Preening Crane – photo by Jeannie Allen

What is Rewilding?

Rewilding is a comprehensive conservation effort focused on restoring sustainable biodiversity and ecosystem health by protecting core wild areas, providing connectivity between such areas, and protecting or reintroducing top predators and highly interactive species.

See also: What is Rewilding? The Rewilding Institute:

https://rewilding.org/what-is-rewilding

In general a healthy ecosystem is native living organisms interacting in balance with each other and -nonliving things in a productive and sustainable way.

At the Candelaria Nature Preserve, rewilding means transitioning the Preserve from non-sustainable agriculture to a mosaic of habitats that will support diverse native wildlife: wet and dry areas, hedgerows, grasslands, upland shrublands, conservation buffers, and forage for wildlife.

Returning the Bosque to its Natural State

The Blue-eyed darner (Rhionaeschna multicolor), a top predator in wetland ecosystems. Insects, spiders, fungi, microbes and other small organisms are as important as the larger, more visible creatures in a healthy ecosystem

Blue grosbeak (Passerina caerulea). Not abundant anywhere, blue grosbeaks live in shrubby places such as those provided by the Candelaria Nature Preserve.