“You can’t go through the official channels and make it work.”
July 23, 2023 2:23 AM Subscribe
As rewilding and the prospect of nature restoring itself has caught the public imagination in recent years, projects have sprung up all over Europe, often led by philanthropists and enthusiastically backed by politicians. But many of these projects have also become entangled in bureaucracy and an intense debate over the scientific practicality of rewilding. Many in the rewilding movement say that political leaders are not doing enough to restore biodiversity — leaving the mavericks with little choice but to act unilaterally and reintroduce species themselves. from The secret movement bringing Europe’s wildlife back from the brink [Coda]
But the biologists talk about the laws of nature and how wild animals will go through phases of starvation. Yeah, and they will then move on to a better place. Which they can't when there is a fence around the area.
This is a major point.
I recently went on a three-hour hike through a local rewilding area, and there was a lot of discussion about invasive species. Part of me was wondering if it was really a bad thing: this area is going through and will continue to go through significant change due to climate change. The planet has gone through massive climate changes in the past, and existing species of flora and fauna have given way to species better adapted to the new conditions. And knowing roots in the ground is better than no plants, the logic went: maybe the invasive species aren’t so bad, if that means more diversity available while the rate of change intensifies. So, maybe the US loses all of it’s maples, but Denmark now has oodles, does that really present a problem beyond “it didn’t used to be this way?” So yeah, I was pondering a whole lot of options that required humans to release a bunch of control on things, which we have repeatedly shown never goes well. Never ends up as we think it will.
But then we got to the Japanese stiltgrass, an invasive plant here, and the comment that deer will not eat it. Without that control, the major large fauna will die, and the stiltgrass will out-compete the other species that we do want hanging around that provide the biodiversity objectives.
I do not know what the smart path is here. I do believe that some of the effort to preserve A specific species in A specific habitat are unrealistic attempts to freeze things at one specific time in the planet’s history, when we started Naming Things. I also know that certain species of flora and fauna are anchor species for a massive variety of other species, either for shade or habitat or food or medicine, and their loss destabilizes everything in the area. I am also aware that the climatic rate of change is only speeding up, and that perhaps the efforts should be to support the shift of certain key species to other regions that now exhibit the same criteria for annual and diurnal temperature and moisture, and that maybe that’s the smart play. But then we get into the issue of the loss of corridors for all the other things to follow, and I am back to not knowing how we address what needs to be addressed, without assuming that there is or ever could be a realistic “reset to factory default” button.
posted by Silvery Fish at 5:41 AM on July 23, 2023 [16 favorites]
This is a major point.
I recently went on a three-hour hike through a local rewilding area, and there was a lot of discussion about invasive species. Part of me was wondering if it was really a bad thing: this area is going through and will continue to go through significant change due to climate change. The planet has gone through massive climate changes in the past, and existing species of flora and fauna have given way to species better adapted to the new conditions. And knowing roots in the ground is better than no plants, the logic went: maybe the invasive species aren’t so bad, if that means more diversity available while the rate of change intensifies. So, maybe the US loses all of it’s maples, but Denmark now has oodles, does that really present a problem beyond “it didn’t used to be this way?” So yeah, I was pondering a whole lot of options that required humans to release a bunch of control on things, which we have repeatedly shown never goes well. Never ends up as we think it will.
But then we got to the Japanese stiltgrass, an invasive plant here, and the comment that deer will not eat it. Without that control, the major large fauna will die, and the stiltgrass will out-compete the other species that we do want hanging around that provide the biodiversity objectives.
I do not know what the smart path is here. I do believe that some of the effort to preserve A specific species in A specific habitat are unrealistic attempts to freeze things at one specific time in the planet’s history, when we started Naming Things. I also know that certain species of flora and fauna are anchor species for a massive variety of other species, either for shade or habitat or food or medicine, and their loss destabilizes everything in the area. I am also aware that the climatic rate of change is only speeding up, and that perhaps the efforts should be to support the shift of certain key species to other regions that now exhibit the same criteria for annual and diurnal temperature and moisture, and that maybe that’s the smart play. But then we get into the issue of the loss of corridors for all the other things to follow, and I am back to not knowing how we address what needs to be addressed, without assuming that there is or ever could be a realistic “reset to factory default” button.
posted by Silvery Fish at 5:41 AM on July 23, 2023 [16 favorites]
I have really bad associations with the term "rewilding", as opposed to good old conservation, so I was dreading the comments on this, so am really relieved to find I am in total agreement with mumimor and Silvery Fish. I'd like to recommend a really deep and thoughtful book, Shaping the Wild, from a very experienced conservationist working together with a Welsh hill farm. It doesn't discuss beavers but it does offer very honest exploration and critique of many simplistic assumptions about goals for conservation and the colonialist origins of idealising the notion of land without people.
