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Published October 2025

Visit Knepp’s rewilded Walled Garden

After months of sunshine and very little rainfall, the tail end of August brought with it the remnants of Hurricane Erin – a category 5 at its peak, sustaining 160mph winds as it travelled to us across the Atlantic. Above the garden, high skies paraded fantastical smoke-grey and soft-white, beast–shaped clouds. Gusting, dark masses intermittently released pelting curtains of rain, the sun chasing behind, the unfamiliar drumming on the greenhouse glass a deafening novelty. One overnight measurement on the rain gauge reached 33.2mm. 

The garden responded almost immediately, leaves plumped and lifted, wilting heads were raised up, and myriad tiny seedlings and grass blades appeared overnight. The faded corduroy greens of summer became a vibrant fizz of agate, lime and fern green, rinsed of dust. A rush of royal purple bloomed in a few days all through the crushed concrete-and-sand mix of Hitchmough ridge as the European Michaelmas daisy (Aster amellus ‘Veilchenkönigin’) burst into flower. Strictly speaking, they have come early. The Feast of Michael and All Angels (Michaelmas) is actually celebrated on 29 September.  Associated with the coming of autumn and the shortening of days, it’s traditionally one of four days through the year close to solstices and equinoxes (the others being Lady Day on 25 March, Midsummer on 24 June, and Christmas Day on 25 December), when servants were hired, rents became due and leases begun. It signalled the last day of the harvest and a well–fattened goose, fed on the stubble of the fields, was said to protect against financial need in the following year, while St Michael, himself, the warrior chief of the angels and archangels who fought against Satan, protects against negative forces in the dark months. There is still a Nottingham Goose Fair, named for the years when 20,000 geese were driven up from East Anglia and Lincolnshire to be sold and stuffed for the traditional Michaelmas dish. 

Before the darkness comes, though, there is still time for the ‘season of mellow fruitfulness’. It has been an extraordinary year for blossom and fruit – the hedgerows are full of laden boughs russet-red with hawthorn berries and the scarlet fruits of the guelder rose. Following last year’s wet autumn, the orchard was well watered and ready for the warm, dry, windless spring. None of the blossom was lost to frost, pollinators could roam freely and fruits form at their leisure. These conditions also favoured the queens of common wasps (Vespula vulgaris) in their first stages of founding nests, and provided an abundance of insects for them to eat. As our summer progressed through four heatwaves, however, some insect populations suffered. Bees can overheat and are unable to fly or forage, young caterpillars can be scorched, life cycles and metabolisms of some insects can become out of sync with flowering plants, or their food host plant becomes scorched and inedible. Plants under pressure from the heat and environmental stress produced fewer flowers for shorter periods.  

Even the wasps may have been affected. Tabloid headlines about ‘invasions’ of wasps over the summer are based not on scientific evidence (see below for surveying websites – it’s still too early for results) but from their more noticeable presence as their diet moves from insects to sugar. When the queen stops laying eggs, the need to feed the larvae declines. The quantities of sugar that the workers take from the larvae secretions comes to an end, and they turn to alternatives. Since plenty of our outdoor activities involve sugar, and we’ve spent more time outside this year in the good weather, we’ve inevitably seen more wasps, and it’s possible a shortage of other insects has also led them to seek sugar earlier. 

Wasps are an absolute necessity for any functioning ecosystem because of the number of insects they devour, keeping populations in balance.  Every UK summer, social wasps consume an estimated 14 million kilos of insect prey, including caterpillars, greenfly and blackfly.  As gardeners, when we see a wasp’s nest, we need to learn to breathe a sigh of relief rather than a gasp of panic – free pest control! 

When it came to harvesting the orchard, which was like a collection of children’s drawings of fruit trees – dripping with perfect, large red, yellow and green fruit – we shared the bounty with plenty of wasps. Neither we nor the fantastic Knepp volunteers and the team from Brighton Permaculture Trust suffered any stings while we were picking – they rarely sting unless they’re threatened with swatting or sudden movements. There wasn’t time to worry about wasps in any case, our hands were full with the harvest – a colossal haul of 1740kg of apples.  The Trust process the fruit for us and transform them into a delicious juice for the Wilding Shop and Kitchen, and this year for the first time we’re using the windfalls to make apple cider vinegar. It’s also been the best year for damsons, plums and greengages too, but sadly, the birds are still winning the cherry race. 

It’s been a month of visits and visitors, including the inspiring Talking Plants Symposium in Sheffield. A two-day symposium of talks, debates and workshops for professional and amateur plantspeople, the hall was buzzing with designers, gardeners, ecologists, florists, landscapers and growers. The key themes were substrates (planting mediums), biodiversity, planting design, and garden management and maintenance – although even this last word was a hot topic, with ‘care’ or ‘stewardship’ suggested alternatives.  

Our main takeaways were on the subjects of sustainability and resilience. On sustainability, we appreciated the discussions on the effects of our actions further down the line and finding innovative ways to solve problems, rather than passing them on to another site. Re-using on-site ‘waste’ and recycled materials and factoring in the costs and risks of what we use, and how the supply industry is behind the curve on sustainable products and infrastructure.  On resilience, the discussion was of designs and planting schemes; meadows and their best management for biodiversity; plant species in urban settings where temperatures are highest, particularly London, that are no longer able to survive in the heat; how to build longevity into designs – will they still work as a plant community seven to ten years in? And the importance of the gardener and the gardener’s role in taking a design forward.  

