Over recent weeks, as wildfires have burned across the UK and Europe, a disturbing claim has started to surface that environmental policies, rewilding and nature recovery have somehow created the problem.
It is a convenient argument for those who have long opposed environmental protections. But it is not the story the evidence tells.
The real drivers of wildfire risk are much more uncomfortable: a hotter, drier climate, a broken water cycle, and landscapes that have been drained, straightened, degraded and stripped of their natural resilience.
The climate is changing faster than our landscapes can cope
This summer did not appear from nowhere. After a very wet period, vegetation growth surged. Then came prolonged heat and drought, drying that vegetation rapidly and creating the conditions in which fires can start and spread more easily.
Critics of rewilding argue that reducing vegetation management (through routine cutting and burning) leaves more fuel available for fires to burn. However, this ignores the critical role that healthy ecosystems play in storing water in the landscape, creating natural firebreaks and building resilience to extreme heat, as well as the realities of deeper environmental changes driving wildfire risk.
The Met Office is clear that wildfires depend on a combination of fuel, ignition and weather, and that extended hot, dry conditions make vegetation more flammable. Climate change is making those conditions more likely and more severe.
So, when commentators blame nature recovery, they are pointing in the wrong direction. Blaming conservation work for wildfires is rather like blaming the fire brigade for the fire.
A broken water cycle
Wildfires are not an isolated problem. They are connected to drought, water shortages, degraded rivers, drained wetlands, damaged peatlands and landscapes that can no longer hold water effectively.
For generations, we have engineered water out of the landscape. We have straightened rivers, disconnected floodplains, drained wetlands and degraded peatlands. In doing so, we have created places that shed water quickly when it rains and dry out faster when it does not.
The same broken water cycle that leaves chalk streams struggling and communities facing water restrictions also leaves land more vulnerable to heat, drought and fire.
Nature recovery is part of the solution
Healthy landscapes behave differently, acting as firebreaks and providing refuges for wildlife. Wetlands act like natural sponges. Functioning floodplains allow water to spread, soak into soils and recharge groundwater. Healthy peatlands hold enormous quantities of water and are far less vulnerable when kept wet and functioning.
These are not fringe environmental projects. They are natural infrastructure. Just as we invest in reservoirs, roads and energy networks, we need to invest in the landscapes that store water, cool places down, reduce flood risk and support wildlife.
Nature recovery is not separate from climate adaptation. It is climate adaptation.
What this looks like in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight
At Hampshire & Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust, much of our work is focused on bringing water back into landscapes that have lost their natural function due to engineering, drainage or development.
On the Isle of Wight, our work along the Eastern Yar is helping reconnect the river with its natural floodplain. Instead of water rushing rapidly out to sea, it has more space to spread across the landscape, soak into soils and recharge groundwater. That reduces flood risk in wetter periods and helps the landscape retain moisture for longer in dry ones.
At Manor House Farm in the Lower Test Valley, we are restoring wetlands and creating space for natural processes to shape the land again. Wetlands work like natural reservoirs, storing water when it is available and releasing it slowly over time. They improve water quality, support wildlife and help landscapes stay more resilient during prolonged dry spells.
We are also increasingly recognising the role that beavers can play as ecosystem engineers. By creating ponds, channels and wetlands, beavers slow the flow of water and hold it in the landscape for longer. In a future of both droughts and floods, those natural processes matter.
These projects are not only about helping wildlife. They are about rebuilding the natural systems that communities, farms, rivers and local economies depend on.
The public want practical action
Contrary to some of the headlines, the public are not demanding less action on climate and nature. Recent polling shows that three-quarters (74%) of UK adults are concerned about climate change and that the majority of the population recognise that extreme heat is becoming part of Britain’s future.1
The debate we should be having is not whether climate resilience matters. It is how quickly we can build the resilience our communities, economy and landscapes need.
The wrong lesson from this summer would be to weaken environmental protections or retreat from nature recovery. That would leave us more exposed, not less.
In response to growing wildfire threat, the Prime Minister has introduced a ban on disposable barbecues. This does little to address why our landscape has become so vulnerable in the first place.
We must tackle the problem at its source by addressing the underlying drivers: a worsening climate crisis and landscapes so depleted and dry that they can no longer retain water.
We need more wetland restoration, more floodplain reconnection, more healthy peatlands, more trees in the right places, more nature-friendly farming and more investment in nature-based solutions. We need landscapes capable of storing and holding water again.
Nature did not cause the climate crisis. Nature did not light these fires. But if we give it the chance, nature can help protect us from what comes next.