I am kind of agnostic about guerrilla beaver release, I think if you're going to go rogue then beavers are about the best candidate to do it with.
posted by Rhedyn at 5:57 AM on July 23, 2023 [12 favorites]
I am kind of agnostic about guerrilla beaver release, I think if you're going to go rogue then beavers are about the best candidate to do it with.
posted by Rhedyn at 5:57 AM on July 23, 2023 [12 favorites]
“The Pablo Escobar of beavers" is not a sentence I expected to run into but it's amazing.
posted by mhoye at 6:18 AM on July 23, 2023 [12 favorites]
posted by mhoye at 6:18 AM on July 23, 2023 [12 favorites]
Rhedyn, thanks for the book recommendation. It’s on the list now.
Because this thread has opened up this particular obsessive box in my head, I’m adding in the little factoid that a number of the invasive plant species here are ornamental landscaping plants that have gone rogue. Control, in my opinion, would require banning and legislatively forced removal of those plants from urban areas. That is just never going to happen in ways that would be soon enough or complete enough, so imo, any solution that does not include hundreds of hours of human work to painstakingly and manually remove plants has to assume ways to work with or around some of the invasives.
It’s weird: I lived many adult years in poverty, and the whole skillsets built up around realities of all the needs and what actually can be accomplished and what must be attended to, and the allocation of terribly limited resources and what you decide to just not do anything about and let decline, because you can survive with cavities in your teeth but you can’t survive without a car to get to work… I am finding that these are incredibly useful skills now. There is so much that needs to be done, there are way more needs than resources, we keep getting dinged by the consequences of what we couldn’t (didn’t) attend to in the past, resources have to first be allocated to the things that get us to next week, and some other things are going to be lost in the process.
Huh. Maybe that’s what I am not hearing in these conversations: I am not hearing the “….to meet this foundational objective, this is what gets lost in the process.”
posted by Silvery Fish at 6:25 AM on July 23, 2023 [14 favorites]
Because this thread has opened up this particular obsessive box in my head, I’m adding in the little factoid that a number of the invasive plant species here are ornamental landscaping plants that have gone rogue. Control, in my opinion, would require banning and legislatively forced removal of those plants from urban areas. That is just never going to happen in ways that would be soon enough or complete enough, so imo, any solution that does not include hundreds of hours of human work to painstakingly and manually remove plants has to assume ways to work with or around some of the invasives.
It’s weird: I lived many adult years in poverty, and the whole skillsets built up around realities of all the needs and what actually can be accomplished and what must be attended to, and the allocation of terribly limited resources and what you decide to just not do anything about and let decline, because you can survive with cavities in your teeth but you can’t survive without a car to get to work… I am finding that these are incredibly useful skills now. There is so much that needs to be done, there are way more needs than resources, we keep getting dinged by the consequences of what we couldn’t (didn’t) attend to in the past, resources have to first be allocated to the things that get us to next week, and some other things are going to be lost in the process.
Huh. Maybe that’s what I am not hearing in these conversations: I am not hearing the “….to meet this foundational objective, this is what gets lost in the process.”
posted by Silvery Fish at 6:25 AM on July 23, 2023 [14 favorites]
The article is good; thank you for posting.
Rewilding is so complicated. There is a lot of abandoned land in Europe which could in theory be rewilded, but in practice, with all the land having been managed for about 4-500 years, it is difficult to recreate a healthy balance, and ironically, it needs care, a lot of expensive care. If you just stop managing a field or a forest, it will rapidly be overtaken by invasive species, both flora and fauna.
Personally, I am not a fan of the term "rewilding," because of how it elides the human role in the landscape and the extent to which we are all living in landscapes shaped by at least hundreds and usually many thousands of years of human manipulation. I live and work in the western US, and just like in northern Europe, there have been humans constantly living in and altering the landscape here since the retreat of the last ice age. (Recent finds in Oregon pushed back the confirmed span of human occupation to around 18,000 years ago, for example.) There literally is no pre-human landscape or ecology in these spaces.