In our Rewilded Garden experiment Tom Stuart-Smiths design is a starting point – the garden is intended to develop in ways that are not entirely predictable, the gardeners as the ‘agents of disturbance’ driving change. 

Above all, though, there was a refreshing focus on plants themselves, a celebration of their beauty and diversity and all who have a relationship with them, including insects and wildlife. There were some fantastic speakers on insect life in gardens and meadows – as the entomologist Dr Linda Birkin reminded us, over half of all living things are insects. It’s often a missing element in horticultural conferences. 

Back in the Walled Garden at Knepp, there was an incredible array of career diversity in the group from the Young People in Horticulture Association. The YPHA as they’re known, was formed in 2020 to unite under 35’s working in horticulture and their focus is on collaboration, education and innovation. They have over 900 members nationwide, and our visitors came from all over the UK – Scotland, Cumbria, Wiltshire, Shropshire, London and Surrey and Norfolk from a range of horticultural settings. A group of thirteen of them were interested to learn about the design of the garden, and the way we approach horticultural tasks, taking our cues from the behaviour of the free-roaming herbivores in the rewilding project.  So they  joined us for a spot of grazing in the garden. Below the Kitchen Garden beech hedge, the ‘dirty path’ – as our garden designer Tom Stuart-Smith refers to them – has become blurred with self-seeders in the gravel cap that sits on a topsoil and gravel mix beneath. Oregano, yarrow, wild strawberries and ox-eye daisies relish these conditions and whilst they’re all wonderfully beneficial plants for pollinators they’ve become dominant and reduce plant diversity, crowding other less boisterous species like the lavender, rosemary, thyme and Chilean myrtle (Luma apiculata). Clearing some space around them gives these plants more air and light and makes the path more ‘readable’ when it comes to harvesting the herbs. Like the herbivores, we indulged in some selective grazing, pulling out the plants that were most plentiful. 

As we worked, our conversations covered everything from the best organic slow-release fertilisers and peat-free compost brands to some intriguing natural solutions for how to deal with over-zealous mammal populations (older queen cats for predating voles, and planting what badgers love in vegetable beds that need digging over – the badgers do all the work!). Sharing stories is by far the fastest and most enjoyable way to learn.   

 Autumn is upon us, the frenzy and rush of summer easing into the distance. Time to prepare for slowing the pace, to listen to the stories the garden has told us this year – to observe, reflect and adapt. 

Photos courtesy of Charlie Harpur

Garden Tips – October 2025 

1. Herd disturbance – ‘browns’ – as the autumn gets into its stride, more leaves and stems die back. We therefore curate the visual brown-to-green ratio in the garden, moving through and disturbing the landscape, cutting or pulling in a random way as a herd might. Some material is dropped, some is used to create winter habitats, some is cleared away for compost and some is left standing. 

2. Herd disturbance – ‘greens’ – in the more impoverished areas of the garden (concrete and sand-based soils), we ‘graze’ relatively hard, reducing the biomass to keep the fertility of the substrate down. We’ll use it for our compost heaps. We remove species that are dominating and swamping others, creating patches of bare ground and over-sowing with more species to increase diversity. 

3. Hedge cutting – as the grass begins to slow its growth, herbivores will browse the new tender tips of woody hedgerow plants. We’ll trim our beech hedge too now all danger of nest disturbance is over, and the plants are moving into dormancy. We cut in an irregular waving pattern, to increase surface area and create aspects, microclimates and niches for insect and bird winter habitat. We leave any flowering ivy, as it’s the most important winter evergreen in any garden. 

4. Seed collecting and autumn sowing – we’ll be disturbing and scattering some seed in-situ to mimic natural systems, leaving some seedheads for birds, and collecting some to sow. We’re also continuing to sow hardy annuals for earlier growth in 2026, and perennials to try in our concrete substrate areas that need a winter chill to germinate. 

5. Planting out – the cuttings of woody subshrubs like lavenders and rock roses that we took last autumn are ready in our nursery sand beds. We’ll lift and plant them directly into the concrete-and-sand mix while the ground is still warm, leaving the autumn rains to water them in. In the Kitchen Garden, we’re planting the last of the spring-sown edible perennials like nettle–leaf bellflower (Campanula trachelium) – wild greens that are used in Italian cooking, and they’re particularly important for solitary harebell and scissor bees in the summer. 

What we’re reading 

Nottingham Goose Fair 2025 Dates + Info | GooseFair.co.uk 

Bees Wasps & Ants Recording Society | BWARS 

Welcome to the UK Pollinator Monitoring Scheme (PoMS) | PoMS 

The Big Wasp Survey – Citizen Science = Wasp Love! 

The long‐term population dynamics of common wasps in their native and invaded range – Lester – 2017 – Journal of Animal Ecology – Wiley Online Library 

Complex responses of insect phenology to climate change – ScienceDirect 

YPHA – Young People in Horticulture Association 

Talking Plants Symposium 2025 — Talking plants 

Wildlife Gardening Forum 

Identifying-open-mosaic-habitat.pdf 

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The post Episode 40: Owl Quiet on the Nesting Front appeared first on Knepp.

