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.

Another safari in the autumnal gloom

The Safari headed east with CR on a shorter safari to Brockholes for our first winter (= late autumn really) visit there since the old days before it was a reserve. Watch that nasty pothole on the way in if you're visiting, it's more like a cave, the car's suspension bump-stops came into play with a disconcerting bang! Once past that hazard and under the bridge onto the main drag into the reserve we saw lots of work had been done, or was still in the process of being done on the lake to our left. Our first stop would be the look-out area from the Visitor Village for a closer look. The pic doesn't show what's been happening too well but the overly-well vegetated islands have been scraped and reprofiled possibly to attract breeding waders like Redshank, Snipe, Little Ringed Plovers and Lapwing; maybe we should invest in a drone but then the reserve management might not be too happy about one of those flying round disturbing the wildlife,

From there we usually have a wander along the river but broke with tradition again and went to have a look at the other lake, although we did walk round it and through the woods in our 'normal' clockwise direction this time. From The Lookout we could see that similar work had been done to the  island here too. The newly exposed expanse of mud was certainly attractive to the Lapwings, there were at least a couple of hundred roosting on there. Too far away for pics and with nothing else nearer we moved on to the next screen where a Buzzard flew over our heads calling but neither of us could get a pic before it wafted over the treetops and away. It's a pity IH couldn't be on safari with us today as Herons started with a bang and not an egret to be seen. This one, the first of the day, was stood opposite us.

Another was only a dozen or so yards to it's left.

This one had a little preen and a shimmy before stalking off onto the mud perhaps on the hunt for Frogs, Toads or Newts that had been disturbed by the machinary.

Just behind the hide a bird chattered which sounded like a Cetti's Warbler and then clucked like a Blackbird, we went to investigate and found a Song Thrush deep in a Willow bush, we don't recall them making those sorts of alarm(?) calls before. That's the thing with nature, there's always something new or unexpected even from 'common' things just around the corner - always something to learn. 

Continuing our wander along the track we passed a Goldcrest that wouldn't show itself, other than that the wooded trail was quiet apart from the ticking of occasional Robins. We were hoping for some winter thrushes, Redwings and Fieldfares, but even Blackbirds were absent. Similarly the noisy part of the trrail along side the busy motorway was also devoid of life. Stopping at the next screen we got a better view of the recent management works.

If you look closely at the lower pic you might spot another Heron.

This one too partook in a bit of preening.

Herons 3 - 0 Egrets! A flying start for Team Heron; can they keep the momentum going?
In the channel between us and the new mud island a small group of Tufted Ducks mooched about. A couple of the females showed the 'Scaup-like' white blaze to their faces.

The males pose no such ID problems for the unwary or the duck novice.

A scan through the gulls we could see at the back o the island revealed no Mediterranean Gulls, a shame as we'd already seen the other two of our 'Big Three' birds, Coot and Moorhen. In the bushes adjacent to the hide a small flock of Long Tailed Tits wouldn't pose for pics.

Moving on towards the woods we passed an Elderberry tree impressively bedecked in blobs of moss.

This part of the British Isles' natural climax vegetation is Atlantic Temperate rainforest, of which only a tiny percentage of its  original extent remains and so is one of the rareset natural habitiats on the planet. It is typified by high rainfall, obviously, and the fact that that rainfall gives rise to forest with trees covered in epiphytes  aka plants wot grow on other plants usually trees - just like the pics above. It's a very rich and diverse habitat and there are,at last, significant moves to try to expand the area it covers, both here in the UK and neighbouring Ireland. Sadly there is also serious pressure from some communities NOT to help it expand into areas where it once stood. Anyway moving on into what is Lancashire's largest Ancient Woodland - not that it's very big at all - we hoped to come across some Roe Deer but had to settle for a massive moss-covered Bracket Fungus instead. Strangely there were very few other fungi to be found.

And then found some Red Campion still in flower with Herb Robert likewise a foot or so away.

No walk through a woodland in autumn is complete without a pic of a splendiferously golden tree.

We weren't the only ones getting pics of this beauty, a couple of ladies coming the other way had stopped to do the same and who could blame them, it was quite spectacular. But where were the birds, all along the path through the woods we'd only seen and heard a couple of Robins and a Blackbird. Passing the fields we came to the old hedge and that's where we found them. A nice selection of common birds were shuffling about in there including an unseen Goldcrest and a brief male Bullfinch which we hoped was going our way A few yards further on there is a small but very lively feeding station. We stopped here for a good while enjoying the comings and goings. Lots of Blue and Great Tits and a few Chaffinches along with the ubiquitous Grey Squirrels. Unlike Pennington Flash where the dozens of squirrels ruled the roost here the feeders were squirrel-proof expensive ones that worked well, closing the food ports when a squirrel manafged to get onto one, and the tables designed so that the squirrels couldn't jump onto them or clime the pole and access the food from beneath consequently there were far fewer Grey Squirrrels here and they were only able to mop up any spillage the birds dropped. Well done Lancs Wildlife Trust.

