Wild Places | 6 Amazing UK Rewilding Success Stories
September 16, 2025Over the last 25 years rewilding has come out from the shadows, lighting up a new hopeful pathway for ecological progress across the country. That hope now comes in many forms: from reintroduced species and the natural regeneration of woodland, to rewiggled rivers, seabed restoration, rewetted peatland and – crucially – the removal of grazing pressures. From here you find ecosystems rebounding towards their full potential, ultimately guided by natural processes over human intervention. When nature is left to just get on with it, amazing things can happen – as these incredible success stories prove.
incredible success stories prove.
Carrifran Wildwood, Moffat, Dumfries and Galloway
Nestled in the Moffat Hills of southern Scotland, this 1620-acre site is a pioneering example of what can be achieved when a bold vision combines with the tenacity of grassroots community involvement. Historic pollen samples showed that once, this valley was a wooded wilderness, but centuries of overgrazing had reduced it to a depressingly denuded state.
That began to change on 1st January 2000, when the first trees were planted. Fast forward over 25 years and well over 750,000 locally sourced native trees and shrubs have breathed new life into the Southern Uplands from the valley floor right up to the highest elevations – along with the removal of sheep and goats.
It was the first ecological restoration project of its kind and has become a valuable source of learning and education. By 2015 262 species of bird had been recorded, and over 20 species of mammal are now known to have passed through. During one recent moth-trapping session, an incredible 159 species were found. Long-term, the level of human intervention will be reduced as the wildwood becomes a fully functioning natural ecosystem once again.
Creag Meagaidh, Highlands
When ecological restoration in Britain was still in its infancy and the rewilding movement was yet to be conceived, the Scottish Government’s nature agency, the Nature Conservancy Council bought this land ‘for the nation’ in 1985, and in doing so, saved it from being turned into a non-native Sitka spruce plantation following a vociferous public campaign. Decades of sheep grazing and – in the absence of natural predators – an overabundance of deer, had taken its toll on the degraded land.
What followed is a textbook example of how the natural regeneration of woodland can revive an ecosystem stuck in first gear. With sheep removed and deer culled, new trees are marching their way up the mountainside – all planted by Nature’s own hand. A once barren landscape is now filled with insects and birdsong, and the patchwork of forest and moorland supports a healthy population of black grouse, as well as rare mountain plants such as Highland saxifrage and woolly willow. Often described as the Highlands in microcosm, venture beyond the woodland and you’ll find rewarding Munro summits, a dramatic whaleback ridge, ice-carved gullies – and if you’re lucky – a mountain hare, ptarmigan, or one of the many birds of prey.
Wicken Fen, Cambridgeshire
A previously lost landscape of undrained fenland has been reinstated in Cambridgeshire by the National Trust. 26 years in the making, this once common wetland habitat – before being widely drained for agriculture – is now home to an astonishing 9,600 species of plants, birds and invertebrates on what had been arable farmland until 1999. Natural grazing was introduced to create a mosaic of habitat, while land was rewetted, peatland restored and reedbeds reformed. With nine hides and a boardwalk that weaves its way through the reedbeds, it’s a wetland site you can really immerse yourself in.
590 acres of peatland has recently been restored over a year – a vital carbon store in the fight against climate change. Within hours of the final repairs being made and the water level raised using a nearby river, cranes and great egrets were spotted arriving to inspect the revitalised habitat.
Community Of Arran Seabed Trust [COAST]
This community-led initiative has been conserving and restoring the seas around Arran and the Clyde for 30 years. Founded by two divers from the Isle of Arran – Howard Wood and Don MacNeish – who had seen first-hand the destruction of the seabed from years of bottom trawling and scallop dredging, they set about trying to reverse this decline. A campaign lasting 13 years led to Scotland’s first No Take Zone [NTZ] being established in 2008, where no fishing of any sort is allowed. Continued concerns about the health of the wider marine ecosystem in the Firth of Clyde led to an extended Marine Protected Area [MPA] being designated in 2014 spanning 300 sq km. Further campaigning by COAST and others for improved protection of the MPA led to the introduction of fisheries management zones to the MPA in 2016 which prohibit or restrict the use of bottom-towed fishing dredges and trawls.
The way marine life has rebounded both in the NTZ and the MPA has been remarkable. Studies that have followed show increased biodiversity in the protected areas. There is more marine life covering the seabed in the NTZ and MPA with a doubling of species richness in certain areas. Populations of king scallops have shown dramatic increases in both areas, with up to eight-fold increases in density following protection. Much of the marine plant life – seaweeds – that were impacted by dredging and bottom trawling have recolonised the area, providing strong foundations for the ecosystem to bounce back. Dive surveys have also confirmed that the damaged seabed is recovering, with structurally complex ‘nursery’ habitats developing that are such a vital refuge for myriad creatures, including commercially important fish and shellfish.
Alladale Wilderness Reserve, Sutherland
Alladale has been at the forefront of the UK rewilding scene since 2003, occupying 23,000 acres of Sutherland in the far north of Scotland. Once a prime location for deer stalking, grouse shooting and fishing, it’s now defined by how much it’s giving back to Nature – instead of taking from it. When Paul Lister took it on 22 years ago, he wanted to recreate a slice of what wild Scotland used to be like before human extraction and modification took hold, when the land was roamed by brown bear, Eurasian lynx and grey wolves through vast swathes of forest as far as the eye can see.
He would dearly love to see free-roaming wolves back in Scotland – the last of which is believed to have been killed not far from Alladale back in 1743. But for now, he’s happy to settle for playing a pivotal part in saving Scotland’s current top predator – the Scottish Wildcat – from extinction, with these famously untameable felines bred in enclosures on the reserve in partnership with the Saving Wildcats project. Red squirrels were also translocated to Alladale in 2013 and have become a thriving, reproducing population now spreading into former strongholds, helped along by the rewilding habitat, such as the 920,000 native trees that were planted in riparian areas.
Mar Lodge, Cairngorms
Britain’s largest National Nature Reserve is a dramatic mosaic of regenerating pinewood, blanket bog, moorland and plateau. Over 25 years ago, the National Trust for Scotland began culling deer across the estate, to get their population back down to a more natural level the land could support. Fast forward to today and over 1,972 hectares of naturally regenerating woodland is the result up and down the slopes. Mar Lodge is now also home to 12 hen harrier nesting territories, as well as other breeding raptors such as white-tailed eagles.
Around 120,000 native trees have been planted too; an important future seed source, as well as developing into crucial riparian tree cover for spawning salmon. Deer management has also created the right conditions for montane willow scrub to develop once again up in the high coires – a rare and vulnerable habitat throughout the Cairngorms. And peatland is being restored, with dams built and dried-out gullies revegetated in Glen Geldie.