Five Years of the Rewilding Network: A growing movement

Back then, we were a handful of isolated projects across England, Scotland and Wales, desperate for connection and support. Those initial conversations have now grown into a movement, supporting landowners, land managers and project managers across land and sea. 

The network was founded on a simple yet powerful belief: we are stronger when we work together. 

Over the past five years, we’ve seen the Rewilding Network…

• cover over 250,000 hectares of land and 1.02 km² of seabed
• grow to over 1,000 member projects, 20 local rewilding networks and 700 practitioners on the forum
• restore landscapes and seascapes so they burst with life, allowing species to return and communities to come together around a shared vision of a wilder Britain. 

We’ve delivered over 70 online webinars, built up a practical resource library and allocated nearly £1 million in Innovation funding to projects on the ground. We can now see a range of rewilding happening across uplands, lowlands, our coasts and our seas. These exciting projects are being led by communities, landowners, land managers, tenant farmers and project managers alike.

The Rewilding Network is crucial to delivering the systems change we need to see within nature recovery in Britain. We can no longer afford small tweaks – we need bold, joined-up change that connects government policies, those who are rewilding and public support. The Rewilding Network provides us with a clear steer on what needs to be done, through building strong relationships with members. 

For example, we’ve listened to concerns about how to fund rewilding, then used this information to publish a Financing Rewilding Report while continuing to advocate for change. We will also continue to work with practitioners to identify the barriers they face, feeding this back into our policy and advocacy work. 

But we’re not done yet! 

The Rewilding Network community is the place for rewilders to share ideas, challenges and lessons learned, a like-minded group to provide peer-to-peer support and advice. But these five years haven’t been without challenges. Rewilding often asks us to rethink established systems, navigate uncertainty, and learn by doing. As a network, we’ve grown stronger by embracing this complexity – listening, adapting and improving together.

As we look ahead, the Rewilding Network is more committed than ever to reaching new projects, sharing more ideas and progressing rewilding across Britain. It will continue to share stories of hope across landscapes, seascapes and communities. We’ll be working together to build a credible evidence base that shows how rewilding can support wildlife and people. And it will always be a place for rewilders to gain the support they need.