Published September 2025

Visit Knepp’s rewilded Walled Garden

As the Perseid meteor shower hurtles through the night sky, with fragments of pea-sized rock travelling at 58km a second and heating up to over 1500°C, the temperatures in the UK begin to rise again. The meadows are brushed with a dusty sheen, faded-corduroy greens, sandy-hued ripples of grasses. 

August is a busy month for us outside the Walled Garden: cutting meadows and harvesting soft fruits from the orchard. There are advantages to the warm dry weather – we have bumper crops of greengages and Mirabelle and Merryweather plums. We’ve also been wrangling into shape the four enormous wisterias that cloak the walls of the house, as well as curbing the enthusiasm of the climbing roses, Virginia creeper and common jasmine from a cherry picker that rises a breathtaking eighteen metres high.  

In the meadows, the cuttings have been significantly less than last year. Ordinarily we would collect up the cut biomass from our wildflower-rich areas and strew it on other paddocks where grasses are dominant. It’s a cheap and efficient way of increasing plant diversity. Left for one to two weeks, the drying seeds fall onto the newly exposed soil and germinate the following spring. But the dry year has impacted the number of species, with common knapweed (Centaurea nigra) and creeping cinquefoil (Potentilla reptans) becoming dominant. Both plants are brilliant for pollinators, but the greater the diversity of plant species in a meadow, the greater the range of insects it can support and, in turn, this benefits the insect predators – from birds and bats to dragonflies, toads, frogs and small mammals. And snakes. We use a power scythe to cut the four areas around the castle and have put out some reptile shelters of corrugated roofing scrap so any grass snakes, slow worms and amphibians can take shelter from the blade. We’re careful to begin cutting from the centre outwards to give wildlife the opportunity to retreat.  

We’ve tried experimenting to reduce the dominance of the creeping cinquefoil this year by digging over an area and removing as many as possible – they have extraordinarily long and tenacious roots – and strewing with some hay kindly donated by our neighbours at Wadhurst Park who have a well-established species-rich meadow. Hopefully the seed will establish and spread, competing with the cinquefoil. 

In the rewilded Walled Garden, the prairie conditions are encouraging the ornamental grasses and we gradually become submerged as the month progresses, the seedheads reaching eye-level, the pathways embraced by plants that slow your pace and lend the garden an enigmatic air of secrets round every corner. The American tall tickseed (Coreopsis tripteris), shoulder high, with its bright yellow daisy flowers and chocolate-button centres like giant cartoon bees, has self-seeded everywhere this year. The narrowleaf ironweed (Vernonia lettermannii) from rocky and sandy floodplains in Arkansas and Oklahoma has bulked up magnificently, and great stands, almost a metre and a half wide and the same high, parade their royal purple, aster-like flowers. Avoiding some of these larger plants, we’ve undertaken a series of quadrat surveys of floral diversity, identifying the number of planted and volunteer species per square metre. 

We’ve been carrying out surveys of our wilding garden experiment from the very beginning in 2020, including everything from soils and wildlife to logging ‘grazing’ hours, and now we’re starting to try and link data to form judgements on how we manage the garden. Some of the quadrats were chosen based on areas where we’ve had soil samples analysed; others represent different substrates. We recorded our highest plant diversity – twenty-five species in one quadrat – in what we call Hitchmough Ridge – the ridge of 75% crushed concrete and 25% sand in the rewilded Walled Garden. With the help of these surveys we hope to build up a long-term picture of fluctuations in diversity, whether we see species change, and how this reflects in insect diversity.  

With the continuing drought (the MET office reports consistent above-average temperatures so far this year), Suzi Turner, Deputy Head Gardener in charge of edibles, has been looking at different ways to use water and increase nutrients in the Kitchen Garden. We’ve been given some wool from a flock of sheep that are annually brought onto the estate to graze around the solar photovoltaic panels that provide electricity in a field in the Southern Block. Wool can be used in gardens in two ways – as a mulch or a fertiliser added to compost or soil. 

Holding up to 30% of its weight in water, a layer of wool around the base of plants can retain moisture in dry spells, regulate soil temperature – in both hot or cold weather – and supress germination of competing seedlings. Suzi made a small test bed when she planted out the winter brassicas. Half of them have thick white collars like Shakespearian ruffs; the remainder have a layer of wool buried in a trench beneath their roots. There’s some evidence of the fibrous nature of the wool being a slug repellent, although when it’s very wet it can also act as a slug refuge. We’ll monitor the responses as the weather changes into autumn to see what effects the wool has had.  

Wool can also be used as a sustainable and renewable alternative to peat because of its high nitrogen content (9-11%) and capacity to hold water. Since it biodegrades slowly – anything from three months to two years, depending on conditions – it can act as a slow-release fertiliser. It has a relatively high potassium content, as well as iron, sodium and phosphorous which are all important elements for plant health and growth. And it can improve aeration and drainage in soils, particularly heavy ones like clay. This facilitates the movement of soil biota. As usual, the devil is in the details. Coarse wool from hill breeds of sheep has better structure and texture than fine wool and is slower to break down. It’s more readily available, too, as it’s less likely to be used for the clothing industry. Wool that has been bundled needs to be separated before it’s added to compost or soil otherwise it’s likely to compact into clumps that can lead to poor aeration. Overall, it’s going to be interesting to follow its progress in the garden and see how visitors respond to the visual aspect. We’ve covered some mulched areas with wood chip to show alternatives.  

