To what extent are rewilding and human activity compatible?
This article has been adapted from an assessed piece of coursework from my undergradute degree.
Conserving, and potentially enhancing, biodiversity is more than a moral obligation: humans also benefit from the services biodiverse ecosystems provide. If we continue to exploit our planet in the way we currently are, biodiversity will continue to decline and we will lose the benefit of these services. A multifaceted approach to conservation is needed if we are to effectively conserve nature. Rewilding proposes that habitats are restored to a wilder state, in which human influence is minimised. The baseline for the restoration state is often a time before humans dominated the Earth. But confusion surrounding its definition and criticism that its goals are unobtainable have put the concept under fire. There is however a shift in thinking that, perhaps counterintuitively, for rewilding to succeed, humans must be included within its framework.
The various proponents of rewilding use the term differently, so there are many definitions. The first use of the term sates rewilding is a means of restoring self-regulating ecosystems. To do so, large predators would need to be reintroduced in order to exert top down control on an ecosystem. The reintroduction of these predators would be facilitated by the creation of a number of large, connected core nature reserves. ‘Trophic rewilding’ develops the original definition. It aims to restore self-regulating ecosystems but lacks the emphasis on carnivores and the creation of reserves. ‘Pleistocene rewilding’ further develops trophic rewilding by proposing the restoration of ecosystem functioning via the reintroduction of locally extinct Pleistocene megafauna, giant mammals that lived between 2,500,000 and 12,000 years ago like mammoths, European hippos and giant Irish elk. ‘Translocation rewilding’ is very similar to Pleistocene rewilding and is applied to island ecosystems. The main difference between the two is that on islands the a more recent baseline to reintroduce species from is selected, as extinction of species capable of regulating these ecosystems occurred more recently than the Pleistocene.
The above approaches are generally seen as ‘active’ rewilding. ‘Passive rewilding’ attempts to achieve the restoration of wilderness in a different manner, by allowing ecosystems to return to their natural state with little to no human intervention and management. In Europe one suggested method of doing so is the abandonment of agricultural land to return to a wilder state. This European version of passive rewilding still aims to restore ecosystems but focuses more on grazing species than apex predators.
Despite the lack of consensus on the meaning of the word, a central idea of rewilding is the return of ecosystems to a ‘wilder’ state with minimal human influence. However, there is debate even over this issue: some argue that after restoring ecosystems we should then remove ourselves from the picture and let nature run its course, while others propose a more hands-on approach to ecosystem engineering and management to ensure maintenance of the restored ecosystems, minimise human-wildlife conflict, restore natural disturbance regimes, and provide a number of other potential benefits.
Human intervention: current rewilding projects
In a world in which a romanticised version of wilderness is desirable and realistically attainable, a human-free version of rewilding is compatible and achievable. But this is not the position we find ourselves in. There is no perfect dichotomy of nature and society. The environments of the Anthropocene are influenced, inhabited, transformed and politicised by humans. The conservation ideal of true wilderness is a practical impossibility, especially considering how much the environment has changed since the baselines put forward by advocates of rewilding. A total lack of human intervention is impractical, but it is also unnecessarily restrictive. It is unfeasible for humans to be completely excluded from the ‘wild’, and so we must be incorporated into the creation and maintenance of wild areas because the alternative to our incorporation is a presence and an influence that are inevitable and yet unwanted. The aim of reinstituting a true wilderness, with functioning ecosystems, is an admirable target, but it should be recognised that, in most cases, it is unachievable. By including humans within a rewilding framework, a new set of tools becomes available that can aid in achieving the aims of conservation.
There are many well-known cases of rewilding that originally used a framework that aimed for little to no human intervention, in which human intervention was ultimately needed to help achieve desired outcomes.
Created in 1988 and located in northern Siberia, the Pleistocene Park has been aiming to recreate the mammoth steppe ecosystem via the reintroduction of the surviving megafauna that were present, and consequently reinstating the interaction of these herbivores with the vegetation and soil. The mammoth steppe ecosystem was able to sequester huge amounts of carbon, so if the ecosystem can be successfully recreated not only will the species present do better, but the effects of climate change could also be mitigated. As of 2019, 27 Yakutian horses, 13 bison, 4 musk ox, 10 elk, 25 reindeer, 20 sheep and 20 Kalmyk cattle had been translocated to the Pleistocene Park, and there is even talk of mammoth de-extinction to restore the iconic species to the ecosystem. But, in order to successfully establish these animal populations, researchers have had to establish a fire regime by annually burning areas of the steppe. The establishment of these populations, a key step in the rewilding process, would not be possible without human intervention. This anthropogenically created fire regime was then not reported, perhaps because the need for intervention was seen as a failure of the rewilding process or as being contradictory to its principles. This is an example of human intervention in a successful rewilding project suggesting that it is better to tolerate some human influence than to insist on a strictly hands-off approach.
