An old friend visited at the weekend and asked if we had been rewilding.
He had driven through the farm earlier and was now sitting in the garden, enjoying the views and the birdsong.
At a time when globally we need to grow more food, good land is at a premium. We are lucky that we have some pretty good ground here and we can grow crops that are going straight for human consumption rather than being fed to cattle.
So we’re not putting large tracts of land over for re-wilding. But what we have been doing for years is making space for nature. Field margins, wildlife corridors, chalk grassland restoration, planting more hedges and letting them grow out. Plus woodland management and coppicing to open up the woods and increase biodiversity.
We’ve also been focusing on soil health for the last decade. Regularly adding tons of sewage cake across the fields. It has the same effect as manure from livestock. It builds up the organic matter and microbial content of the soil and reduces the amount of fertiliser we need. Then minimum tillage to reduce disturbance to the soil biome we’re building up. Crop rotations help to aid management of weeds through cultural control rather than sprays.
The result is land flourishing in harmony.
A beautiful landscape, lots of birdsong, a restored soil and food.
It turned out he just hadn’t been here during the summer.
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