America’s landscape has undergone dramatic changes since European settlement, with vast ecosystems fragmented or lost to development, agriculture, and resource extraction. As ecological awareness has grown, so too has the movement to restore these natural systems through rewilding – the strategic reintroduction of native species and restoration of natural processes to repair damaged ecosystems. Across the United States, dedicated conservationists, scientists, and communities have launched ambitious projects to return landscapes to their ecological glory, reconnecting wildlife corridors and reestablishing keystone species that maintain balance in nature. These rewilding initiatives represent some of our most promising efforts to address biodiversity loss and climate challenges while reconnecting Americans with the wild heritage that shaped our national identity. The following examples highlight America’s most successful rewilding projects, each demonstrating nature’s remarkable resilience when given the opportunity to recover.
Yellowstone Wolf Reintroduction: The Trophic Cascade Success Story
Perhaps the most celebrated rewilding initiative in American conservation history, the 1995 reintroduction of gray wolves to Yellowstone National Park has transformed the ecosystem in ways scientists are still documenting. After a 70-year absence, the return of this apex predator triggered what ecologists call a “trophic cascade” – a series of ecological changes flowing through the food web. The wolves’ presence altered elk behavior, reducing overbrowsing of willow and aspen trees along riverbanks, which in turn allowed beaver populations to thrive. Beaver dams created new wetland habitats, benefiting countless species from fish to songbirds. Today, approximately 100 wolves roam the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, balanced within the natural predator-prey relationships. The project demonstrated how a single keystone species could restore ecological processes across an entire landscape, making it a model studied by conservation biologists worldwide.
American Prairie Reserve: Creating the Serengeti of North America
In the northern Great Plains of Montana, an ambitious private conservation effort is working to create the largest wildlife reserve in the continental United States. The American Prairie Reserve aims to stitch together three million acres of public and private lands to restore a fully functioning temperate grassland ecosystem – the iconic American prairie that once stretched across the heart of the continent. Since 2001, the organization has acquired over 450,000 acres, where bison have been reintroduced as the keystone grazing species that shaped these grasslands for millennia. The reserve now hosts growing populations of pronghorn antelope, elk, prairie dogs, swift foxes, and numerous grassland birds. By connecting fragmented lands and removing interior fencing, the project creates wildlife corridors that allow species to follow natural migration patterns. The vision includes eventually supporting the full complement of native species, including predators like wolves and grizzly bears, that once maintained the prairie’s ecological balance.
Elwha River Restoration: The Largest Dam Removal Project in History
The Elwha River restoration in Washington State represents one of America’s most dramatic examples of ecosystem recovery through infrastructure removal. For nearly a century, two massive hydroelectric dams blocked salmon migration on this river flowing through Olympic National Park, decimating one of the Pacific Northwest’s most productive salmon runs. Between 2011 and 2014, both dams were dismantled in the largest dam removal project in U.S. history, allowing the river to flow freely for the first time in 100 years. The response has been remarkable – sediment once trapped behind the dams has rebuilt the river delta and nearshore habitats, while all five native salmon species have returned to spawn in the upper watershed. Eagles, bears, and other wildlife that depend on salmon have followed. Native vegetation has reclaimed the former reservoir beds, and the river has reestablished its natural meandering channels. The project demonstrates how removing human-built barriers can allow natural systems to rapidly heal themselves.
California Condor Recovery Program: Saving America’s Largest Bird
When the California condor population plummeted to just 22 individuals in the 1980s, the species faced imminent extinction. In a desperate measure, all remaining wild condors were captured for an intensive captive breeding program – a controversial but ultimately successful strategy. Today, thanks to the California Condor Recovery Program, more than 300 of these magnificent birds with 9.5-foot wingspans soar over parts of California, Arizona, Utah, and Baja California. The program represents one of conservation’s most dramatic species rescues, combining captive breeding, release techniques, habitat protection, and the elimination of environmental threats like lead ammunition. Condors now nest in the wild, producing offspring that join the growing population. The ongoing recovery effort represents true rewilding – not just saving a species from extinction but restoring it as a functioning component of ecosystems across its historical range, where these massive scavengers play a critical role in the cleanup of carrion.
