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Rewilding Innovation Fund projects

Explore all the projects funded by Rewilding Britain’s Innovation Fund.

Eurasian elk
Many funded projects are testing the feasibility of trailblazing species reintroductions  © Belinda Greb / Wildscreen

It’s not too late to restore nature, but we must act urgently if we are to do so. We set up the Innovation Fund to offer seed funding to projects, breaking down barriers to getting started or enabling new approaches to go on to scale up.

These projects are pioneering, pushing rewilding forward at the scale and speed that’s needed to restore ecosystems at the landscape scale. Many are focused on developing strategies to guide future efforts and ensure all the impacts of the project are fully considered and accounted for. More and more are involving local communities in rewilding initiatives.

We’ve chosen to fund these areas to help kickstart the mass restoration of ecosystems and drive more effective nature recovery.

If you’re interested in applying for funding in spring 2025, here’s how it works

Support the Innovation Fund

With your help we can support more rewilding projects on the ground.

Our impact so far

Innovation Fund Impacts

  • A simple woodland scene in icon format

    74,255

    hectares covered by funded rewilding projects

  • RB icon simple key actions gradient RB icon simple key actions gradient

    44

    projects funded in total since 2021

  • RB icon simple superpower gradient RB icon simple superpower gradient

    £521,565

    awarded to innovative rewilding projects

  • RB icon simple network gradient RB icon simple network gradient

    26

    Counties in Britain covered by funded projects

Map showing all Innovation Fund projects

Where we’ve funded projects

This map shows the incredible diversity of Innovation Fund rewilding projects across England, Scotland and Wales, from landowners to managers and community groups. 

With our support, they are expanding their bold efforts to improve our climate, bring back nature, and create economic opportunities for local communities.

Find out more about our project categories and the full list of funded projects.

Community Engagement projects

Community-based rewilding projects not only benefit the land, they can improve people’s health and wellbeing and create resilient local economies. We’re funding projects that integrate rewilding landscapes with improving people’s lives.

Community engagement

  • Community hubs

    NEW: Community rewilding hubs

    Yorkshire, England

    The Community Rewilding hubs project by the Yorkshire Rewilding Network is linking local networks of rewilders allowing the sharing of rewilding inspiration, experience and skills and engendering positive views of rewilding.

    Yorkshire Rewilding Network

  • The River Marteg meandering beneath autumnal trees adorned with golden leaves at the Glifach Rewilding Project

    NEW: Cultivating Change in the Uplands

    Countrywide, Wales

    Radnorshire Wildlife Trust is on a mission to change the perception of rewilding in Wales. Funding is provided to engage with stakeholders to showcase the benefits of rewilding.

  • Divers working on native seagrass and oyster restoration

    NEW: Internships with Seawilding

    Argyll, Scotland

    This funding is giving three more interns the opportunity to work with Seawilding on native oyster and seagrass restoration, imparting valuable skills and knowledge to the next generation of marine rewilders.

  • Sharpham

    Devon Rewilding Network

    Devon, England

    Local action is vital for rewilding. We’re helping the Devon Rewilding Network engage with a range of audiences, to provide support and advice to local communities and join up rewilding initiatives.

    Devon Rewilding Network

  • A wellbeing workshop in Essex

    Education at the Spains Hall Estate

    Essex, England

    We helped Spains Hall Estate develop an education and community outreach programme for local schools and community groups. Partnering with The Wilderness Foundation, they’re delivering the programmes from a nature-based camp on the estate.

    Wilderness Foundation project

  • A group of people at a rewilding site in Hampshire

    Hampshire and Isle of Wight Network

    Hampshire and Isle of Wight, England

    We’ve helped them set up and run the Hampshire and Isle of Wight local 
    rewilding network. By connecting local rewilders, the group aims to share learning, provide specialist knowledge, improve ecological monitoring and increase rewilding.