Suzi has also been adding an irrigation trench to the mounded bed in the fruit cage.  Ben Henderson-Butler, the fantastic head of vegetable production at the Lost Gardens of Heligan, joined us and Knepp’s organic Market Garden team for a week, sharing water wisdom from Southeast Asia. He owns a rice and duck permaculture farm in Thailand and he and Suzi created a water trench between two mounded areas. The top few inches of soil in our annual vegetable beds tends to dry out and it takes a lot of repeated watering to rehydrate. Using this trench, and flooding it weekly, will provide moisture to roots and soil biota as it gets drawn into the banks. 

 The presence of water is essential to ensure good soil health but diversity of soil organisms and fungi are also fundamental for making nutrients available to plant roots. Amanda Lowe, a Knepp volunteer studying soil science, provided us with a summary of a soil analysis report for two of the larger beds in the Kitchen Garden. We’ve long suspected that the soil biota in these beds is not as it should be, and the report has now confirmed that the main biology is bacteria, with a lack of larger microorganisms and very little fungi. A productive soil really needs a good balance of all three. Whilst the dry conditions haven’t helped the situation, it’s possible to detect dormant spores in a sample, and these are also minimal. 

We’ve talked about these challenges before – soil compaction preventing movement of soil organisms, and the presence of established yew trees within the beds competing for water and nutrients. The home-made compost we’ve added to the beds over the past few years isn’t holding on to moisture, possibly down to lack of volume. Introducing more soil biota from proven or analysed sources (for example, compost that is certified by the Chartered Quality Institute) is pointless without supplying the right conditions in which the biota can survive and thrive. But now we’ve identified the specific problems and deficiencies we can plan a strategy to get the soil in much better shape. 

Testing and observation are what help us learn and move forward, and within the gradient of productivity that we want to achieve between both sides of the Walled Garden, we want to push the boundaries as far as we can. From low-nutrient, free-draining aggregate that helps increase plant diversity in the rewilded garden through to high-nutrient, water-retaining soils where edible plants flourish in the kitchen garden, we chase the rainbow – to increase above and below-ground opportunity for wildlife. 

Photos courtesy of Suzi Turner, Charlie Harpur, Moy Fierheller. 

Garden Tips – September 2025 

1. Sow autumn seeds – you can sow autumn vegetable and ornamental seeds now while it’s still warm. Leafy greens like spinach and winter salads, garlic cloves and autumn onion sets and green manures like phacelia directly onto annual veg beds. Ornamental hardy annuals like Nigella, Calendula and cornflower can bulk over winter so you have early flowers in the garden for pollinators in spring.  

2. Take cuttings – a lot of the Mediterranean plants like rock rose, Phlomis species, lavender and rosemary have put on strong summer growth after flowering and they’re easier to grow from cuttings than seed. We cut the stem under a node, remove the lower leaves and push them into a bed of sharp sand. 

3. Sow meadow seed – meadows should have been cut back by now. Sow yellow rattle seed now to reduce the dominance of grasses and add wildflower seed by strewing from other species-rich meadows or buying meadow mixes – the more local the seed the better. 

4. Harvest apples and pears – it’s that lovely time of year to gather some friends and harvest apples and pears, for juicing, for storing, dehydrating, freezing or eating straight off the tree. Go to the National Fruit Collection to see what uses your fruits are best for. Leave some fruit on the tree and any windfalls for wildlife. 

5. Bulb ordering – time to browse those bulb catalogues and fill the floral gaps in the year for pollinators. Looking back at the late winter, spring and summer of this year from photos or notes will help. We have a population of voles that love tulips above all else – we’ve learnt from our mistakes and we’re bulking up alternatives. Think of the ‘hungry gaps’ – snowdrops, crocus, iris reticulatas for winter, gladioli, nerines, autumn crocus for late summer. 

What we’re reading 

Wadhurst Park     Grasslands 

(PDF) The Feasibility of Large-Scale Composting of Waste Wool 

The Use of Wool in Compost and other Alternative Applications | OSU Small Ruminant Team 

Explore the Heligan Grounds | The Lost Gardens of Heligan 

Compost standards at the heart of sustainability | CQI | IRCA 

Gravel Garden Maintenance – Beth Chatto Gardens 

Cranfield University showcases groundbreaking toilet technology at RHS Chelsea Flower Show 

The post August: Soils, Surveys and Meadows  appeared first on Knepp.

The post Episode 39: The Plant People Love to Hate appeared first on Knepp.

Published July 2025

Visit Knepp’s rewilded Walled Garden

Amid the spice and balm of wild rose blossom, the deep green of summer settles on the landscape. Rains at the beginning of the month have given the grass a verdant lushness, the shade of trees a cool wrap of air as the temperature begins to rise.

In the garden, James Hitchmough, landscape architect, delivered a Garden Masterclass workshop. James is a recent recipient of the Society of Garden Designers Lifetime Achievement Awards and is the designer responsible for the plant choices along the most free-draining, nutrient-poor ridge of the Rewilded Garden. In its fourth year, the sloping crushed concrete and sand mix is in full humming vibrancy: a burst of colours, flowers and leaf shapes, fluffy seedheads and waving clumps of grasses, flying and bustling insects.  