Everglades Restoration: Reconnecting America’s River of Grass
The Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan represents the largest ecosystem restoration effort ever attempted, aiming to restore natural water flows to Florida’s “River of Grass” after a century of drainage and development dramatically altered this unique landscape. The $10.5 billion, multi-decade project works to correct the extensive canal and levee systems that diverted water away from the historic Everglades, causing widespread ecological damage. Key accomplishments include the removal of sections of the Tamiami Trail roadway that functioned as a dam blocking water flow, and the restoration of the meandering path of the Kissimmee River, a crucial headwater. These interventions have already improved habitat for iconic Everglades species like alligators, wood storks, and Florida panthers. By reestablishing the natural hydrological patterns across this vast wetland system, the project aims to protect South Florida’s water supply while rewilding one of America’s most distinctive ecosystems.
Channel Islands Fox Recovery: A Rapid Turnaround
The Channel Islands fox recovery program stands as one of the fastest and most successful endangered species recoveries in U.S. history. These diminutive foxes, each unique to one of six Channel Islands off the California coast, faced catastrophic population crashes in the 1990s, primarily due to predation by golden eagles that had moved into the islands after bald eagles were eliminated by DDT poisoning. Conservation efforts included captive breeding, relocating golden eagles, reintroducing bald eagles (which don’t prey on the foxes), and removing non-native species like feral pigs that had attracted the golden eagles. The results were dramatic – in just 15 years, fox populations rebounded from near extinction to sustainable levels, allowing the removal of three subspecies from the endangered species list in 2016. The interconnected restoration of these island ecosystems demonstrates the importance of understanding ecological relationships in successful rewilding efforts.
Plains Bison Restoration: Bringing Back an American Icon
Once numbering in the tens of millions across North America, plains bison were hunted to near extinction by the late 1800s, with fewer than 1,000 surviving in isolated pockets. Today, thanks to multiple rewilding initiatives, approximately 20,000 plains bison roam conservation herds across the American landscape. Beyond the aforementioned American Prairie Reserve, successful reintroductions include the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve in Oklahoma, where The Nature Conservancy manages about 2,500 bison on 40,000 acres of restored prairie. At Wind Cave National Park in South Dakota, genetically pure bison maintain the prairie ecosystem through their grazing patterns. The InterTribal Buffalo Council, representing over 70 Native American tribes, has been instrumental in returning bison to tribal lands, reconnecting Indigenous communities with their cultural heritage while restoring ecological functions. As a keystone species, bison create habitat for countless other prairie species through their wallowing, grazing, and movement patterns, making their restoration central to grassland rewilding efforts.
Longleaf Pine Ecosystem Restoration: Recovering the South’s Original Forest
Once covering 90 million acres across the southeastern United States, longleaf pine forests have been reduced to less than 3% of their original range due to logging, fire suppression, and development. America’s most ambitious forest ecosystem restoration effort aims to reverse this trend through the America’s Longleaf Restoration Initiative, a collaborative effort to restore 8 million acres of longleaf pine ecosystem by 2025. These forests, maintained historically by frequent natural fires, host extraordinary biodiversity, including rare species like the red-cockaded woodpecker and gopher tortoise. Successful restoration sites include Apalachicola National Forest in Florida and Fort Bragg in North Carolina, where prescribed burns mimic natural fire regimes that keep the forest open and park-like. The project emphasizes not just replanting trees but reestablishing ecological processes and full biological communities in one of North America’s most species-rich forest ecosystems.
Rio Grande Silvery Minnow Recovery: Saving Desert Waterways
The Rio Grande silvery minnow may be small, but its recovery represents a crucial effort to rewild the Rio Grande, one of America’s most culturally and ecologically significant rivers. Once abundant throughout the Rio Grande basin, this native fish had disappeared from more than 95% of its range by the 1990s due to dam construction, water diversion, and channel modification. The recovery program combines habitat restoration, water flow management, captive breeding, and reintroduction efforts across the middle Rio Grande in New Mexico. Critical to success has been the restoration of the river’s natural flow patterns, including periodic flooding that creates shallow nursery areas for young minnows. The project demonstrates how rewilding must often address water management in arid regions where competing demands have left many waterways depleted. By focusing on this indicator species, conservationists work to restore the entire river ecosystem, benefiting numerous other aquatic and riparian species.
