Rewilder Weekly #9
Welcome to the latest edition of the Rewilder Weekly! Last Saturday marked World Ocean Day and - in case you missed it, follow this link for a wealth of engagement and insight on the occasion. Without further ado, let's go with this week's eight selected rewilding stories.
Let's rewild!
👉 As a reminder: If you come across stories you'd like to see featured in an upcoming edition, send them to me and I'll gladly do what I can.
1) Limited Giveaway: Grab SBP's new ebook 'Coastlands'
Perfectly timed to celebrate World Ocean Day, SCOTLAND: The Big Picture has published a brand new ebook, entitled Coastlands. Our species has always depended on the oceans but, in recent centuries, has gone to every excess possible to exploit what our primal waters offer.
Scotland's coastal resources were depleted and degraded - but recovery and restoration is absolutely possible. It's been shown that ocean regions being left alone even for one single year, can show dramatic recovery. The folks at SBP write that the ebook, "is a visual celebration of Scotland’s spectacular coastal waters and the growing number of marine rewilding initiatives committed to their restoration."
👉 Get your free copy here - offer ends on the 13th!
2) Rewilding Europe's Annual Review is out
If you want to get a sense of what's happening in rewilding, look no further than Rewilding Europe's Annual Review. It details just how productive and exciting a year it's been - and how the rewilding movement continues to expand.
They write: "Thanks to the expertise, passion and dedication of our entire European team, 2023 saw our rewilding efforts move up another gear! Our latest annual review is the perfect place to read more about our work and growth, packed with inspirational and educational content, highlighting a year of incredible achievements and milestones in rewilding across Europe."
👉 Go here for post and link to annual review
3) Spain's growing herd Przewalski's horses
Frans Schepers, Co-founder and Executive Director at Rewilding Europe reports back from the supervisory board's visit to the Iberian Highlands. Fundación Española de Renaturalización - Rewilding Spain started introducing the iconic Przewalski's horse just last year - with horses arriving from France and Hungary. By now the herd has grown two 27 horses, with the last two foals born just two weeks back - and more on the way as the video suggests!
Frans highlights that this "shows the horses are doing really well in this landscape where they will be roaming free eventually. It is the second free roaming herd of this rare and wild horse species in Europe (the other one is in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone in Ukraine). More animals will be brought each year, to grow the herd."
👉 Go here for post and video clip
4) Relive the 'Rewilding Hope - Land to Sea' conference
Last week saw the 2-day virtual 'Rewilding Hope - Land to Sea' conference, organized by Climate Action North, Rewilding Britain and Northumberland Wildlife Trust. There were 13 excellent presentations by a veritable who's who of the UK's rewilding movement. And in addition to the insights, we were also treated to a video by and with James Shooter and the music of Richard Durrant, whose new album is entitled ... wait for it ... Rewilding.
Do take the time for the presentations by Sara King, David Hetherington, Libby Drew, Jenny Barlow, Graham Holyoak, Peter Cairns, Alan Watson Featherstone, Amelia Newman, Ailsa McLellan, Benjamin Coppin, Sandra King and Sacha Dench. Truly, a rewilding smorgasbord about a great many aspects and efforts both land and sea - enjoy!
👉 Go here for the video recordings
5) Good wolf news: record number of Mexican wolf pups
A record number of 27 Mexican wolf pups have been fostered into New Mexico and Arizona. Fostering, as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) explains, "is a method used by the Mexican Wolf Interagency Field Team to increase genetic diversity in the wild Mexican wolf population. It begins with selective breeding by the SAFE program to produce genetically diverse pups for release into the wild."
“The 27 pups fostered this year were placed in eight different dens in the recovery area to bring the total of recipient dens to 48. This points to the ability of spreading the genetic contribution of the fosters into a wide geographic area, amplifying the benefit of the foster program. In addition, these pups will learn how to live successfully in the wild from an experienced female which is yet another benefit of fostering over release of adults that have been maintained in captivity.”
👉 Go here for post and article (and wolf pup pix!)
6) Trout - in a beaver dam - on film - kapow!
Leave it to SCOTLAND: The Big Picture to post a 12 second clip that's just joyous. Simple - fun - and it most definitely also makes its point - making space for water, powered by beaver super-engineers, brings biodiversity to life. And then we can sit there, dog at our side, and enjoy it!
As SBP writes, "One of the key Northwoods rewilding principles is Making More Space for Water. At South Clunes Farm near Loch Ness, they’ve been doing this for over a decade using a methodology that costs nothing, has been tried and tested over millennia... and seems to work!"
👉 Go here for the post, the clip - and the Northwoods Nine
7) More carbon stored in scrubland than previously thought
I had not come across this before, but heck, while I come across many things, I won't ever come across most things! Thanks for highlighting, Joanna Redfeather. The research, published earlier this year, has revealed that trees under browsing pressure in a rewilded section of Knepp Estate adapted by investing more in root growth - an area which has been overlooked in carbon storage models.
Lead author Nancy Burrell writes, "We've been so fixated on tree plantations as carbon offsets that we’ve neglected to examine or understand the contribution that could come from smaller, non-forestry species. We have no idea how much carbon they might store, not only above ground but also below ground in their roots – and how this storage may be stimulated and enhanced by the browsing of the free-roaming herbivores that drive rewilding projects."
👉 Go here for post and full story
8) These pupfish just may be the canary in the coalmine
You know the term of "the canary in the coal mine", right? Miners took a canary in a cage into the mine to warn them of dangerous gases. If the canary died, they knew to exit the tunnels asap. And so today the term simply means that something's an early warning system. Maybe that's exactly what the amazing Devils Hole pupfish are.
Mongabay reports that "In a glimmer of hope for one of the world’s rarest fish, scientists have counted 191 Devils Hole pupfish this spring in their tiny desert habitat. This number marks the highest spring count for the critically endangered species in more than two decades." Funny thing about this - in my last novel Quintus Hopper of Nevada a whole chapter played at Devils Hole, with those pupfish - and with legends and myths native people had woven around that very special place in the Amargosa desert.
👉 Go here for post and article
And here's this week's art by Chilean science illustrator and painter Mauricio Alvarez (mauricio_alvarez_art on Instagram): Say hi to a monito del monte (dromiciops gliroides), a mouse-sized marsupial native only to south-western South America.
And that's it for this edition! For more rewilding insights and stories from around the globe, use the #rewilding hashtag and follow people, organizations and groups that are as passionate about rewilding as you are.
Have a good week!
Cheers,
D