27-05-2025
Wilding, based on Isabella Tree's book, shows how one failing farm tried something new, and changed everything
In a tiny corner of southern England, there's a small pocket of paradise.
There's not a hedge or lawn in sight: ethereal deer wander peacefully through clouds of blossoms; dark-haired, stocky horses amble through abundant green scrub.
What: A peaceful documentary about the huge successes of an enormous rewilding project on English farming land.
Directed by: David Allen
Starring: Isabella Tree, Charlie Burrell and a menagerie of incredible animals
Likely to make you feel: Like ripping up your lawn
The air is full of birdsong — even the lilting call of the turtle dove, that beloved bird from Christmas songs past, which has lost 98 per cent of its population in England and is on its way to extinction.
This is Knepp Estate, a resplendent tract of land passed down through generations of a farming family to Charlie Burrell and his partner, Isabella Tree. But when they took over the farm in the late 80s, it was a muddy wreck where nothing would grow.
"We're on this terrible land, heavy clay soil, 320 metres of the stuff. And, you know, in the winter, it's just like porridge," Tree explains to ABC Entertainment.
"You can't get heavy machinery onto it, so you can't sow spring crops, you can't do the maintenance, you can't be competitive. No matter what we tried, we couldn't make farming work."
Millions of pounds in debt and running out of options, the couple made the decision to stop farming, selling their equipment and stock. They were heartbroken.
But after a fortuitous meeting, a light appeared at the end of the tunnel: they could 'rewild' Knepp estate.
This spur-of-the-moment decision changed everything, as shown in a new documentary, Wilding.
Rewilding can look quite different to traditional conservation, according to Doctor Sally Hawkins, a lecturer at Central Queensland University and a leading rewilding scientist and educator.
Where conservation is about protecting a certain species or habitat, rewilding is about allowing nature to restore "without trying to control what it looks like".
Rewilding is a step away from "colonial attitudes towards natural resources", says Dr Hawkins.
Using government subsidies to fund the initial transition, the Knepp project pulled down the farm's fences and released populations of Old English longhorn cattle; Exmoor ponies and Tamworth pigs — mammals that would have roamed in this area centuries before.
The animals did what machines couldn't: turned over the soil, spread around seed, created hollows and habitats that bugs and plants thrive in. When a particularly stubborn thistle threatened to take over, a breed of butterflies that hadn't been seen for years appeared in droves and ate it all. The lack of pesticides and machine ploughing allowed mycelium networks to reconnect and plants became healthier.
In short, it was working.
"Ironically, we used to travel the world to see nature, to see wildlife," says Tree.
"We never once wondered why we didn't have it in our own backyard because of what we were doing to our landscape. Then we thought, 'My God, we might actually get nature back here.'"
After only about five years, the scale of wildlife returning brought other income streams to Knepp, largely in ecotourism. They now have a restaurant, a café and a shop, and employ more than 100 people.
"People often assume that rewilding is about excluding people from nature, but it's actually about bringing more people in," says Tree.
"Suddenly, you've got a vibrant community. Nature has brought all this back to life.
"What we didn't really anticipate was how healing it would be for us as well because we hadn't realised how stressful it had been trying to force the land to do something it didn't want to do."
The damp, verdantly green world of Knepp might be light-years away from Australian wilderness but Dr Hawkins says the principles of rewilding stay the same.
"There's a lot of degraded land [in Australia], whether that's been through mining or whether it's been through intensive agriculture," she explains.
But what works in rural England won't fly in the Australian outback; the strategy must be adapted to what the nature here needs.
We don't have native mega herbivores like they do in Europe and North America, but traditional burning practices can fill that role of disturbance, says Dr Hawkins.
"In many places in Europe, we don't remember how we sustainably managed our land in the past, but here we have first-hand knowledge. So it's really a big advantage."
In Australia there are already many "very valuable" protected areas, and rewilding could help connect those together across the country, creating healthy migratory corridors.
Wilding, the 2018 book by Tree on which it was based, and the whole Knepp project, in its essence is about the joy of nature.
The film is full of dreamlike wilderness montages and Tree's gentle but excited storytelling.
It isn't wagging the finger, it's celebrating the power of change.
"You know, we have what, 40, 50, harvests left? So we have to change, and we have to do that now," says Tree.
She says rewilding and regenerative farming work "hand-in-glove": wild spaces threading through and alongside farmland can help make the land healthier.
"It's providing the life-support system that is going to enable ourselves to feed ourselves."
Dr Hawkins says while legislation is key to protecting what we still have, the rewilding process has to start from the ground up.
Tree is a happy poster child for the huge impacts that small, local steps can have.
"It's that old mantra, you know, 'Think globally, act locally': we can restore even the tiny ecosystem in our garden [and then] it's cooler, it holds onto moisture … and then you might notice more birds coming to your garden."
There's one more point she says people should know about rewilding.
"It's also tremendous fun."
