I couldn't agree more. it's depressing when anglers refer to "these re-wilders" as some species of ill-informed do-gooder. Re-wilding covers a broad spectrum from those supporting trialled re-introductions of mammals to suitable areas, through those increasing our understanding of how our missing species -animals, plants and insects - leave damaging gaps in natural chains and hierarchies, to those advocating we leave alone some of our unused land to let nature work its recovery. There is massive expertise and specialist knowledge out there, and its importance is only becoming clearer as we lose more and more species and see our environment and the natural systems it supports deteriorating.
Anglers would do better to read up on the matter before travestying proponents as "tree-huggers", "bunny-huggers", do-gooders and all the rest, and conjuring alarmist nonsense about dangerous animals roaming the countryside. I've read nothing by influential figures which doesn't recognise that whatever we do to restore some of the damage we've caused needs to fit with our modern, developed, economically intensive world. Any one who writes stuff like "they'll want to bring back pterodactyls next" is just proving who's the dinosaur now.
The trouble is these are not trailed re-introductions to suitable areas, these are the re introduction and "re-wilding" of alien species (and I do consider them alien) on a big scale. And nature doesn't have damaging gaps, it fills them with whatever suits the gap except, we have decided to re fill them with what we think is suitable and kick out what nature "thought" was suitable to fill the gap with. If it works fine, but will it and are we able to deal with the consequences if it doesn't. The evidence that we can is not good. Who is deciding these things, the experts, or some bloke in Devon with a bit of land! Granted he had the experts looking on but all I see them do is look at it biasedly. And at the end of the day their opinions and expert advice mattered not one jot, because they "escaped" and run and bred freely anyway. How many beavers do the experts think will populate the UK now they are wild, I have never read their estimations on this, which would probably be wrong anyway, I have seen enough of scientific/expert estimations to know they often are.
And why do humans have to always to take a back row to these projects. Humans and their needs should not be put in second place. I have just read of a woman setting up an appeal to stop a building of a glamping site because swallows nest there, sod the families and people that need holidays, I am sure she will succeed as well. My hobby is fishing, it is more important to me and 3 million other people possibly than if I can see a beaver wandering around, yes I and we will adapt but at a loss to my hobby I am sure of it.
And this is not just being a selfish angler, I don't think any of these re wildings are good whether it affects angling or me personally. I think they are ecologically unsound and I am no expert but I think I know enough to have an opinion.
I am not expecting everyone to agree or follow my thinking, I can understand the nice side of all this, in fact I was excited by it all once, it is just I have been following this re-wilding for some time, a few years in fact and have learnt enough to change my opinion.
