A long orange beak poked curiously out from its wooden crate, followed by a sleek head and slender body. Then the first white stork of the morning flapped its wings and took the air. Moments later a second emerged tentatively to stalk through the long grass, followed closely by a final sibling who stretched its wings and explored the length of the enclosure.The trio of juvenile white storks have just arrived at their new home in Willington Wetlands in Derbyshire and conservationists are hopeful that their presence will kickstart the return of the birds to the Midlands after an absence of more than 600 years.“It feels absolutely incredible,” said Katie Last, the living landscape officer for Derbyshire Wildlife Trust, who has overseen the project and manages the nature reserve. “To see white storks back at Willington feels like a real milestone. We’ve put years of work into restoring this landscape. I’m over the moon with how it all went. Our next aim is to get to the point where they’re a sustainable population and they can live outside, flying around and people can see them moving through the landscape.”White storks disappeared across Derbyshire and the Midlands around the 14th century, largely due to habitat loss and hunting. Recent sightings of birds have increased in the region but none have yet stayed to breed. The hope is that the trio of juveniles – one male, one female and one of yet-to-be-determined sex – will act as a “magnet flock” to attract wild birds moving through the Trent Valley to encourage others to settle and lead to a healthy breeding population.Storks at the Knepp Castle Estate in West Sussex. The birds are associated with babies and new life because their migratory pattern means they arrive in the UK in the spring. Photograph: RA Chalmers Photography/Alamy“White storks seek safety in numbers, so it’s been proven that white storks will settle around other white storks,” Last said. “We’ve got wild white storks migrating over from Africa. We’ve had white storks recorded in nearby Matlock and Ashbourne, so this is the perfect opportunity. We’ll also be putting artificial platforms up in existing trees to give birds space and encourage nesting.”Watched by an excited gathering of staff, volunteers, donors and birders, the freshly released birds soon settled into their new home,. They were bred at Celtic Rewilding’s captive breeding facility in Staffordshire before being moved to their new, purpose-built enclosure, which is predator-proof, with an electric fence to defend against foxes and minks, and fine netting to keep smaller birds out and protect the storks from avian flu.Over time, Derbyshire Wildlife Trust hopes to see white storks successfully breeding in the area and to manage releases from the enclosure into the reserve as part of the ambitious species-recovery programme. The first pair will be carefully monitored. Depending on how they settle and progress, additional birds may be shipped into the reserve in future. “Our long-term hope is that white storks become part of the Midlands landscape once again, but success is about much more than one species,” said Rachel Bennett, the director of wilder landscapes and wilder communities at Derbyshire Wildlife Trust. “Success means thriving wetlands, more wildlife across the landscape, and communities that feel connected to nature and invested in its future.”The £309,000 project has been funded by the Veolia Environmental Trust through the Landfill Communities Fund. “This whole project is about more than the return of an iconic bird,” said Last. “It’s about reigniting people’s sense of wonder in nature. If you can create the kind of healthy, dynamic landscape that supports white storks, you’re also creating habitats that benefit countless other species.”The Wetlands, a 40-hectare (100-acre) rewilding site that was previously an area of gravel pits, has been identified as a critical stepping stone for stork recovery. Years of restoration work has helped create wet grassland, open pools and reed beds, which provide ideal foraging and nesting conditions for storks, and it is also home to Derbyshire’s first resident beavers in more than 800 years, after two pairs of Scottish beavers were released in 2021, which has helped create a “fluid, dynamic wetland habitat”, Last explained.Storks “have a really strong connection with people across Europe, and they’re part of lots of folklore. They migrate and arrive in spring, so they’re a sign of new life, which is why they’re associated with delivering babies – there’s the story that birthmarks are where the stork carried the baby, leaving their mark on them. Because they have that history with us, they’re great at inspiring people to reconnect with nature. They’re an iconic species that capture people’s imaginations but what they really represent is healthier wetlands, healthier ecosystems and a landscape that’s becoming richer for wildlife.“This has got to be the ultimate wetland that acts as a space for protection for wildlife but on a larger landscape scale,” added Last. “We want to see this reserve extending out and for the River Trent to be a wildlife corridor. We want land-owners to work with us, get onboard and give a bit of space for wildlife to move freely. We want landowners to work with us and engage with wetland habitat, to create corridors, so when the storks migrate, they have an abundance of food and rest points. We want the wildlife we’ve got here to be able to move freely in and out across Derbyshire and beyond.”