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We diversified, we tried different crops, we tried different cows. we sold ice cream. we did everything we could. but always it was this clay that was against us. so let s just stop for a second and look around, because what we are surrounded by now is a form of wildness. yes. it s extraordinary, isn t it? i mean, in about 2004, 2005, this would have been a field of wheat. so what we did, piecemeal, over about six years, was leave the fields after their last harvest just left them open as stubble and allowed the seed rain to come in, allowed the hawthorn, blackthorn, dog rose, brambles to take off, allowed, you know, the saplings, the oaks to start naturally regenerating. and let that vegetation pulse kind of take off. mm. this is the kind of habitat, you know, that people look at normally and consider absolute wasteland. ....
Are you a problem in your neighbourhood? we cut a buffer of between 50 and 100 metres around our perimeter so that we re not allowing the sort of seed rain, the weed species, so called, to go into farmland. that s not really a problem. what we re actually providing here is pollinating insects and natural pest controls. we re also restoring, replenishing the water table. we re also cleaning the water. we re preventing flooding. so we re preventing destruction of arable land from flooding. we re doing all these other public goods, these ecosystem services that are really important to protect our farmland. well, i want to talk much more about some of the strategic challenges you face and perhaps how you fit into an international perspective. let s do that in your office, which is down the track, down there. sure. let s go. yeah. isabella tree, having walked the estate with you, ....