I have very mixed feelings about the guerilla tactics the article profiles. It definitely is a way to bypass and force change on hide-bound regulatory agencies, but I've seen so many amateur projects go awry, too. Beaver reintroduction is complex particularly because beaver are so incompatible with most infrastructure and also most farming. Beavers have a lot of ecological benefits, but that's because they are such high-impact creatures in the landscape, and a lot of that impact lands on neighboring landowners, local road departments, and other stakeholders who aren't getting a say in whether or not the unpermitted releases are happening.
posted by Dip Flash at 7:07 AM on July 23, 2023 [8 favorites]
Rewilding is so complicated. There is a lot of abandoned land in Europe which could in theory be rewilded, but in practice, with all the land having been managed for about 4-500 years, it is difficult to recreate a healthy balance, and ironically, it needs care, a lot of expensive care. If you just stop managing a field or a forest, it will rapidly be overtaken by invasive species, both flora and fauna.
Personally, I am not a fan of the term "rewilding," because of how it elides the human role in the landscape and the extent to which we are all living in landscapes shaped by at least hundreds and usually many thousands of years of human manipulation. I live and work in the western US, and just like in northern Europe, there have been humans constantly living in and altering the landscape here since the retreat of the last ice age. (Recent finds in Oregon pushed back the confirmed span of human occupation to around 18,000 years ago, for example.) There literally is no pre-human landscape or ecology in these spaces.
I have very mixed feelings about the guerilla tactics the article profiles. It definitely is a way to bypass and force change on hide-bound regulatory agencies, but I've seen so many amateur projects go awry, too. Beaver reintroduction is complex particularly because beaver are so incompatible with most infrastructure and also most farming. Beavers have a lot of ecological benefits, but that's because they are such high-impact creatures in the landscape, and a lot of that impact lands on neighboring landowners, local road departments, and other stakeholders who aren't getting a say in whether or not the unpermitted releases are happening.
posted by Dip Flash at 7:07 AM on July 23, 2023 [8 favorites]
I'm always amazed at shots of some European "countryside", particularly the British Isles. The narrator is waxing poetic about its beauty... and all I can think of as they pan across bald hillsides is - where are the trees?
We live on the north side of Lake Ontario. We are blessed with many parks and conservation areas that are still close to cities, but few are completely wild. Many immature forests, that were originally clear-cut, and the regrowth is commercial replanting or invasives. There's a manmade land extension and breakwater quite near us which was carefully planned to be as natural as possible, with an included wetland... and it's definitely been a hit with many birds, including migratory ones. We now have mink, and otters have been sighted. Some beavers arrived, and chewed down thousands of dollars worth of carefully planted trees. Coyotes have found their way here,. They have occasionally stalked solitary evening walkers/joggers, and have snatched a few cats and small dogs.
So of course, some start saying hey... this is a little too wild?
I'm fairly cynical about this. Unless we choose to confine humans to a few dense urban centers, and leave as much of the planet as possible to do its own thing, then we'll just end up with pockets of "managed" nature - parks and petting zoos, basically. Quite pleasant - but not quite the natural planet we were given.
posted by Artful Codger at 7:37 AM on July 23, 2023 [6 favorites]
We live on the north side of Lake Ontario. We are blessed with many parks and conservation areas that are still close to cities, but few are completely wild. Many immature forests, that were originally clear-cut, and the regrowth is commercial replanting or invasives. There's a manmade land extension and breakwater quite near us which was carefully planned to be as natural as possible, with an included wetland... and it's definitely been a hit with many birds, including migratory ones. We now have mink, and otters have been sighted. Some beavers arrived, and chewed down thousands of dollars worth of carefully planted trees. Coyotes have found their way here,. They have occasionally stalked solitary evening walkers/joggers, and have snatched a few cats and small dogs.
So of course, some start saying hey... this is a little too wild?
I'm fairly cynical about this. Unless we choose to confine humans to a few dense urban centers, and leave as much of the planet as possible to do its own thing, then we'll just end up with pockets of "managed" nature - parks and petting zoos, basically. Quite pleasant - but not quite the natural planet we were given.
posted by Artful Codger at 7:37 AM on July 23, 2023 [6 favorites]
Something to keep in mind when you look at the "bald" hillsides in the UK is that, insofar as we can say it is "supposed" to be anything, much of what you are looking at is supposed to be blanket bog, not forest. There are a variety of restoration projects underway, including work to heal damage from inappropriate tree planting.
posted by Rhedyn at 7:50 AM on July 23, 2023 [9 favorites]
posted by Rhedyn at 7:50 AM on July 23, 2023 [9 favorites]
I appreciate that bogs, moors and meadows are often natural features in the UK. But more than a little of the area is just sheepwrecked.
