Wilding by Isabella Tree.
AboutThe book proceeds chapter by chapter using titles "The Secret of Grazing Animals", "A World of Wood Pasture", "Creating a Mess", "Rewilding the River", "Painted Ladies and the Perfect Storm", "Nightingales", "Pasture Fed", and a number of congruent others. To read them one by one is to learn, not only what happened on the ground, but what the public, the conservationist community and scientists thought as they observed change. Knepp is an audacious, startling project. It turns most farming practice on its head because nature is allowed to rule. Bringing in the proxiesThe key chapter is 'Wild Ponies, Pigs and Longhorn Cattle' because it tells of bringing in the proxies – the modern animals chosen to replicate the wild grazers thought to have once roamed Britain. Old English Longhorn Cattle substituted for the ancient aurochs. Knepp started with 14 Longhorns then gradually built up a herd as calves arrived and were left to grow naturally with the adults. As numbers increased to grazing capacity the cattle had to be culled. The pasture fed beef, so produced, became sought after, thus developing a viable income virtually free of cost. Exmoor ponies, thought to be one of the oldest horse breeds in Europe, were added, as were Tamworth pigs to stand in for primitive wild boars. Fallow deer were part of the mix as well. But the nub of the chapter is not the very arrival of the animals but what they did over the next few years. The pigs rooted up the ground, the cattle pruned and broke the trees and created hoof holes that filled with water. and the ponies grazed on whatever they could find. Scrub developed. A wildness evolved attracting all sorts of insects, birds bats and other small animals. WormsA later chapter, "Rewilding the Soil", is very significant. Here's a paragraph 'Early on, we had seen dung beetles tunnelling through cowpats and dragging nutrients into underground chambers for their larvae, and ants raising hills out of the earth, but it was the evidence of the machinations of earthworms in the ground beneath our feet that signified the return of our inert, post-agricultural land to fertility. Several years into the project we started to see worm casts – tiny pyramids of worm excrement like squiggles of piped chestnut puree – erupting on the surface. ' Tree then explains that research a few years later (2013) showed that all three categories of earth worm (surface dwellers, horizonal soil burrowers and deep vertical burrowers) had increased in abundance compared to a neighbouring farm with similar Sussex clay soil. DarwinI didn't know that Charles Darwin, spent his later years researching earthworms but Isabella Tree knew and she quotes him. "It may be doubted whether there are other animals which have played so important a part in the history of the world as have these lowly organised creatures". According to Tree, worms have been knocked about in modern plough and replough intensive agriculture, but now the role of these Darwin honoured 'lowly organised creatures' is being reconsidered and once again valued. New wayI was captivated by the daring, the innovation and the enthusiasm for 'a new way' shown by Isabella Tree and her husband, but parts of the narrative I found tedious. The author is so keen to explain, elucidate and verify that the detail at times becomes overwhelming. Partly that's because I'm a New Zealander reading an English book and therefore something such as a detailed discussion of whether or not ancient Britain was totally enclosed forest cover or open spaced woodland, seems a tad irrelevant. And an early chapter describing a Dutch experiment that inspired Burrell and Tree just made me impatient to hear their story and not that of their inspirer. I liked Wilding's story more than the reinforcing detail. The story is exciting. I do hope the book is being widely read because it shows a way for our hurt world to be healed and renewed. An invitationBecause I'm worried that many potential Wilding readers may be put off by too much detail, I've posted below a 15 minute video. In it Isabella Tree gives an ilustrated talk. It's not boring. It tells and shows the heart of the Knepp story. It's inspiring. It's an excellent watch. And I hope it gives all diffidents the courage to read the book. □ John McInnes Friday 10 December 2021 Publication details: Wilding by Isabella Tree, Picador Books, PanMacmillan, 2018, ISBN 9781509805099 Note: I read the ebook version borrowed from my local library. ##########
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