A new wildlife conservation project has launched a campaign to recruit Devon children to breed harvest mice which will be released into the wild next September.

Wild Pets, founded by teenagers Eva Wishart and Emily Smith from Devon, is searching for up to 20 children to breed harvest mice as part of a conservation project.

The initiative follows on Eva and Emily’s conservation work which saw them breed hundreds of the endangered mice and release them into the wild in September 2025, with the help of Chris Packham, who attended after the girls contacted him. He later called Wild Pets “truly sensational” on Springwatch.

Eva said: “Our future is very scary at the moment, so doing something even though it’s only a tiny project with tiny creatures, makes me feel a lot better.”

Emily added: “Even if we start with a small idea hopefully people will encouraged to help the environment. We want to help change the way we treat the planet, to safeguard the future of nature.”

Children interested in taking part in the project are asked to apply via the Wild Pets website and, as part of the application, write 500 words and film a short video explaining why they are enthusiastic about conservation.

Marketing and communications manager Lauren O’Brien, said: “The girls wanted to get more kids doing something rather than looking after the traditional small pets like hamsters, gerbils and similar pets.

“Harvest mice are really lovely to look after. They don’t need massive amounts of care and are energetic. They enjoy activities like exercise wheels so we want to encourage the children to create their own enrichment activities for them.”

Selected children will attend a training course led by the renowned ecologist Derek Gow at his centre near Lifton in the spring and then given a breeding pair of harvest mice to look after at home for five months.

In September 2027, the mice will be released together at a site in Devon to start a new wild population, which will be supported by Derek Gow’s team going forwards.

Derek said: “There’s a lot of doom and gloom about the catastrophic collapse of nature and whether anyone or anything will survive, including us. But there is nothing that gives me more hope than children getting on and trying to solve the problems that we adults have created.”

In future years, Wild Pets hopes to expand and include children from other parts of the country breeding other “missing species” (native British wildlife which should be common in our landscape), potentially including common lizards, stag beetles, mole crickets, tree frogs and glow worms.