posted by Artful Codger at 7:58 AM on July 23, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by Artful Codger at 7:58 AM on July 23, 2023 [4 favorites]
It seems the established consensus in Britain is that, in effect, the Clearances must never be reversed, however much it costs us to maintain these unprofitable sheep and however much damage they do. And if you could somehow persuade the government to try reforestation, they would undoubtedly do it by spending huge sums on unprofitable rectilinear conifer plantations.
posted by Phanx at 8:09 AM on July 23, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by Phanx at 8:09 AM on July 23, 2023 [4 favorites]
I was struck by the article's theme of class and oligarchy. For example:
“Is it healthy that a class of elite unelected people are using their wealth and privilege and influence to make changes to places, rather than with places and their communities of ‘plebs’ who live and work there and don't get a say?” she said. “It feels like a form of ecocolonialism.”
posted by doctornemo at 8:30 AM on July 23, 2023 [3 favorites]
“Is it healthy that a class of elite unelected people are using their wealth and privilege and influence to make changes to places, rather than with places and their communities of ‘plebs’ who live and work there and don't get a say?” she said. “It feels like a form of ecocolonialism.”
posted by doctornemo at 8:30 AM on July 23, 2023 [3 favorites]
I was struck by the article's theme of class and oligarchy. For example:
This is a major issue in land management and restoration (the synonymous term used here instead of "rewilding") in the US as well, though much less extreme since so much restoration work here takes place on federal and state public lands. Particularly within a given county or watershed, things can easily be dominated by individual landowners (especially the people who buy trophy ranches and don't need them to make money) or groups like The Nature Conservancy that buy land for conservation purposes with outside money (again, meaning they don't need that land to produce an income).
posted by Dip Flash at 9:03 AM on July 23, 2023 [3 favorites]
This is a major issue in land management and restoration (the synonymous term used here instead of "rewilding") in the US as well, though much less extreme since so much restoration work here takes place on federal and state public lands. Particularly within a given county or watershed, things can easily be dominated by individual landowners (especially the people who buy trophy ranches and don't need them to make money) or groups like The Nature Conservancy that buy land for conservation purposes with outside money (again, meaning they don't need that land to produce an income).
posted by Dip Flash at 9:03 AM on July 23, 2023 [3 favorites]
Huge questions of governance and democracy.
posted by doctornemo at 11:16 AM on July 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by doctornemo at 11:16 AM on July 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
On the other hand, industrialized countries don't live in the world of peasant farmers anymore. All the actual plebs who didn't own land got pushed off to try and make it getting jobs in the city, and now, by this logic, don't deserve an actual say in the future of their country and environment because they all got consolidated into little apartments they don't own and have to pay increasingly exorbitant rents on.
posted by Zalzidrax at 11:43 AM on July 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Zalzidrax at 11:43 AM on July 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
since so much restoration work here takes place on federal and state public lands
I should have said "... federal and state public lands, and tribally-owned and -ceded lands" since so much of the most cutting edge restoration work is tribally-affiliated (i.e., done by tribes, or with tribes as active partners in the work). And, the lack of an active tribal/First Nation component is a major difference in the dynamic between "restoration" here and in Canada, versus "rewilding" in Europe, and I suspect is a large part of why the dynamics of the work and even the language used is so different. Tribes, as sovereign nations, bring a lot of autonomy to the table and can negotiate government-to-government about natural resource management, so can force public agencies into action, or can choose to ignore policies they don't agree with.
This is why most of the early major beaver reintroduction projects (along with other aquatic species) in the US were done by tribes -- they could act, legally, as a sovereign nation exercising treaty rights, despite agencies not being on board with the idea. There's a difference between that, and the purely individual option of guerilla action discussed in the article, even if the outcomes are similar.
posted by Dip Flash at 12:20 PM on July 23, 2023 [9 favorites]
I should have said "... federal and state public lands, and tribally-owned and -ceded lands" since so much of the most cutting edge restoration work is tribally-affiliated (i.e., done by tribes, or with tribes as active partners in the work). And, the lack of an active tribal/First Nation component is a major difference in the dynamic between "restoration" here and in Canada, versus "rewilding" in Europe, and I suspect is a large part of why the dynamics of the work and even the language used is so different. Tribes, as sovereign nations, bring a lot of autonomy to the table and can negotiate government-to-government about natural resource management, so can force public agencies into action, or can choose to ignore policies they don't agree with.
