Historic land clearing, agricultural land use as a rural grazing property, and illegal dumping of construction and demolition waste left a 54-hectare (133 acre) property at Carrickalinga, on the Fleurieu Peninsula of South Australia, in a degraded condition.

Biodiversity loss is a major issue globally and Australia is recognised as 1 of 7 countries responsible for more than half of this biodiversity loss. Rewilding can be used to address biodiversity loss, via revegetation with native plants which in turn will provide seed sources for natural regeneration and habitat for the return of native animals and other native species.

Climate change is causing environmental, economic and social impacts globally, and carbon capture is one of the recognised strategies to address this issue. Revegetation and subsequent rewilding, at the property scale, can sequester tens of thousands of tonnes of carbon.

Rewilding can therefore be used to address both biodiversity loss and climate change. The Forktree Project is a registered charity whose goals are to:

• Provide habitat for native species and help combat climate change through rewilding the land. Since Forktree began in April 2019, we have planted over 20,000 trees and shrubs, restored degraded landscape by removal of 8ha of invasive weed species, and invested heavily in infrastructure to keep out introduced animals including feral proof fencing around the perimeter of the property
• To trial improved methods of restoring landscapes and sharing this knowledge. This includes but is not restricted to improved ways to calculate both above ground and soil-based carbon for small/medium sized rural landowners; trialling innovative native grassland re-establishment and weed eradication techniques; and utilising innovative, cost-effective irrigation technology to grow rare plants to rebuild native habitat
• Establish a large-scale native seed nursery and rare seed orchard (RSO) to grow native plants for use at Forktree and other Hills and Fleurieu properties to help combat biodiversity loss and provide desperately needed native habitat for native flora and fauna. The RSO involves growing threatened species in a dedicated vermin-proof 1.5ha area for ease of seed harvesting and propagation and as a security population in the wild. The focus is on species that are rare, or of significance to Aboriginal people
• Be an educational resource to encourage both sustainable practices and small-scale land regeneration, both through provision of formal educational content as well as the modelling of proactive sustainable practices. Principal target audiences include schools, the local community and rural landowners. One of the buildings at Forktree is being converted into a sustainability centre to enable school children and other stakeholders to visit (with activities on offer including propagating native seedlings in the nursery, tree planting, recycling, ecological surveys, etc). Forktree education programs link directly to the specific curriculum objectives such as ethical decision making (Year 6), water management (Year 7) and economics (Year 11). All Forktree visits link to the General Capabilities of the Australian Curriculum through teamwork, problem solving and critical thinking and offer significant wellbeing benefits resulting from time spent in nature and engagement in meaningful service.