A month ago several of us travelled a long way south to visit the Knepp Wildland Estate in West Sussex. We all had early starts on the Sunday to meet, pack vehicles and then continue on our journey south. With plenty of stops on the way, we arrived at our place to stay for the night but then we all decided we would quite like a walk to stretch our legs after the long drive so drove just down the road to Knepp for a little wander!
The sun was setting as we walked around one of their signposted walks and we saw longhorn cattle grazing amongst the scrub as well as white stork flying overhead and perching in their nests in the distance. Deer started pronking past us as evening bird song filled the air. It was a lovely evening immersing ourselves in the Knepp Wildland landscape.
After a good sleep, we travelled back to Knepp for our tour of the estate by Sir Charles Burrell himself. In their safari vehicle we travelled to the three different sections of Knepp: southern, middle and northern and learnt all about what they have done onsite over the years. We managed to see the white storks up close as well as spotting their pigs grazing and cattle and ponies in the distance.
We had lunch in the Knepp Wilding Kitchen and then spent the afternoon with Libby Drew, Director of Knepp Wildland Foundation who talked to us about their Weald to Waves Project.
After a lovely day of exploring and learning, the group parted ways with several NWT staff travelling west to Canterbury to check out the beavers and then visit Wilder Blean the day after and the rest of us travelling east to Poole for the Rewilding Britain Network Gathering!
The Rewilding Britain Gathering started in Poole with a boat trip around Poole Harbour. We spent the morning hearing about the species reintroduction work underway, such as the current work with the osprey, white tailed eagles and beavers in the nearby area! Just as we were hearing about the white tailed eagles, two started flying towards us along the sea and then flew up and over the boat. It was like they were putting on a show just for us. Incredible! It was definitely a highlight of the trip for all of us!
After fish and chips by the sea for lunch, we headed to Purbeck Heaths National Nature Reserve for a tour. Purbeck Heaths was declared a national nature reserve in 2020 and brings together three existing national nature reserves along with some of the surrounding landscape. It is now ‘bigger, better and more joined up’ which benefits the animals, plants and their habitats. On the tour we heard about the various habitats within the landscape as well as the herbivores they have onsite through their Wild Grazing Project! They have a huge area with no internal fences for introduced animals to graze the land as a single, wilded, grazing landscape.
The following day consisted of a tour of Dorset Wildlife Trust’s Wild Woodbury, which the trust has been rewilding for 3 years. It was quite a wet site due to the Stage-0 river restoration work which they have been doing so wellies were definitely needed! It was great seeing this work in action and hearing about the benefits to wetland wildlife and water quality. As well as hearing about this work, we also learned about their free-roaming livestock of which they have Hereford cattle, Exmoor ponies and 2 Mangalitsa/Berkshire cross pigs. It was great to hear how they are involving the local community as well.
The final day of the gathering, before the long drive back north, was a day of intriguing talks and workshops. We heard about hydrology and stage zero river restoration, monitoring that is going on throughout the country, several species reintroduction talks and then a few talks on engagement with people and accelerating change. There were a few workshops throughout the day where you got to work with different landowners and organisations from across the UK and hear about their work.
Overall, it was a very insightful trip, filled with many site visits, networking, great conversations with like-minded people and a lot of sunshine!