Kissimmee Prairie Preserve: Restoring Florida’s Inland Grasslands
Florida’s interior once featured vast stretches of prairie and savanna ecosystems that have largely disappeared under agricultural development. At Kissimmee Prairie Preserve State Park, managers have implemented one of the Southeast’s most successful grassland restoration programs, rehabilitating former ranchland to its natural condition through prescribed burning, exotic species removal, and hydrological restoration. The 54,000-acre preserve now protects the largest remaining tract of Florida dry prairie, supporting endangered species like the Florida grasshopper sparrow and crested caracara. Regular prescribed fires mimic the natural lightning-ignited burns that historically maintained this ecosystem, preventing woody encroachment and stimulating the growth of native grasses and wildflowers. The preserve demonstrates how active management using natural processes can effectively rewild altered landscapes, creating habitat for specialist species that cannot survive elsewhere.
Shark River Slough: Restoring the Heart of the Everglades
While the broader Everglades restoration was mentioned earlier, the specific rewilding of Shark River Slough deserves special attention as one of America’s most successful wetland restoration projects. This historic “river of grass” once served as the main water flow path through the southern Everglades to Florida Bay but was largely cut off by the Tamiami Trail highway. Recent completion of multiple bridge spans along this roadway has allowed water managers to reintroduce natural sheet flow patterns to this critical landscape. The ecological response has been immediate – wading birds have returned to feed and nest in previously dry areas, alligator holes have expanded, and native vegetation patterns are recovering. Water quality improvements are evident as natural filtration processes resume. Fish populations, the foundation of the Everglades food web, have expanded into newly accessible habitat. This project demonstrates how targeted infrastructure modifications can effectively rewild even severely altered wetland systems when based on solid hydrological understanding.
Jornada Experimental Range: Desert Grassland Recovery
In the Chihuahuan Desert of New Mexico, the Jornada Experimental Range has pioneered techniques for restoring degraded arid grasslands that have transitioned to shrub-dominated landscapes due to historical overgrazing and climate change. Rather than attempting to return to an idealized past condition, scientists here have developed novel approaches to create functioning ecosystems adapted to current and future conditions. Using strategic soil manipulations, targeted grazing, and native seed dispersal, they’ve established “islands” of restored grassland that gradually expand into surrounding areas. The return of banner-tailed kangaroo rats as ecosystem engineers has been particularly significant, as these native rodents create soil disturbances that favor grass establishment. The project demonstrates how rewilding in changing environments may require innovative techniques that work with current conditions rather than against them, while still restoring critical ecological functions and native species assemblages.
Future Directions in American Rewilding
As rewilding science matures, several emerging approaches promise to expand America’s ecological restoration successes. Connectivity conservation, which focuses on creating wildlife corridors between protected areas, is gaining momentum through initiatives like the Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative and the Path of the Pronghorn migration corridor. Assisted migration – deliberately moving species to new areas to accommodate climate change – remains controversial but may become necessary as habitats shift faster than species can naturally respond. Some conservationists advocate for “Pleistocene rewilding,” which would introduce ecological proxies for extinct megafauna, such as using elephants to fulfill ecological roles once played by mammoths. Meanwhile, technologies like environmental DNA monitoring, satellite tracking, and genomic tools are enhancing our ability to measure rewilding success and make adaptive management decisions. What unites these approaches is a shift from preservation-focused conservation to process-based restoration that embraces natural dynamics and change.
Conclusion
America’s successful rewilding projects demonstrate nature’s extraordinary capacity for self-renewal when given the opportunity. From the dramatic ecological cascade triggered by Yellowstone’s returning wolves to the resurgence of ancient waterways following dam removals, these initiatives reveal that damaged ecosystems can recover much of their former function and diversity with strategic human assistance. These projects also highlight the importance of addressing root causes rather than symptoms – restoring natural processes like fire, flooding, and predation rather than just protecting individual species. As climate change and development pressures continue to transform landscapes, these rewilding successes offer valuable lessons and hope. They suggest that by working with natural processes rather than against them, we can create resilient ecosystems that support biodiversity, provide ecosystem services, and reconnect people with the wild foundations of the American landscape. The rewilding movement, once considered radical, has proven itself as a practical and effective approach to conservation in the 21st century.
Leave a Reply