ABSTRACT
The wilding ethos has gathered such momentum in the first five years of the 21st century, that there are now many projects on the ground of varying degrees of wildness, encompassing a variety of visions, ranging from small-scale programmes on particular reaches of rivers and urban wildlife corridors to habitat network initiatives relating to woodland, reedbeds and coastal marshes. Many of the smaller schemes are indicative of a general wave of change in cities, the urban fringe, the community forests, wetland restoration, coastal retreat, the wilding of farming and even wild gardens. In this chapter, we shall look at those larger schemes of relevance for linking core areas with corridors of land that, although not necessarily free of human use, would be wild enough to allow movement of animals between these core areas and also to provide buffer zones with more appropriate economic activity. Each of the following schemes, though separately conceived and not yet part of an overall strategy, will provide important lessons in implementation, particularly for landscape-scale initiatives outside traditional nature reserves.
