope with the increased water flow off the mountain - there's nothing wetter that wet long grass but there isn't much long grass up there its all been nibbled away, and then we pay again in increased insurance premiums to cover the losses when floods do happen. When you look at it that way and the very few jobs provided by that amount of land it makes sense to us to restore its biodiverisity and enrich its landscape. There's probably quite a few more jobs available in the latter scenario as well.

Going back to those members of our society who like killing things, they could become conservationists too by doing some essential culling of some of our non-native nightmares - we're looking at you Muntac Deer (the carnage we saw on the roads between Oxford and Southampton last year was horrendous, the carnage they cause to our woods and associated wildlife is even worse), Sika Deer, Grey Squirrel, Canada Geese to name but a few. They could fulfil their bloodlust while providing our beleagured wildlife a very helpful service rather than being  part of the problem. Not sure about the freal geese and the squirrels but venison should be almost free in this country there's so many deer causing so many problems. The squirrels and geese - well there's lots (far too many!) dogs n cats that need feeding, would the pet food industry be interested in free range produce; shot with non-toxic ammo though. How about "Eat the Aliens" as a slogan?

Not just woodland/forest either, parts of Somerset flooded again last week not as devastatring as a few years ago but enough to show there's anm on-going issue -  the book describes opportunities for large scale wetland restoration in various areas of the country especially Somerset...Pelicans? Yes please!

all well and good this know-it all townie  - Community buy-in essential - aging multi-generational sheep farmer how to engage and encourage them to change/retrain - economics, government initiatives and incentives, the policy is just about there

Fewer sheep, fewer problem deer, more Wild Boar, Beavers, Moose and Wisents please and Nightingales which used to nest in Lancashire just about living memory. The Safari is going to admit to watching a TV show called  A Place in the Sun, when they visit France the sound of the local area being viwwed by the punters is always Nightingales. And can we have more Corncrakes which an elderly relative now passed away could remember calling on our family farm when she was a young girl - oh did we not mention we're not just a another suburban townie keyboard warrior know it all.

All we want is a future abounding with wildlife rather than the currrent position of letting it dwindle away with the shifting baseline getting lower and lower despite the odd success story like the Bittern comeback

and Cetti's Warbler colonisation,

these are just feel better blips on the otherwise inexorable downward spiral to mass extinction on these isles. Being closer to 70 than 60 now were unlikely to see the benefits of all this good work even if it starts at first light tomorrow morning. But given the opportunity wildlife can spring back very quickly as the Knepp project down south has shown - somewhere we'd like to visit for a good shuffy round one day. All it needs is the will and some sensitive management and our future generations will be looking back asking why didn't they do it sooner. 

There has to be community buy-in to these projects. After all you can't just turf folk off their land, well ntot in a civilised society you can't. But how do you convince an aging sheep farmer whose family have been sheep farmers for generations to give his land over to nature, even with compensation what is he going to do next? What's in it for hime? Can he quickly learn a new set of livestock skills to look after cattle rather than sheep, can he become a woodsman - does he have the time to wait for trees to grow so he can harvest them - does he really feel comfortable running wildlife watching safaris - questions that those affected will need answering. Maybe the government coud waive the recently introduced inheritance tax for those farmers that would be affected by the tax that join the schemes. We'd much rather se a lot of carrot and not a lot of stick in this transition to a better state otherwise there's going to be a lot of resentment. It's going to be hard enough to get the status quo vested interests on board as it is. Look how difficult it continues to be to get raptor persecution to stop or even a prosecution on the few occassions there's enough evidence.

Here's some pics of recent 'winners'

Little Egret

Spoonbill

Roe Deer

Tree Bee

and some recent 'losers'

Corn Bunting

Skylark

Willow Tit

Tree Sparrow

And don't forget it's not just about birds, it's as much if not more about soil improvement (structure, microbiome and losing toxins), mosses, lichens, liverworts, fungi, the herb layer, invertebrates (see above), fish, amphibians and reptiles as well as the birds and mammals - it's restoration of a whole (at least as whole as can be) functioning ecosystem including these chaps - one day? Maybe the wilder parts of NW Scotland first, can't really see England going for Wolves anytime soon...but you never know, if you don't ask  you certainly won't get!

Lynx should be out there soon. However, numpties recently illegally releasing them inappropriately might have added a few years on to that wait though.

Anyways it's all food for thought so what do you think? 

Where to next? We expect to be out  on safari again later this week - when the weather imroves, honking it down today!

In the meantime let us know how much wilder your outback could be given a few sympathetic changes.

Onward, here, there and everywhere

The Safari left you on a high last time with the news that we'd hit the dizzy heights of 100 species of birds photographed in January. Well, as we alluded to then, things slowwwwweeeddd right down in February. We set ourselves a rather weeny target of just 15 new species to get during the extended month. How have we got on?