This is why most of the early major beaver reintroduction projects (along with other aquatic species) in the US were done by tribes -- they could act, legally, as a sovereign nation exercising treaty rights, despite agencies not being on board with the idea. There's a difference between that, and the purely individual option of guerilla action discussed in the article, even if the outcomes are similar.
posted by Dip Flash at 12:20 PM on July 23, 2023 [9 favorites]
There's limits to this whole 'Guerilla wilding' - c.f. Lioness on the loose in Berlin. (Later suggested it was really a wild boar.)
Also seconding the “The Pablo Escobar of beavers" as unexpectedly hilarious.
posted by From Bklyn at 12:36 PM on July 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
Also seconding the “The Pablo Escobar of beavers" as unexpectedly hilarious.
posted by From Bklyn at 12:36 PM on July 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
"Something to keep in mind when you look at the "bald" hillsides in the UK is that, insofar as we can say it is "supposed" to be anything..."
Genuine question: Can there be said to be anything like a "wilderness" or "pristine" environment in England? My (limited!) understanding is the environment there was highly manipulated by humans from the moment the ice fields retreated.
(And I am aware that the same is true to a large extent in North America, but Natives using fire.)
posted by LarryC at 12:40 PM on July 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
Genuine question: Can there be said to be anything like a "wilderness" or "pristine" environment in England? My (limited!) understanding is the environment there was highly manipulated by humans from the moment the ice fields retreated.
(And I am aware that the same is true to a large extent in North America, but Natives using fire.)
posted by LarryC at 12:40 PM on July 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
A nice piece on the tribal reintroduction of beavers in Washington State:
“Now, I’m the Johnny Appleseed of beavers,” he said.
posted by LarryC at 12:57 PM on July 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
“Now, I’m the Johnny Appleseed of beavers,” he said.
posted by LarryC at 12:57 PM on July 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
Genuine question: Can there be said to be anything like a "wilderness" or "pristine" environment in England? My (limited!) understanding is the environment there was highly manipulated by humans from the moment the ice fields retreated.
Guessing you meant Britain and not just England? And no, humans have been all over since the Neolithic. Maybe a few really small islands off of Scotland.
It sounds like you know this, but the notion of pristine wilderness, idealising nature without humans, is deeply bound up with empire and colonialism. And now we see it used to get people to believe that a billionare owning 220,000 acres of Scotland (yes you read that right) is a good thing, while Welsh hill farmers struggling to hold onto their 200 acres that their families have been on for centuries are bad. Neat trick that.
posted by Rhedyn at 1:51 PM on July 23, 2023 [3 favorites]
Guessing you meant Britain and not just England? And no, humans have been all over since the Neolithic. Maybe a few really small islands off of Scotland.
It sounds like you know this, but the notion of pristine wilderness, idealising nature without humans, is deeply bound up with empire and colonialism. And now we see it used to get people to believe that a billionare owning 220,000 acres of Scotland (yes you read that right) is a good thing, while Welsh hill farmers struggling to hold onto their 200 acres that their families have been on for centuries are bad. Neat trick that.
posted by Rhedyn at 1:51 PM on July 23, 2023 [3 favorites]
A brief history of woodlands in Britain (conservation handbook) may be enlightening.
posted by Rhedyn at 2:28 PM on July 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Rhedyn at 2:28 PM on July 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
>On the other hand, industrialized countries don't live in the world of peasant farmers anymore. All the actual plebs who didn't own land got pushed off to try and make it getting jobs in the city, and now, by this logic, don't deserve an actual say
I recently visited near a stretch of abandoned mountainside where, up until about 70 years ago, some of my forebears lived. The entire village is now abandoned and the infrastructure to reach it is eroded. All that’s left is tumble down slate walls. I won’t comment on who deserves what, but I will say that my people didn’t get pushed off. They got the fuck out of dodge as soon as they could.
posted by bq at 6:35 PM on July 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
I recently visited near a stretch of abandoned mountainside where, up until about 70 years ago, some of my forebears lived. The entire village is now abandoned and the infrastructure to reach it is eroded. All that’s left is tumble down slate walls. I won’t comment on who deserves what, but I will say that my people didn’t get pushed off. They got the fuck out of dodge as soon as they could.
posted by bq at 6:35 PM on July 23, 2023 [2 favorites]
(I’ve been to Dodge. It had an artsy little coffee shop that seemed like it was maybe queer-friendly, if I recall correctly? Several years ago and pre-Trump era, so even if my recollection was accurate for the time, it may not be the case today, of course.)
posted by eviemath at 8:26 AM on July 24, 2023
posted by eviemath at 8:26 AM on July 24, 2023
"He procured almost all the beavers from Gerhard Schwab, a wildlife manager based in Bavaria known as “the Pablo Escobar of beavers.”
posted by mecran01 at 10:17 AM on July 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by mecran01 at 10:17 AM on July 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
"He procured almost all the beavers from Gerhard Schwab, a wildlife manager based in Bavaria known as “the Pablo Escobar of beavers.”