Don't look too closely at the pics it was really dark under the bushes so the quality isn't up to much. Through the twiggery behind the feeders CR spotted a bit of movement which turned into a Roe Deer, not just one a second one was with it a few minutes later. After much waiting they almost came out into the open to show themselves.

Lots of cropping to try to get 'wrong' branches and bits of feeder out of  the way.

Doing a bit of sniffing

and then tasting but not nibbling the twig.

Before too long they moved away to the right so we took the opportunity to get some shots of the other visitors to-ing and fro-ing around the feeders like this Dunnock.

and as many as five Reed Buntings were about.

The male Chaffinches are being to colour up nicely now.

Unlike the Reed Buntings above the Great Tits didn't pose for long and were difficult to get a pic of, as soon as you'd seen it and swung the camera round they were gone and we were trying not to take pics of them on the feeders themselves.

We could fill our boots with Blue Tit pics as they were much more obliging.

Another movement in the back of the bushes was a Great Spotted Woodpecker that didn't come to the front. A few minutes later more movement was seen, it was the Roe Deer coming back. Again not really coming out into the open but staying tucked up at the back under and between the bushes behind the feeders - so lots of heavy cropping agian on the pics.

We're not sure what they were after on the ground there was no greenery down there but one of them did start to browse, first on Hazel leaves.

Followed by a tongue tickling nibble on some Nettle leaves.

Look at those pearly whites!

We had hoped to see Roe Deer and before we'd had this sighting we were getting a little disappointed we'd not seen any so far but this close up and prolonged sighting was way more than we could have wished for. Obviously we were being very quiet and they were very relaxed, relaxed enough to do a bit of grooming.

Relaxed that is until one heard us.

After a while they slunk off back into the undergrowth and we slunk off back to the car to collect our scran passing two more Roe Deer out in the open at the edge of the lake but they slunk off too before we could get a pic.

Before getting to the car park we called into the Visitor Village for another look at the new mud island where Heron #s 4 & 5 could be seen (and still no egrets). 

After lunch we took the riverside path where we weren't expecting to find a Redshank feeding on a shallow sandbank mid-stream.

It was now very misty and double gloomy as you can see. We were hoping for some Goosanders which are often found here but found Heron #6 instead.

Whilst watching a Carrion Crow very intently wading around in the shallows, was it looking for a fish supper? the first Little Egret of the day flew past went round the slight bend in the river and out of sight.

We like the way you can see the pebbles on the riverbed in the shadow of the bird in this pic. 

Walking further down the river to see if we could find the Little Egret again we bumped into Heron #7

And yes just abit further on there was the Little Egret too.

Leaving the river we headed back to the feeding station hoping for more Roe Deer action, which as you know is never guaranteed. Around feeders Blue Tits are guaranteed.

This afternoon the Great Tits were more obliging.

The Great Spotted Woodpecker was still about and equally hidden at the back of the bushes as earlier, no further visits from the Roe Deer though. We failed to get any pics of the Nuthatch that always seemed to land on the back side of the feeders grab a nut and vanish into the woods to eat or stash it. On that note we left to have another look over the mud island behind us. The Lapwings were very skitttish taking flight at the merest thing...at least that's what we thought as we never saw anything that might be expected to upset them. We found one then four Snipe well hidden in the mud but when they got up with the Lapwings one time we saw there were actually about 70 of them, a fabulous sight. This is only about half of them after the 'wisp' split in two.

Still no sign of any Mediterranean Gulls in the gull flock, apart from the many Black Headed Gulls there was just a single Lesser Black Back and two Common Gulls. With one of the Lapwing 'dreads' most of the gulls left along with neafrly all the Lapwings. It was then we heard a Wigeon whistle and looking through the reeds in front of us found a pair of them.

From here we went for a final look at the feeders where we found the only Coal Tit of the day having noted their absence on the day's previous visits

And at last we got a bit of a shot of the in-and-out Nuthatch.

A pair of Chaffinches posed nicely on one of the feeders

In the end we succumbed to temptation and could no longer resist taking a few pics of the Grey Squirrels.

The Safari had to be back at Base Camp earlier than usual to meet a tradesman so we called it a day an hour earlier than we would normal finish up. Before leaving we had a final look for the two lake edge Roe Deer from one of the high bank vantage points but to no avail. However looking down at our feet was a gorgeous picture painted by fallen Field Maple leaves, a fine end to a great if mizzly day.

Where to next? We're hoping to get out a bit further east to a new venue for the safari but it may well be weather affected looking at the forecast, fingers crossed.

In the meantime let us know who's prowling around the undergrowth in your outback.