Our first safari of February saw us head up north to a rather soggy Leighton Moss where it didn't take long to find the long staying female Ring Necked Duck, as is usual for us it was away across the far side of Lillian's pool. But hey near or far if they're identifiable they all count for our Challenge - #101.

Our attention was soon drawn away from it by a well marked male Marsh Harrier.] quartering the reeds over the far side of the pool.

After a while we'd exhausted the possibilities at Lillian's and wandered slowly down to the Grizedale Hide where the water before us was largely bird free, in fact we don't think we've ever seen it so birdless. A shout from CR pointed us in the direction of a very distant Great White Egret, just about photographable beforee it banked and dropped into a distant channel btween the reedbeds\ #102.

With so little happening there we didn't stop long and retraced our steps past the deserted Bearded Tit grit trays to Tim Jackson Hide. Again high water levels meant the pool was lacking in our feathered friends but at least there were a few more than at the Grizedale Hide including several sleepy Snipe, #103, a species we just couldn't connect with in January.

Once again though we soon exhausted all the possibilities and headed back towards the Causeway Hide where pies would be consumed passing the Feeding Station as we went. Not as busy as it can be there but a Marsh Tit is always a good spot here.

Lunch was eagerly consumed while watching Cormorants coming and going.

And a pair of Teal did us the favour of foraging right under our noses.

Butties and pies scoffed it was time to head along the causeway to Lower Hide. The booming of Bitterns was our soundtrack of the day, we could hear them both sides of the track, at least three and probably four we thought. Four booming males, it's not that long ago there were only 11 in the whole country! Just shows what a bit of positive habitat management can achieve - "Build it and they will come" as they say. Along the causeway we got waylaid by a gang of Siskins feeding on Alder seeds that had been washed out of their cones by wind and rains and floodwaters had accumulated them at the edge of the path.

It's not often you see them on the ground as they usually prefer to feed acrobatically high in the tree tops. A Lesser Redpoll was seen with them but easily eluded our lens. Half way down the wooded path to the Lower Hide is a small bridge and that was a bridge too far for CR and his ankle high boots. WE carried on with IH in our wellies and did managed to get to Lower Hide after an intrepid journey through hell and high water - cold high wtaer at that!

And sadly a bit of wasted journey - the very high water levels meant no birds to be seen apart from a few Mute Swans so back to rejoin CR we slopped. Back on terra-firma we went to Lillian's Hide again passing a far-to-quick-for-us Water Rail and a couple of frustratingly invisble Cetti's Warblers. A stationary Snipe on the tern nesting platform was easier.

A little more Marsh Harrier action coincied with the Ring Necked Duck coming a bit closer.

Not the most productive day for our Challenge but a good day on safari with good friends never-the-less and that's what it's all about. 

A few days later our next safari took us along the icy lanes of Over Wyre. Passing a car that had slid off the road through a fence and into a field had us taking extra care on the narrow ditch-sided roads. We struck lucky in Eagland Hill, spotting the Little Owl we've not seen there for several years - #104.

It's a pity that it was on the wrong side of the tree and facing away but you can't have everything. Further down the lane we couldn't stop at the first Farmland Birds Feeding Station so motored on down to the next one where a Corn Bunting , #105, flitted in and out of the large anti-Pheasant/Grey Squirrel cage.

Obviously we'd have preferedv a pic of it in the tree away from the ironmongery but every time it flitted it flut behind the tree truck and out of sight - the pesky so-n-so! Not much else doing there so it was back to the first Feeding Station which was alive with birds, mostly Chaffinches and Tree Sparrows. Luckily there was a pair of Yellowhammers too, our target species, unfortunately it was right at the front of the viewing area with lots of twiggery in the way so our pic is a bit (well a lot) hmmmm, but you can tell what it is so it's (just about) good enough for our purposes. #106

We  met a couple of birders on the drive back to the main road and told them how to find the Little Owl which they'd not seen, we hoped they did find it as it wasn't where we'd spotted it when we drove past.

From the farmland mosses we headed further north for another attempt at the Bewick's Swans. We soon found the flock of Whooper Swans they were probably with but it was so far away across the fields we needed the telescope that we didn't have with us today. With that disappointment we went further up to Plover Scar where another birder was just leaving and told us of a Barn Owl that had been hunting the ditches - we didn't see it but the sound of singing Skylarks in the frosy morning air was glorious. The tide was dropping as we went for a mooch along the seawall to see what we could see. Curlews, Oystercatchers and Redshanks were the most numerous birds but a duck on the water was more interesting...an Eider #107

The following day we were out with t'mutt for his late afternoon walk and what an awful afternoon it was, reet dreich as a Scots person might saw, dark, grey, dingy and raining. Perfect conditions for spotting the Snow Bunting that's been kicking around the cliff/dunes/prom close to Base Camp. We've been seeing it fleetingly about once every 10 days but today it sort of hung around even if a little flighty. No-one in their right mind would carry a camera on a day like that but then everyone has a phone in their pockets these days...The Snow Bunting continued to flit about on the grass bank not too far away from us so ever so cautiously the phone cane out of the pocket. Full Zoom was selected and we held it in the direction of said bird...

