£100k boost for ambitious project to rewild huge area of South East England

£100k boost for ambitious project to rewild huge area of South East England - Kent Wildlife Trust

Charity Rewilding Britain names Kent Wildlife Trust as first recipient of new £100k Rewilding Challenge Fund.
Funding will scale up rewilding – enabling five of Kent's most famous residents, the European bison, and other grazers to roam more freely.

An ambitious rewilding project aiming to rewild tens of thousands of hectares across South East England has been awarded £100,000 by Rewilding Britain to connect a rich range of habitats, create green corridors for wildlife, and boost eco-tourism.

Several brown, stocky ponies walk along a rough grass track — Large herbivores, such as these native Exmoor ponies, play a key role in the Trust’s rewilding plans. (Photo: Kent Wildlife Trust)

Charity Rewilding Britain has named Kent Wildlife Trust as the first recipient of its new Rewilding Challenge Fund, an annual award of up to £100,000 for rewilding projects that ‘Think Big, Act Wild’.

The funding has been awarded to help scale up the Trust’s rewilding efforts within and beyond the Blean complex, an area which contains one of the largest continuous areas of ancient woodland in southern England.

The Blean is home to the UK’s first reintroduced European bison which were famously released last year along with other large herbivores in a key stage of the Trust’s rewilding plans.

Approximately a third of the Blean is woodland, but that area is currently fragmented by agriculture and urban development. To create a landscape-scale rewilding project, Kent Wildlife Trust will work with partners RSPB and the Woodland Trust to reconnect the fragmented woodlands.

This will boost biodiversity and provide a connected gateway to allow wildlife – including the newly introduced bison – to move more freely across the Blean.

Funding from Rewilding Britain will support the rewilding of an initial 8,300 hectares, but the partnership aims to expand further. The project’s long-term goal is the rewilding of tens of thousands of hectares across South East England, reconnecting Blean’s ancient woodlands to the Kent Downs and High Weald Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

Kent Wildlife Trust, The Woodland Trust and RSPB are the three major landowners within the Blean complex and, together, are launching the Wilder Blean Initiative to scale up rewilding within the Blean and beyond.

Read more about the Rewildling challenge fund and decision to award the grant to Kent Wildlife Trust. “Our Challenge Fund asked applicants to ‘Think Big, Act Wild’, and Kent Wildlife Trust is doing just that!” said, Sara King, Rewilding Britain