Isabella Tree’s wonderful book brings together science, natural history, a fair bit of drama, and-ultimately-hope. The fabled English nightingale sings again.Īt a time of looming environmental disaster, Wilding is an inspiring story of a farm, a couple, and a community transformed. New life flooded into Knepp, now a breeding hot spot for rare and threatened species like turtle doves, peregrine falcons, and purple emperor butterflies. In the face of considerable opposition the couple persisted with their experiment and soon witnessed an extraordinary change. But what would the neighbors say, in the manicured countryside of modern England where a blade of grass out of place is considered an affront? Using herds of free-roaming animals to mimic the actions of the megafauna of the past, they hoped to bring nature back to their depleted land.

They would restore Knepp’s 3,500 acres to the wild. By 2000, with the farm facing bankruptcy, they decided to try something radical. Isabella Tree’s wonderful book brings together science, natural history, a fair bit of drama, and-ultimately-hope.An inspiring story about what happens when 3,500 acres of land, farmed for centuries, is left to return to the wild, and about the wilder, richer future a natural landscape can bringįor years Charlie Burrell and his wife, Isabella Tree, farmed Knepp Castle Estate and struggled to turn a profit. New life flooded into Knepp, now a breeding hotspot for rare and threatened species like turtle doves, peregrine falcons, and purple emperor butterflies.

For years Charlie Burrell and his wife, Isabella Tree, farmed Knepp Castle Estate and struggled to turn a profit.

Wilding knepp book