Beavers and Knepp
David Beeson
If you haven’t heard of the Knepp Estate you have a positive time ahead. What they have achieved is a breath of fresh air.
It is in West Sussex and is a re-wilding project. The owners have finished with conventional farming (on admittedly difficult soils) and are reverting the estate back to its wild-like origins.
Isabella Tree has written a superb book about the project that can be downloaded for £0.99 – amazing value, or bought from Waterstones in Andover or via the Internet.
YouTube has many videos about the project.
One of the last pieces in their jigsaw was to re-introduce beavers. (They were probably on the site during Saxon times but have long-since been killed off.) Just recently they, together with several others, have been given permission for that re-introduction.
Beavers can now be found along the River Tay in Scotland, the River Otter and other locations in Devon. Re-introduction to the Forest of Dean occurred in 2019.
The EU has been pushing for such moves for many years.
Watch out for more re-introductions: pine marten (already in our New Forest, Forest of Dean and Central Wales) and even European lynx into Kielder Forest in Northumberland.
Fancy a trip to the New Forest? Well, aim for one of the big, central blocks of woodland and try to get there at dawn or dusk. You might be lucky enough to spy a marten!
Suggested location: Reptile Centre, just to the west of Lyndhurst or near Burley.
Wildlife and Ecology, the Wildlife Encyclopaedia 