James delved into the technicalities of his design – a matrix of plants chosen for their ability to thrive in harsh conditions, hailing from habitats such as dry, stony riverbeds, nutrient-poor prairielands and mountain scree. His familiarity with the behaviour of the plants, how tall or wide they grow and over what period, when they emerge and flower, when they die back or retain their structure through the seasons, dictated how and in what numbers they were grouped. Some were selected for their reliable performance: plants such as golden oat grass (Stipa gigantea), Siberian spurge (Euphorbia seguieriana subsp. niciciana), the two species of king’s spear (Asphodeline liburnica, A. lutea), bloody cranesbill (Geranium sanguineum ‘Max Frei’), and the little bluestem grass (Schizachyrium scoparium ‘Ha Ha Tonka’). These were distributed at suitable intervals in the original planting plan as small 9cm pots or bare root.  

Walking through the garden now, James noted one of the stalwarts in his design, immortelle (Helichrysum orientale), is behaving in an unexpected way, larger and faster growing, leading him to think that what was delivered differs slightly in its provenance from the species he was expecting. It may have been that the cutting from which the stock was grown was taken from a different habitat than that which James was familiar with. These silver-leaved, low-mounded sub-shrubs from North Africa and the Mediterranean basin do a lot of work in the dark winter days, giving structure and light, acting as a backdrop to standing dead seedheads and grasses. Right now, they are like full stops between babbling, busy sentences.  

Laid over the planting in the winter of 2021 was a seed mix of James’ devising. Some seeds were repeats of a few of the 9cm pot planting to give a sequence of generations, others were indicator species – they would only grow in these kinds of conditions, and their success would indicate that we had successfully recreated the right habitat for the plant choices. Others were chosen for their short-lived, but eye-catching qualities, flowering while slower-growing plants in the mix were establishing. The most obvious being the large-flowered delphinium (Delphinium grandiflorum), which smothered the ridge in stunning Majorelle blue in 2022 and of which we have only one specimen this year.  

Others were what might be termed a ‘punt’. They may or may not make it. Austrian dragon head (Dracocephalum austriacum), a mountain herb from the mint family with blue salvia-like flowers, has remained elusive. This year, many of the seeds have reached a boisterous teenage maturity. The flattened, off-white cauliflower-like flowerhead of moon carrot (Seseli gummiferum), is asserting itself at thigh height. Yellow-flowered horseshoe vetch (Hippocrepis comosa) is sprawling over any number of other plants, regardless of their habits, and wild carrot (Daucus carota) can only be described as rife.  

James’ plant selection acknowledged the evolutionary strategy of individual plants, based on the ecologist J.P. Grime’s ‘CSR triangle theory’ which divides plants into three categories based on their lifecycles: ‘competitors’ (which thrive in low-stress, low-disturbance environments), ‘stress-tolerators’ (which dominate in high-stress, low-disturbance environments), and ‘ruderals’ (which flourish in low-stress, high-disturbance areas). Knowledge of CSR theory can help with the design of balanced plant communities in different growing environments. The harsh conditions of ‘Hitchmough Ridge’ will suit the stress-tolerators best. The garden has no ‘end’ point and, as in nature, there will be a constant rise and fall of species, a dynamism that is key to supporting a diverse range of wildlife. Our job as herbivore proxies is to continue our work as ‘agents of disturbance’ grazing out plants that are in plentiful supply.  James’ major impression was that, despite a drop in diversity from the original plant list, mainly from too much exuberant growth and loss of clear ground, “the visuals are sensational”. 

Many of the Mediterranean shrubs are contributing to the overall visual impact of the Rewilded Garden this year, having reached a level of maturity that gives a greater profusion of flowers and adds a middle layer to the structural complexity of the planting. We have twelve species of Phlomis on our original plant list, although the genus boasts a hundred shrub and herbaceous species from the Mediterranean and eastwards into China. On ‘Hitchmough Ridge’ it is the less common blush-pink flowered Balearic Island sage (Phlomis italica) – from the group of islands off the Iberian Peninsula that includes the famed Ibiza – that has thrived. The dry and sunny spring seems to have favoured the growth of Phlomis lychnitis, with many more of its bright crayon-yellow flowers arranged in whorls at intervals along the stems that splay out from its thin and hairy, narrow silver leaves.  

One of the reasons for the inclusion of so many sages, both the Salvia and Phlomis families, is their flower shape and relationship with insects. They are part of a group known as ‘complex’ flowers, with tube-like or fused petals. Unlike ‘simple’ flowers such as a buttercup, insects require a greater degree of motor skills and experience to access the pollen and nectar. These complex flowers have evolved to reward pollinators by producing greater quantities of nectar and, while fewer species of insects visit, those that do – often more long-lived or emerging early in the season – have more successful reproduction rates. Anecdotally, we’ve also noted how ‘hooded’ flowers are often used by insects as shelter in very cold or wet weather.  So, the greater the diversity of flower shapes in a garden, mixing both complex and simple structures, the greater the benefit to pollinators, as well as the aesthetic interest for us. 