I'm guessing the phrase came from his role in being a purveyor and smuggler of an illegal commodity, like Pablo was. But it's funny in this context because of Escobar's most famous ecological impact, which was the release of hippos into local rivers near his ranch where they have thrived and are now spreading further, causing problems as they go.
posted by Dip Flash at 1:05 PM on July 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
I'm guessing the phrase came from his role in being a purveyor and smuggler of an illegal commodity, like Pablo was. But it's funny in this context because of Escobar's most famous ecological impact, which was the release of hippos into local rivers near his ranch where they have thrived and are now spreading further, causing problems as they go.
posted by Dip Flash at 1:05 PM on July 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
guerilla beaver release
Anarchist lesbian punk band, here’s the name you’ve being searching for!
posted by caviar2d2 at 3:40 PM on July 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
Anarchist lesbian punk band, here’s the name you’ve being searching for!
posted by caviar2d2 at 3:40 PM on July 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
...the notion of pristine wilderness, idealising nature without humans, is deeply bound up with empire and colonialism. And now we see it used to get people to believe that a billionare owning 220,000 acres of Scotland (yes you read that right) is a good thing, while Welsh hill farmers struggling to hold onto their 200 acres that their families have been on for centuries are bad. Neat trick that.
You seem to be replacing one stereotype with another. I don't dream of nature without humans ... else how would I get to enjoy it? Paradoxically, it is conceivable that a few high-minded billionaires would actually take better care of land than the mentioned hill-farmers who continue to exploit small holdings with increasingly uneconomic activities. But a new feudalism (the laird's forest, etc) is not exactly desirable, either.
Slight derail - rewilding the garden.
posted by Artful Codger at 7:41 AM on July 25, 2023 [2 favorites]
You seem to be replacing one stereotype with another. I don't dream of nature without humans ... else how would I get to enjoy it? Paradoxically, it is conceivable that a few high-minded billionaires would actually take better care of land than the mentioned hill-farmers who continue to exploit small holdings with increasingly uneconomic activities. But a new feudalism (the laird's forest, etc) is not exactly desirable, either.
Slight derail - rewilding the garden.
posted by Artful Codger at 7:41 AM on July 25, 2023 [2 favorites]
« Older “What did you mean, ‘Not again?’” | Disabled Creatives in Comics: Interview with Tee... Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
Rewilding is so complicated. There is a lot of abandoned land in Europe which could in theory be rewilded, but in practice, with all the land having been managed for about 4-500 years, it is difficult to recreate a healthy balance, and ironically, it needs care, a lot of expensive care. If you just stop managing a field or a forest, it will rapidly be overtaken by invasive species, both flora and fauna. Ask me how I know, and I was conscious of this in advance. I need to get out right now and remove some poisonous invasive plants, but I am procrastinating.
The very rich can afford to manage "wild" land just for fun, but most of us can't.
Also, some biologists who are in charge of public projects in this country seem to be weirdly ignorant about it, just like some of the activists in the article. For instance in one rewilding project, they have put out ponies and bison, which is in theory a good idea. But they don't feed the animals during draughts or cold winters, so specially the ponies starve. Which is pretty obviously cruel. But the biologists talk about the laws of nature and how wild animals will go through phases of starvation. Yeah, and they will then move on to a better place. Which they can't when there is a fence around the area.
Another thing is that it is pretty hard in Europe to figure out how the "original" landscape may have looked. Or if that is even relevant. The continent has been cultivated for so long and in so many ways that it is near impossible to find some "authentic" balance, and keep it that way. As someone put it recently, if we stopped managing the land here, Denmark would be covered by maple. Not an indigenous tree in many parts of the country, but a hardy one that can out-compete most indigenous species within a few years.
That said, I have seen my little forest, which was a timber-desert, grow into a very rich, diverse jungle in just ten years, with few interventions. A lot of the growth is invasive species, but the fauna is thriving and very diverse. It's a compromise.
posted by mumimor at 4:18 AM on July 23, 2023 [28 favorites]