More life, more life!

In May 2022, Mike and I bought a half-built, abandoned house on a sheep-cropped hill in west Wales. Yggdrasil—an ancient ash named for the World Tree of Nordic myth—stands sentinel over the hill and the Cothi River below. From the beginning, the land’s request was clear: “More life, more life,” challenging me to put years of animist practice and enquiry into native traditions of land care and co-relating with all life into practice.

We try to answer this request through permaculture and micro-rewilding techniques that invigorate and diversify the ecosystem. We’ve not always got it right. Bringing diggers onto the land for the house restoration and to dig ponds compacted soil and disrupted things. But 1,600 native trees, three ponds, a plethora of new habitats, a thriving orchard and vegetable garden, and a gaggle of rescue hens later, wildlife is increasing and thriving.

Three years on, we’re amazed at how quickly the natural world reclaims spaces left wild, land tended with reverence and without chemical intervention. This is not full-on rewilding—we’re too small at two and a spit acres—but it counts. That’s my learning: every small patch counts!

This year we’ve seen bullfinches here for the first time—six males and some females—the goldfinch and nuthatch populations are growing, and we’ve discovered polecats too! Water is a cornerstone of life and biodiversity. Last year, we made a natural swimming pond that we now share with frogs, beetles, dragonflies, dipping swallows in summer, and now palmate newts! Watching these delightful beings pop up for air is becoming something of a mini obsession!

We will continue to care for this land in alliance with the more-than-human, through age-old animist practices of respect, deep listening, and reciprocity. Lluest y Lloer (The Hearth of the Moon) is a living inquiry into how people and place can flourish together, practically, ecologically and spiritually.