    Hampshire & Isle of Wight Rewilding Network

  • Volunteers in field

    North East Rewilding Network

    Northeast, England

    A new network hosted by Climate Action North will expand the support provided through the North East Rewilding Network to local rewilding projects, crucially making connections between land, sea and community.

    North East Rewilding Network

  • Lobster Homarus gammarus

    A seascape plan with the Arran community

    Arran, Scotland

    The funding’s helped make a plan for the South Arran Marine Protected Area. The first of its kind for Scotland, it will be an example for other coastal communities, with a vision developed with the community, for the community.

    Community of Arran Seabed Trust

  • wildcat

    Social feasibility for wild cat reintroduction

    Cornwall, England

    The wildcat, sometimes called woodcat because of its preferred habitat, has been missing from Cornwall for hundreds of years. This project engages with communities, landowners and land managers to scope the possibility of the cat’s return.

    Cabilla Cornwall

  • A group of people in Ardura forest in Argyll

    South Knapdale Deer Management

    Argyll, Scotland

    Argyll supports a large amount of Scotland’s remaining temperate rainforest, however high deer numbers threaten its regeneration. This funding is supporting the community to establish a deer management group for the area.

    Knapdale Landscape Restoration Project

  • Talla hartfell

    Talla Hartfell Wildland area engagement

    Southern Uplands, Scotland

    Covering 47,215ha in the central Southern Uplands, the project aims to increase rewilding and nature restoration, working with communities. Funding has contributed to a new a circular walk, an eco-museum, talks and advisory visits.

    Reviving the wild heart of Southern Scotland

  • Joe Hope taking a closer look at some lichen adorning a stone wall

    Training up the next generation

    Britain-wide

    This funding is helping to develop training for the next generation of land managers. It will give young people the opportunity to learn from on-site experts, teaching them new skills and increasing capacity for nature restoration.

  • People walking under a viaduct in Ouseburn, Newcastle

    Urban rewilding at Wild Ouseburn

    Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England

    Since regeneration, the Ouseburn Valley has retained a diverse range of habitats and green spaces. We’re funding a study that will look at the potential for community-integrated rewilding to increase access to nature in the area.

    Wild Ouseburn

  • Hillside with visible difference between grazed land and woodland recovery at the border of the reserve

    Wilder Marches

    Radnorshire, Wales

    Radnorshire Wildlife Trust have undertaken extensive consultation with local communities to co-create a vision for nature recovery in the landscape that works alongside sustainable food production.

    Radnorshire Wildlife Trust

  • People in Yorkshire doing a pond surveying workshop

    Yorkshire Rewilding Network

    Yorkshire, England

    The project connects, inspires, and enables rewilding in the area, bringing together landowners, land managers and the community. Funding supported the first Yorkshire Rewilding Festival in 2023, plus engagement events and advisory visits.

    Yorkshire Rewilding Network

“Without this support we wouldn’t have been able to prepare such a comprehensive management plan for biodiversity restoration in the temperate oak rainforest that was destroyed to create commercial forestry plantations.”

Moray Finch

Mull and Iona Community Trust, Rewilding Ardura Community Forest

Evidence Building projects

Building evidence is crucial for both showing rewilding’s impact to policy-makers, and for helping others learn more about rewilding. It also helps us to better understand its impact on nature, as well as on carbon, hydrology, and people.

Evidence Building

  • Beaver felled woodland

    Building a case for beavers in Cheshire

    Cheshire, England

    Cheshire Wildlife Trust have set up a county-wide Beaver Management Group. The aim of the group is to engage various stakeholders in advocating for the multi-benefits beavers offer as a keystone species, and support beaver reintroductions.

    Cheshire Wildlife Trust

  • West Dorset Sam Rose

    Developing Rewilding in West Dorset

    Dorset, England

    Developing a baseline for the Brit river catchment alongside a plan to engage the community with plans for landscape-scale restoration. The funding was also used to start up a membership scheme.

    West Dorset Wilding

  • Lichen and moss

    Missing Mosses

    Yorkshire, England

    Sphagnum mosses are a small but remarkable group of ecosystem engineers, with around 30 species in the UK. The funding will support the reintroduction of two sphagnum species to the peatland restoration areas at Kingsdale head.