One of the many simple flowered species that have the most extraordinary amount of blossom this year is the blackberry/bramble (Rubus fruticosus). It’s interesting to note that the common names immediately put the speaker in a ‘for’ or ‘against’ camp, but it is difficult to ignore their scent and the simple beauty of their five pure white petals surmounted by a frenzy of stamens – a cloud of brown dots. Often denigrated as indicative of ‘waste land’, characteristic of abandoned land, in the rewilding project at Knepp bramble has played a crucial role in the process of succession, as well as providing many benefits for wildlife. It is a pioneer species, improving soil quality and preventing erosion. It protects seedling oaks and sallow from the mouths of free roaming herbivores, and supports a range of fungi, insects, birds and mammals. Eventually its dominance has retreated as trees have matured and shaded it out and the soil has regained enough health to support more diverse vegetation. 

We cultivate a horticultural species, ‘Oregon Thornless’, in the Kitchen Garden. It’s easier to crop and manage in its position against the east wall than the native plant, which hugs the perimeter on three sides on the other side of the wall and opportunistically finds niches in the top ridges of the brick to wave at us from above in tangled glee. Now the garden is reaching beyond the establishment phase perhaps it’s time to introduce the native, and graze it sufficiently harshly to prevent it taking over. With its long flowering nectar-rich blossom, it’s also ideal nesting habit, provides food for numerous moth and butterfly caterpillars and of course, gives us a crop of shining, juicy berries.  

Towards the end of the month, as the days draw closer to our National Garden Scheme charity open day, the heat begins to build. The air is palpable, a thick, syrupy presence that crescendos to 33°C on the day itself. The planting, particularly in the Rewilded Garden, shows a stoic resilience. Most plants have already evolved in the harsh, often dry, conditions but we spot-water spring additions and the new sand mounds we created over winter. Despite most of the Kitchen Garden being beds of compost or topsoil-and-grit mixes, again, it was mainly the new, annual crops planted this spring that struggled in the hot spell. These we irrigated, along with the traditional annual veg beds which always get watered with drip lines.  

We have periodically added more layers and complexity to this section of the garden over the last few years, demonstrating how plant density goes a long way in preserving humidity and preventing soils from drying out. Early in the season we dotted some leaf- mould mounds through the beds and these have successfully helped retain moisture. When clearing an area, we employ the ‘chop and drop’ technique (cutting leafy vegetation into small sections and dropping them in a layer round new seedlings) so very little soil is left exposed to the sun.  

All in all, after a little last-minute path-hoeing to create some orderly frames, the garden was enthusiastically enjoyed by a few hundred visitors. We managed to raise over £2,000 which goes to nursing and health charities through the NGS, as well as supporting bursaries and funds for gardeners and community spaces. And an impressive army from our neighbours, the Friends of Shipley School, provided a constant supply of the all-important element of any garden open day – cake. Thank you to everyone who helped in the mammoth effort to make this day so enjoyable and successful.  

You can visit Knepp’s rewilded Walled Garden

Moy’s Garden Tips for July:

1. Gardening in a heat wave – water. We’re accustomed to dealing with wet or cold weather in the UK but always seem to be unprepared for periods of high temperatures. With the climate crisis, it is becoming increasingly apparent that gardens need to be more resilient in both design and management. Using drinking water to irrigate a garden will no doubt come to be looked upon as madness by future generations. If you have downpipes and the space, a water butt is simple to set up and rainwater is free. New plantings can be targeted using watering cans – it is better to water individual plants well every few days, spending time allowing water to filtrate and reapplying, so moisture reaches the roots, than a short sprinkle every day which will quickly evaporate. For larger areas a drip line with small holes all along its length left on for half an hour is a more efficient, targeted and less time-consuming method of watering than using a hose. 

2. Plant choices and design. If you‘ve left areas of lawn to grow long to benefit wildlife, by now you’re also looking at wildflowers and tawny grasses, their diverse seedheads waving in a breeze. A vast expanse of close-cut lawn will need an unsustainable and expensive irrigation system to remain green and pleasing to the eye. Plants that are native to areas that experience hot and dry seasons such as those from the Mediterranean basin, Australia or American prairies are more resilient to extremes provided they are planted in free-draining soils – it’s worth checking the preferred habitat of a new plant before you buy it. Dense and diverse planting mean less exposed soil and plants can create and retain humidity.  

3. Soil types and mulches. Mulches can be leaf mould, wood chip, gravel, sharp sand or grit, and collared round the base of plants can help with moisture retention and prevent soil from drying out. Using crushed aggregate and sand mixes as a planting medium instead of soil, and resilient plants that hail from those habitats keeps moisture in and roots cool. 

4. Chop and drop. In the Kitchen Garden, edibles tend to need more resources to provide a harvest. When cutting back leafy growth or harvesting, chop up the stems and leaves and leave them on the ground to cover exposed soil so moisture is retained and soil biota can function – the more active soil organisms are the healthier your soil, making nutrients available to the plants. 

5. Roots in the soil. In a good growing medium, plenty of volunteer plants (sometimes known as weeds) will soon colonise bare ground. In periods of heat, don’t pull out non-pernicious ground cover weeds or planted plants that are bolting. They keep the soil from drying out and create a layer of humidity. The more diverse roots that remain in the soil, the more diverse your soil organisms will be. They, together with mycorrhizal fungi, will make nutrients and minerals available to the plants. They are place–holders until you’re ready to plant the next round of crops. 