In some cases, maintained human intervention may not be desired, but is the only feasible option. Large avian scavengers, like vulutres, are an important part of ecosystems and are reliant on the presence of animal carcasses as a food source. By removing the remains from the environment, these birds reduce the spread to other species, including humans, of infectious diseases. The carcasses these birds historically fed off were from those of wild, large-bodied grazers; however, due to the decline of many of these species and the rise of agriculture, scavengers are now reliant upon livestock carcasses. But this reliance on livestock carcasses increases human-wildlife conflict and this, paired with the adoption of modern farming techniques that reduce the number of carcasses available, has meant that avian scavenger populations are in decline. Human intervention provides a solution: vulture restaurants. These ‘restaurants’ are feeding stations for scavenging species; they increase food availability and reduce the persecution that these species face. However, there are some undesirable implications of their use: carcasses are usually a random and temporary food source, but when supplied by humans they become predictable. This has negative repercussions on scavenger territoriality, dominance at feeding sites and survival, meaning alternative methods may be needed in order to promote the success of these iconic species.
Rewilding via land abandonment in Europe is one way that may help restore populations of avian scavengers. Agricultural land abandonment, whilst decreasing the number of domestic animal carcasses, will result in increased numbers of wild animal carcasses and allow scavenging species to return to their original diet. In some high-altitude areas, wild grazer populations would be large enough to sustain scavenger populations as a result of agricultural land abandonment and vulture restaurants would no longer be needed. In this case, human intervention is necessary only in some locations. Nevertheless, within a framework in which no human intervention is wanted, this outcome would be seen as a failure. But if we want scavenger populations to do well in all areas, we must accept that some human intervention is required.
Human intervention: future rewilding projects
It is possible for rewilding to be successful without human intervention, a paradigmatic example being the rewilding of the Mascarene islands to restore missing ecosystem functions via the introduction of giant tortoises to replace extinct tortoise species. Nevertheless, future rewilding frameworks should not limit themselves by excluding human intervention, especially as the influence of humans on the landscape will only increase as our population grows and the return to pre-human baselines becomes ever more difficult. The need for rewilding to shift away from complete segregation of nature and society, and to accept that coexistence is the only way forward, has been recognised and has been included in some more recently proposed rewilding projects.
The rewilding of carnivores in Europe is one example where an integrated human-wildlife approach has been proposed. European predators include bears, wolves and lynxes. Populations of all these groups have been naturally recovering in recent years Therefore, the task of rewilding in this case is to sustain these increases and maintain populations. However, Europe is a continent with particularly high densities of humans and humans can affect predator-prey dynamics. But, European predator rewilding must create wild areas that are large enough to accommodate the size of the predators’ ranges and take into account the increased likelihood of human-wildlife conflict. Some degree of intervention and control would be required in order for the public to accept the rewilding of Europe’s carnivore species, especially with regard to human-wildlife conflict. However, studies show that predators do not require a human-free area, as long as the human impact is low. One proposed solution is a coexistence approach to rewilding in which humans and predators are able to live side by side in multi-use landscapes. Changes to human behaviour would be required, especially in those areas that would be shared the most. This could be via the use of traditional practices, especially regarding management of livestock, or the adoption of new ones, such as planted bridges over motorways specifically for the wildlife to use. Sharing a landscape in this way would be challenging and necessarily involves regular human intervention and adaptive management. But it could be the most feasible way of ensuring the future of Europe’s large carnivore species.
The romanticised view of a perfectly natural world is unobtainable because humans dominate the planet. Deliberate human intervention should not be seen as failure of the rewilding process, as human influence on all contemporary ecosystems is unavoidable. In fact, many prominent examples of rewilding have used human intervention. As we head further into the Anthropocene future rewilding frameworks can be successful only if the influence of humans is taken into account and the use of human intervention is accepted.