    Kingsdale Head

  • Lidar survey

    Peatland restoration at Yearn Stane

    Renfrewshire, North Ayrshire and Inverclyde, Scotland

    In Scotland’s Regional Park, Yearn Stane will use drone surveys and a 4k camera to survey over 5,000ha of peatland to aid restoration, provide data and capture footage for public engagement activities. Our funding will support the surveys.

    Yearn Stane

  • A forest in autumn on Iona and Mull Ardura forest

    Rewilding Ardura Community Forest

    Mull and Iona, Scotland

    The charity Mull and Iona Community Trust (MICT) are developing a long-term, collective rewilding vision for the 200-hectare Ardura Forest, which they acquired on behalf of the local community in 2019.

    MICT website

  • Sussex Kelp feasibility meeting

    Sussex Kelp Project

    Sussex, England

    The impact of land use on marine rewilding is well known. This study explores the impact of sediment levels on kelp regeneration at the Sussex Kelp project, and involved a workshop to produce a Sussex Sediment Management Plan.

    Sussex Kelp Recovery Project

  • Northumberland Wildlife Trust West's West Chevington rewilding site

    Testing baseline approaches including eDNA

    England

    At a former opencast mine, we will support eDNA testing of soils to inform the rewilding strategy for Wilding West Chevington and provide a baseline for soil fungal and bacterial communities, essential for measuring improved soil health.

    Wilding West Chevington

“This funding will allow us to assess new methods of woodland and scrub creation, with the hope of reducing the need for tree tubes and other capital intensive infrastructure used for traditional planting methods.”

Jim Bliss

Lowther Estate

Tech and Innovation projects

Rewilding is about doing things differently. Embracing technology is a key part of speeding up nature’s recovery, by learning new skills and information. From drones to data, these projects are pushing the boundaries.

Tech and Innovation

  • AI in rewilding

    NEW: The role of AI in rewilding

    Devon, England

    This funding will help Devon Rewilding Network develop AI technology, using existing drone footage to show how land could be better connected through rewilding, helping local landowners visualise the future of rewilding on their land.

    Devon Rewilding Network

  • Hadrians Wall NNPA

    NEW: The call of the wild at Hadrian’s Wall

    Northumberland, England

    This funding will utilise acoustic recording devices throughout Northumberland National Park’s Hadrian’s Wall: Recovering Nature project to monitor and identify species in real time, building community engagement with innovative technology.

  • Bunloit the view over loch ness Martin Wright Bunloit the view over Loch Ness

    Modelling Carbon Capture

    Britain-wide

    Scotland’s Bunloit Estate, Norfolk’s Wendling Beck and Sussex’s Knepp Estate were funded to measure the potential carbon captured by scrub and wood pasture. Treeconomy are helping them model it using remote sensing techniques e.g. LiDAR.

  • Acorns on an oak tree

    Tree Seeding

    Lake District, England

    Lowther Estate is starting a tree seeding experiment with the funding, to see if it’s more effective than tree planting on their land. They’ll measure if seeding produces more woodland of local origin which naturally expands in the future.

    Lowther Estate

  • A man doing an eDNA survey

    eDNA surveying and baselining techniques

    Radnorshire, Wales

    Radnorshire Wildlife Trust are developing a toolkit for setting an ecological baseline for nature recovery and rewilding projects. This funding has explored eDNA surveys for soil monitoring as well as community engagement opportunities.

  • A woman collecting data in a field at Knepp Wildland

    A new dawn for wild data

    Britain-wide

    Knepp Wildland has been a rewilding pioneer for over two decades, tracking extraordinary journeys of nature recovery. The funding will help develop a new Wild Data portal to allow others to explore the research findings from the project.

    Case study: Knepp Estate

“The funding has not only raised awareness of the many great projects happening in the Northeast and UK wide but has also connected us to potential partners and stakeholders with whom we can and will work with in the future to create a much bigger marine rewilding impact in our region.”

