The writer is the author of ‘The Almanac: a Seasonal Guide to 2026’
The huff of a boar nosing through leaf litter, the soft clatter of a beaver arranging twigs, the wail of a wildcat as it calls for a mate — all these sounds were once lost to Britain but are slowly returning. On Bodmin Moor, in the Forest of Dean, the Cairngorms and elsewhere, species that have been extinct or threatened with extinction are being reintroduced to Britain’s wild and semiwild places. Their numbers are being bolstered by deliberate efforts to change the landscape as they pad through it.
Beavers are a great success story. Their industrious dams, once blamed for flooding, now quietly stitch wetlands back together, creating still areas of water where insects can flourish, making it boom time for the fish, small mammals, reptiles and birds that feed on them. Boar, though their presence is more controversial, rummage through Forest of Dean woodlands as if they never left, turning the soil with a determination bordering on cheerful vandalism. But their chaos breaks up the sward, creating opportunities for wildflowers to seed and grow, and basking spots for grasshoppers. It exposes grubs for birds to feast on.