Photos courtesy of Charlie Harpur and Moy Fierheller 

What we’re reading: 

Kourik,R, Understanding Roots, Metamorphic Press, 2015 

Garden masterclass, Plants, Gardens, Landscape 

(PDF) J. Philip Grime (1935–2021) 

‘What maintains variation in flower accessibility to pollinators in plant communities? A simulation study | BMC Ecology and Evolution | Full Text 

Home – National Garden Scheme 

The post June: Masterclasses and Heat Waves  appeared first on Knepp.

Published August 2025

Visit Knepp’s rewilded Walled Garden

After a spate of days ruled by bouts of stormy rains, the large kindly face of a wax-yellow full moon rises into a still night, and ushers in the third heatwave of the year. Heatwaves are defined by the Met Office as when a location’s temperatures meet or exceed the ‘threshold temperature’ for at least three consecutive days. These vary from county to county. It is 27°C for Sussex. In the greenhouse, the heat peaked at 44.8°C. While the Walled Garden is mercifully cooler, the warmth is trapped and the sand and crushed concrete mix of the Rewilded Garden reflects white light that feels sharp enough to cut the air. The Mediterranean herbs – sage, thyme, the aniseed tang of fennels, the balm of rosemary and lavender – emanate heady and pungent scents, and a steady hum of bees, wasps and hoverflies accompany the flitting wings of butterflies and day-flying moths.  

It’s been a bumper year for butterflies across the UK, and particularly at Knepp where not only have we recorded the highest ever number of purple emperors, but there has been an upsurge in the number of GB Red List species  (species assessed as being of conservation concern in Great Britain) such as the wall brown butterfly.  

In the garden there’s a party atmosphere around the purple cones of buddleias and yellow daisy-like clusters of ragwort flowers, and flashes of orange, purple and blue from red admirals, peacocks, commas, small blues, cabbage white and meadow browns. Occasionally the air is suddenly vibrating with the exotic whirr of a hummingbird hawkmoth, its long probiscis darting into nectaries at dizzying speeds. Dianthus plants, sometimes called pinks, rely on hawkmoths for pollination, and plants from the Stellaria genus, like greater stitchwort, chickweed and many of the willowherb family, serve as food for their caterpillar stage. For that reason, we often leave what others might regard as ‘weeds’ in the garden, such as the hoary or square-stemmed willowherbs you often see on roadsides or disturbed ground. We have an ornamental white-flowered rosebay willowherb (Chamaenerion angustifolium ‘Album’) with its wonderful tall plumes in the Kitchen Garden. Its flowers, stems and leaves are edible, a good substitute for asparagus and can be made into teas. Hummingbird hawkmoths are considered a good omen in Italy and Malta after a swarm was seen crossing the English Channel by the armada on the day of the D-Day landings in 1944 that marked the beginning of the fall of Nazi Germany. Generally, they migrate from Europe and North Africa in May and June and breed here in the summer but with climate change there’s been an increase in recordings of hibernating adult moths overwintering in southern Britain. 

A hummingbird hawkmoth feeding on buddleia flowers 

When we talk about the climate crisis, we‘re really talking about a water crisis – either too much or too little. As we ease into peak harvesting season in the Kitchen Garden, the dry, hot spring and summer has sparked conversations in the garden team around sustainability, water usage, soil fertility, productivity and rewilding principles in an edible ecosystem.  

Deputy Head Gardener Suzi Turner talks about the ‘Golden Triangle’ in the Rewild Your Vegetable Garden Workshop that we hold in the Walled Garden and the organic Market Garden. This Golden Triangle is a hard-won confluence of elements in a Venn diagram made up of productivity, biodiversity and aesthetics. Invariably these three elements seem to act on a sliding scale – too much emphasis on one adversely affect another but get them right, and everything falls into place. Finding the balance between them is a constant juggling act for the vegetable gardener. The added complication of the effects of extreme weather applies further pressures.  

The universal metric the vegetable gardener generally applies to success in food productivity is quantity – abundance – a measure highly influenced by agriculture. But how does this view tie in with sustainability, water conservation and soil health? We know that intensive farming with artificial fertilisers and chemicals over the past fifty years has had devastating effects on the environment, particularly on topsoil and biodiversity in the UK. This month the National Farmers Union held an urgent summit to tackle the pressures of water and food security with representatives from DEFRA, NGOs, farmers and water companies taking part. The government has updated the 2022 Sustainable Farming Initiative (SFI) this year and the Environment Agency has recently published its National Framework for Water Resources. While the total water on the planet remains constant, only 2.5% is fresh water and only 1% is available for human consumption. So, can we implement changes in our growing spaces to prepare for the future?  

We’re often thinking about how our gardens are right now or look ahead in terms of months or even next season. Perhaps part of rewilding our minds is to look at our edible gardens as ecosystems and think about them over a much longer timeframe. Could we think about building soil health and learning to store and use water wisely as, say, a ten-year endeavour? 

There is much we can do to create ways to collect water – in tanks, troughs, ponds and water butts; harvesting grey water from household showers, baths, laundry and dishwashers; using drip irrigation systems; and slowing water loss by creating green roofs, rain chains and rain gardens, and by varying topography to hold water better.  Mulching round the collars of plants with aggregate, woodchip, leaf mould or compost can reduce water loss through evaporation – we were recently donated some sheep’s wool and are trialling it round perennial kales. Developing a seed list that includes drought-tolerant plants and favouring perennial vegetables that require less watering than annuals. 