Sharon Lashley

Climate Action North East

Feasibility studies and business plans

Because rewilding is breaking new ground or trying out radical ideas, it’s important to spend time assessing the risks and opportunities. Feasibility studies and business strategies lay the foundations for long-term rewilding success.

Feasibility studies

  • Dalnacardoch Estate in the Cairngorms

    NEW: 100 years of rewilding in the Cairngorms

    Cairngorms, Scotland

    An exciting 100-year rewilding project managed by Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust is happening at Dalnacardoch Estate in the Cairngorms. This funding will kickstart river restoration plans for Edendon Water, a highly-managed river.

  • Kayaking

    NEW: Fish, infauna and finance

    Arran, Scotland

    This funding will support COAST by helping consolidate and analyse crucial survey and monitoring data to assess not only the increased biodiversity of Arran’s seas but also how the marine environment socially benefits Arran’s residents.

    COAST

  • bamff

    Catchment-scale nature recovery at Bamff

    Perthshire, Scotland

    Funding to explore a catchment wide approach to restoring riparian woodland along the river to improve natural flood management, and create corridors for wildlife.

    Bamff Estate

  • Seagrass restoration project in Inverie Bay Knoydart Climate Action Group

    Community seagrass restoration

    Western Highlands, Scotland

    A community-led feasibility study to identify potential areas for seagrass restoration in Knoydart, located on the peninsula of Lochaber, Highland, as well as providing training for local surveyors to explore the area.

  • Helman tor people walking in landscape

    Helman Tor

    Cornwall, England

    A feasibility study for Cornwall Wildlife Trust to explore opportunities for rewilding on its Helman Tor reserve. The plans include restoring species, mixed grazing as well as opportunities for people to enjoy this wilder nature.

    Helman Tor

  • Doddington Hall Cyclists

    Leveraging wilder connections

    Lincolnshire, England

    A project exploring the potential nature-based social and economic benefits on the Wilder Doddington Estate. It aims to show the social benefits of rewilding as well as creating opportunities for young people to gain skills and experience.

    Wilder Doddington

  • Eurasian lynx

    Lynx to Scotland

    Scotland-wide

    The funding will be used by Trees For Life to support the second phase of the impactful Lynx to Scotland project, which will examine the potential barriers and concerns expressed during the initial consultation.

    Lynx to Scotland

  • Medway

    Marine Rewilding in the Medway

    Kent, England

    This project aims to restore seagrass meadows and native oyster reefs in the Medway and Swale Estuary, Kent, to rewild the area at the seascape scale. The funding will be used to identify a baseline to measure improvements.

    Medway and Swale Estuary Partnership

  • Seahorse in eelgrass

    Rewilding the Intertidal

    Devon, England

    Plymouth Sound supports fragmented habitats in a busy marine area. The project aims to re-naturalise areas currently under concrete and give nature the best opportunity to thrive.

  • Seagrass with some fish swimming over the top in turquoise water

    Seagrass restoration

    Northeast, England

    A feasibility study to identify potential areas for seagrass restoration – an essential marine habitat that absorbs carbon. Climate Action North spearheaded the initiative in the northeast of England.

    North East Rewilding Network

  • Packington Estate

    Wild Packington Estate

    Warwickshire, England

    Feasibility study to inform the new rewilding strategy for the estate. The funding has provided them with an opportunity to explore new rewilding options across the estate and develop a detailed rewilding strategy.

    Wild Packington

  • White tailed sea eagle

    White tailed eagle reintroduction feasibility

    Cumbria, England

    We are funding a feasibility study for white-tailed eagle reintroduction. The study will review habitat requirements as well as the social feasibility for the return of this species.

    White-tailed eagle

“This is an excellent opportunity to provide another educational aspect to the programmes we were already delivering and giving young people a hands on experience of a successful rewilding project.”

Terri Dawson

Wilderness Foundation