We hope that rewilding is going to become a fantastic career opportunity sooner rather than later. And what a career it could be! A great opportunity to connect with nature and people. Do you want such a career? If so, the list below details some of the knowledge, skills, experience, and qualities we think are going to be really beneficial to any rewilder. It’s a pretty long list, but not exhaustive. We don’t think any one person needs it all, but these are all things worth looking into if you’re interested. We’ve added a few links for places to find more information, but we’d love to add more so please share links! The list was collated and supplemented by Chris Sandom via Twitter (@Nature_Based). Many thanks to everyone that contributed to this (evolving) list!
Knowledge
Ecology
- Carbon cycle
- Nutrient cycles
- Climate change
- Natural processes (Evolutionary, Ecological & Ecosystem processes, Ecosystem function)
- Natural disturbance processes (e.g. fire, flooding)
- Metacommunity dynamics
- Soil
- Community assembly rules
- Food webs
- Trophic cascades
- Keystone species
- Ecosystem engineers
- Predation
- Natural grazing
- Vegetation succession
- Palaeoecology
Human-Nature interactions
- Shifting baseline syndrome
- Social science theory
- Perceptions of wilderness and wildness
- Agricultural and forestry history and its influence on biodiversity
- The limitations of traditional nature reserve conservation
- What makes a successful conservation project
- Rural political, social & economic viability
- Socio-economic justice
- Nature Based Solutions
- Compassionate conservation
- Permaculture
- Agro-ecological farming
- Herbal medicine
- Natural world folklore
- Mindfulness and meditation
Other
- Quantum physics (or Quantum Conservation Biology)
Skills & Experience
Field skills, Field skills, Field skills
- Naturalist and field survey skills
- Taxonomy (Identification skills)
- A variety of biodiversity metrics
- Ability assess composition, structure, and function of ecosystems
- Navigation
- Wilderness first aid
Project management skills
- Vision-setting
- Partnership building (Social skills)
- Influencer skills
- Facilitation skills
- Strategy development
- Fundraising
- Monitoring
- Data analysis
Land & species management skills
- Species reintroduction
- Invasive species control
- Management to mimic natural processes
- Forestry
Use of technology
Communication skills
- Inspirational communications skills helping to paint an achievable yet transformational vision that people can and want to be part of
- Citizen involvement and community engagement, and public relation skills
Agro-ecological skills
- Agroecological farming skills
Other
- Tactics to stop extraction
Experience
- Field trip to a rewilding project
- Experience using the above skills
- Multi-year exposure to one or a few places
Qualities
- Empathetic
- Ability to engender a sense of excitement, hope and aspiration
- Avid reader and listener
- Confident in thinking for yourself
- Able to respect other ways of life and belief systems, being inclusive, giving equal opportunities
- Optimistic/positive
- Comfortable with uncertainty and lack of targets
- Willing to learn from mistakes, experience, others
- See both big picture and detail
- Ability to take on a broad range of skills
- Ability to see things from different perspectives and value the perspectives of others
- Developing an understanding that we humans are nature and that all of nature is sentient.
- Developing the ability to listen to other species rather than just imposing what we think is best on them.
- Ability to think at a landscape scale
Dr Chris Sandom
Senior Lecturer University of Sussex – https://profiles.sussex.ac.uk/p361723-christopher-sandom
Director Wild Business Ltd – http://www.wildbusiness.org
Chairperson Rewilding Sussex – https://rewildingsussex.org