Maybe we should have used Night Mode??? Hopefully optomistic we asked our fellow Challengers if they could identify what was in the picture, if they could we could count it towards our tally. The answers came back...a 'shriky thing', nothing, even a Weasel was touted by wildlife savvy IH! So, no we can't count it but would we be able to get a much improved pic before it heads northwards, that was going to be another challenge.

Our next safari saw us with CR and IH at Martin Mere WWT reserve again. It was another grey and drizzly day. Our first port of call was the feeders, on the way we spotted a Brown Hare in the distance guarding the entrance to the Harrier Hide, a nice way to start the day!

The feeders were unusually quiet but as it was raining we stuck it out just in case something of note should show up. Eventually the rain eased and that was our cue to head round to the opposite end of the reserve...the thinking being if we've had at least 60 hours of miserable weather the Barn Owls will be hungry and needing to hunt, the break in the weather is going to bring them out. the hunch was right and we didn't have long to wait. #108 - over half way to our target of 15 for the month now.

After a while hunting the bull's field it swept in front of us and moved over towards the mere to our left.

It then disappeared, possibly circling behind us. Our attention was then turned to the pools in front of us to check all the Teal for any Green Winged Teal that may have secreted themselves among the many hundreds of their Old World counterparts...that's got to be done at this time of year. We couldn't find any, if indeed there were any to be found, We did however find an unexpected quartet of Avocets, a nice little bonus towards our February target. #109. They didn't do much just stood in a line up to their bellies in the water chilling out all day.

Two Kingfishers were also seen but neither were in a photographable location. A shout went up in the hide - someone had spotted the Barn Owl again, only this time there were two. One of which was a little closer than the earlier one.

It even thought about trying  an impression of a Cattle Egret at one point; either that or its eyes were much much bigger than its belly!

But soon it was back to business as usual quartering the fileds for voles.

We hoped one of them would land on a nearby post but neither did, rather they both took themselves further and further away from us across through paddocks. So we took our leave of them and headed back towards the feeders. On the way we called in at the little hide and watched this Little Egret doing its foot-stirring thingy

With little to show for its efforts it decided to swith opools and went for an overland wander rather than take to the wing.

Having a little shimmy on the way.

A brief stop at the Discovery Hide gave us a very close fishing Cormorant. We didn't see it catch any fish but they do swallow small prey items underwater.

For some reason we gave the feeders a miss and continued round to the UU hide where we were kindly shown a Kingfisher. Was this a third one or one of the two we'd seen earlier?

Along the dyke from the Kingfisher and on the opposite side was this bedraggled male Kestrel sat atop his lookout post.

His eyesight must be phenomenal as after a few minutes he swooped down 30 odd yards to nail a worm or other small invertebtrate in the grass

Time for the feeders! The Reed Buntings have found they can collect seeds fallen from the bird table without having to take part in the hustle and bustle that goes on above them.

A female Chaffinch has learnt the trick too.

There was a rattle of camera shutters when a male Great Spotted Woodpecker turned up.

A woodpecker eating Millet - what's that all about? Then a female arrived,

There was a second female too, this second one was a leucistic individual with very pale brown wings, somehow we didn't get a pic of her. We did get the obligatory pic of the pools resident Moorhen though, it's just got to be done; no ifs, buts or maybes.

In the distance we could hear that it was getting near time for the mayhem to begin...otherwise known as the afternoon swan feed. Off we went to the Discovery Hide to get our ring-side seats. 

While the Ranger got herself organised we fired off some point blank shots at the usual suspects.

You can't beat a bit of vermiculation and those found on Pintails and Pochards are exquisite.

The Ranger went out with her barrow of grain, the decibels rose, a flurry of scattering wings soon returned when she threw the first couple of scoops of grain.

After the third scoopful was launch the scrummage began in earnest.

Birds arrived from further out on the lake pitching in wherever there was a  few square inches to get they feet onto - it was bedlam, a seething mass of forward moving feathers...unstoppable in their quest for the free grub.

In the thick of the ducks was a wader, a Black Tailed Godwit with a horrendous looking injury.

Look closely at the foot on the damaged leg, it's horriblby swollen and has lost the claws - yuk!

Then we spotted what we'd been hoping for, a Ruff had joined the party #110

It was now just about time to leave but we couldn't go without a couple more Pintail shots - what a bonny duck.

We were now at two thirds of our February target for the Challenge and only one day into the second week, things were going well but could they/would they continue???

Where to next? There's little change in the local bird world at this time of year, would the water levels in our favourite wetlands remain (too) high, could we get those next five species? 

In the meantime let us know who's doing the scrummaging in your outback.