First published on December 12, 2024 in Horticulture Connected. Link below. In a changing world that urgently needs both local food and space for nature, Féidhlim Harty finds ways to combine these needs by using proxies in small-scale rewilding initiatives. Rewilding is a term that excites as much reticence as enthusiasm, depending on your perspective. To the lover of nature, rewilding promises ecological recovery, escape from the threat of an unfolding mass extinction event, and a reprieve for biodiversity. To many in the farming community, rewilding poses a threat to a familiar way of life, a final push away from…
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Here’s a copy of a presentation given recently in Knocklyon, Dublin with the report underneath:
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Féidhlim Harty explores the potential for (re)introductions of beavers into the Irish landscape – and offers some workarounds for doing their work while we wait. Published in Horticulture Connected on June 6, 2024 (link below). Without wanting to overstate the obvious: beavers are amazing landscape engineers. For those new to the subject, these small, vegetarian, water-loving animals play a role within the landscape that is way above what you’d expect from their shy, secluded demeanours. The dams that beavers build in rivers and streams are just the right design for flood prevention; holding water during downpours and then allowing some…
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Published by Feasta on February 23rd, 2022 (https://www.feasta.org/2022/02/23/healthy-habitats/) & updated February 2023. Underlying the discussions about carbon levels and energy efficiency is another, arguably much more important issue that tends to take second place in both policy and activism. The issue is that of healthy habitats. It is healthy soil that provides the ability to grow healthy food. Healthy river and stream catchments yield a regular supply of healthy water. Healthy peatlands, oceans and woodlands all play an invaluable role in providing atmospheric gaseous exchange; in other words healthy air to breathe. Conversely, without healthy habitats on a global scale, our…
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Féidhlim Harty tracks the principle of succession in a wild garden. First published on Nov 22, 2021 in Horticulture Connected (link below). We bought our house in 2008, just as the housing bubble was at its most inflated. I’d never really wanted to move, but it had been on the cards and now it was time. We got the keys in April. I don’t think there was a single day that summer without rain. The back kitchen door opened south onto grey skies and a growing puddle that swelled to a broad shallow pond as the days lengthened and then…
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First published in Horticulture Connected on May 19, 2021. Link below. Féidhlim Harty explores the boundless potential of and benefits from creating river corridors throughout our countryside Perfect Storm Globally we are in a perfect storm; and I’m not referring to the Covid pandemic. On many different levels, Earth’s health indices are at critical levels. Climate breakdown isextensively publicised, but is compounded with multiple other issues. Biodiversity losses are so great that it is claimed that we have entered the sixth mass extinction event on our planet. Our current trajectory feels akin to sawing off the branch we are sitting…
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Published in Horticulture Connected on August 13, 2020 (link below). Féidhlim Harty describes how ‘rewilding’ can produce landscapes with an abundance of plant and wildlife with opportunities for people to thrive socially and economically We are beginning to recognise that if we don’t manage our landscapes in a way that supports the natural world we may well find ourselves without all sorts of things we currently take for granted. ‘Rewilding’ is all about bringing nature back to life and restoring living systems and allowing nature to flourish. It’s a relatively new term, coined by conservationist and activist, Dave Foreman, and…