The forests that were clear-cut, the rivers once choked with silt and poison, the prairies turned to dust or strip-malls—none of them are lost forever unless we declare them so. Human hands have torn these webs of life apart; human hands can weave them whole again.

We live in an age of ecological scars. You can see them from an airplane—the patchwork of deforestation in the Amazon, the checkerboard of clear-cuts in the Pacific Northwest, the ghostly white coral reefs in the Pacific, the strangled, canalized rivers of the Midwest. These wounds are not inevitable; they are the consequence of short-term extraction masquerading as progress. In earlier centuries, there was at least the illusion that wild lands were infinite, that a damaged place could simply be abandoned for another. That illusion is gone. We now inhabit a crowded, finite world, where the old game of take-and-move-on has nowhere left to go.

The work of restoration is slow and humbling, yet deeply human. It asks us to reverse the flow of history, to rebuild what greed dismantled. Ecologists have shown that damaged ecosystems, given time and care, can return to remarkable health. The prairies of Illinois, reduced to scraps after a century of plowing, have been re-sown and are once again rich with big bluestem, prairie dock, and monarch butterflies. In England, the Knepp Estate—once an over-worked farm—has been “rewilded” into a thriving mosaic of grassland, woodland, and wetland, hosting nightingales and purple emperor butterflies absent for generations. In China, the Loess Plateau—once a barren dust-scape—has been transformed into fertile, green valleys supporting thriving farms and forests, through contour planting, terracing, and native vegetation recovery.

In the United States, opportunities for such transformation abound. The Appalachian region, its mountains gutted by mountaintop removal mining, presents one of the most urgent cases. Here, restoration would mean more than planting trees—it would require reshaping entire landscapes, recontouring slopes to stabilize them, and reintroducing native species like the American chestnut to rebuild forest ecosystems that can support both wildlife and sustainable human communities. The return of elk to Kentucky’s reclaimed mine lands offers a glimpse of what could be possible at scale.

Meanwhile, the Mississippi River basin tells a different but equally pressing story of disconnection. Centuries of levee construction and wetland drainage have turned what was once a vast, pulsating network of floodplains into a rigid agricultural zone that exacerbates flooding while starving the remaining wetlands of nutrients. Projects like Mollicy Farms in Louisiana show how strategically breaching levees can allow rivers to reclaim their ancient floodplains, reducing downstream flood risks while reviving habitats for migratory birds and aquatic species. Expanding such efforts throughout the basin could begin to repair one of America’s most critical—and most damaged—ecological arteries.

Even in urban areas, restoration can reshape the relationship between people and the environment. Los Angeles’ concrete-choked rivers, for instance, represent not just ecological loss but a severed connection to the natural world. The city has begun experimenting with “daylighting” buried streams, following the example of Seoul’s Cheonggyecheon Stream, where the removal of pavement and infrastructure revealed a living waterway that now cools the city and provides respite from urban congestion. Similar transformations could unfold along the Los Angeles River and its tributaries, turning flood control channels into green corridors that mitigate heat islands while restoring habitat.

Psychologically, habitat restoration is an act of repair not just for land, but for ourselves. When people work together to replant native trees, clear invasive weeds, or release salmon fry into a cleaned river, they are repairing a breach in the psyche: the learned helplessness that says nothing can be fixed. This work dissolves the paralysis of despair. It shifts the mind from guilt into stewardship, from a passive mourning to an active guardianship. Children who plant a forest or restore a wetland inherit not just the shade and birdsong of that place, but a lived memory that destruction is not the only story humans know how to tell.

Restoration done well is a partnership with it. We do not “impose” a forest into being; we remove the blockages, re-establish the conditions, and allow the forest to grow itself. We do not bulldoze wetlands into existence; we break the drainage tiles, slow the water, and let the marsh return. This is work that honors the self-healing capacity of life, where our role is more surgeon than sculptor, more midwife than master.

Restoration requires long timeframes, often decades, and thus demands stable, intergenerational agreements. In Japan, satoyama landscapes—carefully tended mosaics of forest, rice paddies, and water systems—have been maintained for centuries, their fertility dependent on communal care. In the United States, prairie restorations thrive when neighbors agree on controlled burns, invasive species control, and seed sharing. If neglected, restored lands slip back into degradation; if tended with continuity, they become permanent fixtures in the cultural as well as the ecological map.

Habitat restoration now is recognized globally as a central pillar of climate resilience. Healthy forests and wetlands absorb carbon and mitigate floods; restored mangroves protect coastlines from storm surges; revitalized grasslands anchor soil against drought. The UN’s Decade on Ecosystem Restoration (2021–2030) aims to restore 350 million hectares of degraded land—an area larger than India. Yet the gap between pledge and action yawns wide; without local political will, these targets will remain slogans. Real restoration begins at the watershed, the neighborhood, the valley floor.

If we choose, we can create a living tapestry stitched back together with care. Every degraded field, drained swamp, or scoured riverbed is a future refuge waiting to happen—if we commit to making it so. Restoration is a repayment of a debt, the renewal of the commons on which all our lives depend.

Therefore, Folklaw advocates:

Every municipality shall adopt a habitat restoration program aimed at repairing degraded lands, rivers, wetlands, and coastal areas within its jurisdiction, prioritizing the re-establishment of native species and natural ecological functions.

Such programs shall be guided by principles of wu wei, working with natural processes rather than against them, and shall be sustained through community stewardship agreements ensuring care across generations.

State and federal agencies shall provide funding, training, and long-term monitoring to guarantee the recovery and ongoing health of restored habitats.