Vertebrates in the Landscape: past, present and future

Mesolithic Britain, 10-6,000 years ago, had a largely wooded landscape, with a large mammal fauna of aurochs, elk, red and roe deer, boar and beaver. Lynx, wolf , bear and a few thousand humans hunted them. Over the 5000 years since then, largely farming humans cleared that woodland, and substituted a farmed landscape mainly of grassland and arable fields.Large areas of wetland have been drained and converted to farmland. In the processes of conversion to farmland, most of the larger mammals, and birds, have become extinct. If we wish to restore those species, or even some of them, we need to recreate the landscapes that supported them. But how do we do this when 44 million humans, 4 million cattle and 20 million sheep dominate the landcsape?