Rewilding: I have 5 acres to spare of old farmland once part of my Great-Grandfather's large farm and ranch. After researching native trees to this area, trees brought by tribes on the Trail of Tears, endangered trees in the US, and the hardiest trees able to withstand climate change extremes, I decided to reforest/rewild the land with a focus on preserving monarchs, bees, and other pollinators.
Rewilding is a dedicated approach to conservation. Nature takes care of itself, enabling natural processes to reclaim land, repair ecosystems, and restore degraded landscapes. Wildlife's natural rhythms create wilder, more biodiverse habitats with assistance.
"The productivity, health, and environmental benefits of Oklahoma's diverse ecosystems are threatened by land-use changes, ecological pressures, economic issues, and landowner and societal influences. Oklahoma's community forests are not fully realized due to a general lack of understanding, management, and conservation of important resources. Wildfire presents a risk... Oklahoma's diverse forest ecosystems, ecosystem components, and associated benefits will be affected by climate change." - Oklahoma Forestry Department
The Arbor Day Foundation wants increased phytoremediation, planting trees and other plants to clean contaminated soil and water. "Due to recent advances in plant microbiology, phytoremediation has increasingly become more cost-effective and feasible than traditional remediation approaches for a wide range of polluted sites while providing co-benefits inherently offered by trees, shade, carbon sequestration, watershed health, and habitat for wildlife."
As an active steward of rewilding land, I will need a few new native trees and native flower seeds. They will have an established growth with occasional need for limited replacement. Often, three trees may be planted but only one tree may live due to extremes of weather like tornadoes or floods. Rewilding provides wildlife greenbelts to migrate across territories. This land is in the migratory path of the monarch butterfly, the flight territory of the big-eared bat, and an occasional place to visit by wandering whooping cranes flying to Sequoyah National Wildlife Refuge. It is essential land for coyotes, foxes, and bobcats. Deer graze the area, small animals scurry-about, and bald eagles fly overhead.
Funds? Rewilding and sowing seeds is one of the least costly methods of conservation. Anyone can contribute to the cause with their garden, rewilding a few acres, or contributing seeds or tools to organizations.
Jerie K. Leep
Trees make the oxygen we breathe AND the water we drink?! Talk about range!!!