How to repair our environment, one species at a times
he swelteringly hot summer of 1976 was the last gasp for the chequered skipper, a dynamic little butterfly that once buzzed along the rides of the ancient royal hunting forest of Rockingham in Northamptonshire.
It abruptly disappeared from England that year, driven to extinction by industrial forestry, which included the spraying of old woods with Agent Orange, before planting non-native conifers in whose shade not much can thrive.
That is one of the wrongs being righted by Back from the Brink, a newly launched antidote to despondency about our destructive relationship with our planet. Supported by £4.6m from the Heritage Lottery Fund, an array of wildlife charities from Buglife to the RSPB are working together to revive 20 species on the verge of extinction in England.
photo credit: Rennett Stowe