World Rewilding Day
The 20th of March is ‘World Rewilding Day’, a day to celebrate successful rewilding projects, and to promote how rewilding can help nature’s recovery. Let’s celebrate rewilding in all its wild and wonderful glory! Forests buzzing with birdsong; seagrass meadows teeming with marine life; peat bogs locking away carbon.
The theme this year is #ChooseOurFuture.
Water’s purpose is Life. Rivers bring Life to the landscape. The Wye would choose a wilder future for Wales and England, a future full of life of all kinds, clean water, healthy soils and thriving nature based economies.
Hope for the River Wye, comes from the landscape being wilder again. Rewilding is restoring natural processes, such as reintroducing native species (such as my beloved Beavers), enabling soils to store water again, rewetting peatlands, removing dams and reconnecting rivers to their floodplains.
Happily, new rewilding initiatives are springing up, the Welsh Rewilding Alliance, Tir Natur and Wye Valley Wilding, are all examples of people doing what they can, acting on their love for the world, trusting Gaia’s intelligence and restoring nature and natural processes to the landscape.
Rewilders are criticized by some in the farming community, scaremongers accuse them of “ecological harms”, but that is not my experience. My tributaries suffer not from rewilding, but from farming without caring. The lists of my ailments reads thus...
“Key reasons cited for the Lugg and Monnow catchments failing to meet their legal targets:
Poor nutrient and livestock management: high levels of phosphorus and nitrogen runoff from the spreading of manure and slurry on already saturated soils, causing nutrient enrichment (eutrophication).
Poor soil management: Soil wash-off from fields (particularly those left bare in winter) and "poaching" of riverbanks by livestock has caused severe siltation, clogging the gravel beds required for fish spawning and invertebrate life.
Agricultural Chemical Pollution: Insecticides, herbicides and fungicides sprayed onto soils multiple times a year, entering watercourses.
Regulatory Failures: The failure to enforce existing environmental regulations, particularly regarding the spreading of manure, has been criticized as a key factor in the environmental decline.”
Yet, there are many benefits of rewilding for rivers:
Flood Mitigation: Restoring natural river channels and reconnecting them with their floodplains creates natural buffers that can absorb and store excess water during heavy rainfall, significantly reducing downstream flood risk and damage to communities and infrastructure.
Biodiversity Enhancement: By allowing natural features such as varied water flow, pools, and riffles to return, rewilding creates a rich mosaic of habitats for a diverse array of species, from fish and aquatic invertebrates to birds and mammals. The reintroduction of keystone species like beavers, which build dams and create complex wetlands, further supports this increase in biodiversity.
Water Quality Improvement: Natural rivers can better filter pollutants, sediments, and agricultural runoff (like nitrogen and phosphorus), leading to cleaner and clearer water. This natural filtration helps maintain healthy aquatic ecosystems and safer drinking water sources.
Climate Change Resilience: Restored river systems and their associated wetlands and riparian woodlands absorb and store significant amounts of carbon (acting as carbon sinks) and help landscapes adapt to the effects of climate change, such as more extreme weather events, higher temperatures, and fluctuating river flows.
Drought Resistance: By holding water in the landscape for longer periods within a network of pools and wetlands, rewilded rivers and their catchments help mitigate the effects of drought, maintaining water flow even during dry spells.
Erosion Control: The re-establishment of natural river courses (meanders) and riparian (riverbank) vegetation helps to stabilize banks and reduce soil erosion, preventing sediment build-up downstream.
Socio-economic Benefits: Healthy, natural rivers provide opportunities for nature-based tourism, recreation (like fishing and hiking), and education, which can boost local economies, create jobs, and foster a stronger connection between people and nature.
