Let nature take the upper hand

Could you let your garden take care of itself? Adrian Thomas puts the case for rewilding and asks whether it’s worth doing on a domestic scale

Could you let your garden take care of itself? The case for ‘rewilding’

Anew term has seized many people’s attention in the past couple of years: ‘rewilding’. It’s the idea that if we stop actively managing big areas of land and let nature take its course, it’s better for wildlife, the environment and all of us, too.

Sometimes it requires reintroducing ‘missing species’ into the landscape, such as large herbivores (beavers, heritage cattle) or even carnivores (such as wolves and lynx). However, overall it’s about relinquishing control and allowing parts of our world to just do what they want to do rather than what we impose. A flurry of books have been released, with every permutation of title from Rewilding and Rewild to Rewild Yourself! ➤

Its popularity might stem from the fact that many of us feel that society should step back in places to redress some of the damage we’ve done to our planet.

It’s a hot topic that has begun to grab the attention of the gardening world, including a recent Radio 4 documentary posing the question (but not quite concluding) whether it’s possible to rewild your own garden. But isn’t that a form of anti-gardening? To help us understand what’s possible, it’s useful to see what’s involved in major rewilding projects in the countryside. I live near one of the nation’s largest schemes at the Knepp Estate in West Sussex. These 3,500 acres of fields weren’t making money from conventional intensive farming, no matter how much the owners tried. So, from about 2003, they began to open the gates, let the fields turn fallow and introduced the old English longhorn breed of cow, plus Exmoor ponies, Tamworth pigs and red deer. These animals wandered where they wanted, when they wanted, chomping away on whatever rough grass and weeds grew. Amazingly, in the 17 years since, the ultra-rare turtle dove has returned to breed, nightingale numbers have boomed and wildlife is blossoming, without the owners raising a finger.

But as a gardener, you’ve probably spotted at least one problem with the concept. We could sell our garden tools, lay down our gardening gloves, and just sit back and watch as the garden does what it wants. But few of us have the space to have a pig or two trampling around! Most of us use our gardens for all sorts of productive activities, so just letting it ‘go native’ isn’t really an option. After all, many of us rather like to impose a bit of control, don’t we?!

Try leaving a small area untouched to get in the spirit of it

Yet I’d argue that it’s still possible to embrace the essence of rewilding in our gardens. Why not try leaving a small area untouched to get in the spirit of it? Or, let parts of our lawn grow into a meadow (also very fashionable). Maybe we could open up some boundaries for hedgehog access – or just pledge to work as much as we can with nature, rather than against it.

So, even if rewilding isn’t something we can contemplate on a domestic scale, it’s interesting to think about what our gardens would become if we didn’t coax them into their current form. And if embracing rewilding just means relaxing a bit more, well, that sounds like a good idea for our own well-being. ✿

● KEEP A RECORD Take regular photos to plot the area’s rewilding progress. This little wilderness offers a window into what your garden would become if you let it go back to nature. It’s likely to become tangled with vegetation in the first growing season, but each year will evolve into something different. Maybe one weed will dominate one year and another the next; a plant you’ve never seen in the garden may spring up; or a tree might even emerge.

● FIND THE RIGHT SPOT You could choose a hidden corner behind the shed, or one in full view where you can watch the changes every day. Turn the area into a self-contained ‘wilderness zone’ and you could keep the areas around it perfectly manicured for contrast.

● GROW WEEDS ON PURPOSE! By embracing rewilding you might become more relaxed about weeds. Wild flowers can be beautiful and fascinating. My vegetable bed is home to common ramping-fumitory (Fumaria muralis), which I’ve never seen in my garden. I let it romp where it likes!

● REMOVE BARRIERS One aspect of rewilding that you can adopt in gardens is removing barriers, such as keeping gates open and cutting ‘hedgehog highways’ under fences. If you plan to replace a fence with a hedge, ask your neighbour first.