Planting young kale into loam mounds with sheep’s wool mulch. 

Growing food in gardens and allotments can only be seen as a good thing. It reduces the carbon footprint of food and the use of chemicals, and supports our own gut biomes by growing healthier, more nutritious food than industrial systems. Vegetable gardeners can help preserve the diversity of plants by saving seeds of heritage varieties and seed swapping with fellow gardeners.  

In our experimental Kitchen Garden we’ve spent a few years developing ideas, and each season playing with different approaches. But always keeping what we’ve learnt about nature recovery from the wider rewilding project, the natural processes and the herbivores – the keystone species that drive those natural processes – in the forefront of our minds. 

In the wider rewilding project, nature is the primary ‘product’ and any food production that happens off the back of it – such as ‘wild range’ meat or foraging – is incidental, secondary to the primary purpose. On the flip side, with our regenerative farm which lies outside the rewilding project, food production is the primary goal and nature is the secondary beneficiary. 

We’re now starting to think about the Kitchen Garden more in terms of focusing on soil health and putting food production at the forefront, a small-scale nod to Knepp’s regenerative farm. In the Rewilded Garden, where soil fertility has been reduced with the addition of sand and crushed concrete to greater and lesser degrees, the focus is on broadening the range of habitats and plant selection and increasing biodiversity, just as in the wider rewilding project. 

But there is still room to play in the Kitchen Garden. In the smaller beds and paths and the margins around the walls where we’re not intensively growing fruit and vegetables we have space to mix it up – with perennial edibles such as artichokes, Solomon’s seal, sea kale and rhubarb, alongside edible flowers and fruiting shrubs, and unusual and challenging edibles, such as our Native American chokeberries, that benefit wildlife.  

Above all, learning and trialling methods from innovators such as Charles Dowding, Iain ‘Tolly’ Tolhurst and Joshua Sparkes who are revolutionising horticulture through techniques such as agroforestry, syntropic farming, no-dig systems, and forest gardening – is an important role for the Kitchen Garden. 

So where does biodiversity – the second aspect of the Golden Triangle – fit into our strategy for the Kitchen Garden? Wildlife, when talked of amongst vegetable growers is often known by another term – pests. How do we reconcile encouraging a broad range of beasts, birds and bugs and discouraging potentially the very same insects and animals with whom we are battling for our lunch? 

 Thinking of the vegetable garden as an ecosystem with complex food chains has an important role to play here. And patience.  Natural pest/predator relationships take time to build – if you are constantly removing aphids, why would the bluetits come? Natural predators like hoverflies and ladybirds are our best friends in the garden and having the patience to give them the habitat and time to establish will reap rewards. There’s merit in accepting that, one year, we may be without a crop when there’s a population surge in a particular pest that attacks a particular crop. It may take that pest’s natural predators a season or more to build in numbers and experience to effectively tackle the problem.  

There are plenty of creative things a gardener can do to counter pests without reaching for the pesticides or pest control. Finding weak spots in an adversary – the poor eyesight of pigeons, for example – can be exploited by blurring margins, allowing some plants to bolt around new seedlings. Or using companion planting, like sowing carrots amongst our onions – the strong smell of the onions deters carrot fly. 

One thing in nature is certain, there will always be change. We’re learning how to work with nature, rather than battling against it all the time, the key to an ecosystem- based approach to vegetable growing. 

Some of the Kitchen Garden’s July harvest. 

The last element of the Golden Triangle – aesthetics – is in many ways the trickiest. The nineteenth century Victorian polymath John Ruskin created a polemic on aesthetics and believed that seeing beauty in something was not a rational act, but an emotional and moral response. Beauty is, indeed, an emotional response and often we’ve grown up with irrational, preconceived ideas about what defines it. In both our gardens and our landscapes beauty is often judged by orderliness, tidiness and control. But if we start to look at them as ecosystems we begin to think differently, we begin to understand what underpins them, what they need to sustain life, to be abundant and sustainable. When we look at a barren hillside, or a monoculture lawn, and recognise how inhospitable it is as an environment, it becomes much harder to think of it as beautiful.  Thinking about the importance of wildlife above and below ground in a vegetable garden as allies to food production shifts the focus. Once we know the benefits of plant complexity, soil protection and insect life it becomes a challenge to  see beauty in our conventional inherited aesthetic of  bare soil and uniform rows of vegetables.  

Clearly, our discussions have given us an enormous amount to think about, but we hope that as this experimental project continues, we can share some of our discoveries. Patience, learning through trial and error, keeping records and taking the long view will help us gain the detailed familiarity with our patch that will get us through the worst of times, and celebrate the best of times. 

Photos courtesy of Charlie Harpur, Suzi Turner, Joshua Chalmers, Butterfly Conservation. 

Moy’s Garden Tips for August

1. Orchard & Wisteria summer prune – if you haven’t done it already, now’s the time to thin out the fruit on your apple and pear trees and cut back any water shoots in the centre to let air and sunlight in. Wisterias can be cut back now too to stop them getting too large and heavy. Loose the wispy new growth to 3 buds above the main stems.

2. Browsing evergreens and subshrubs – new growth on structural shrubs like bay or Mediterranean subshrubs like immortelle can be nibbled back to shape. We like to cut our bay for example, like a sculpture by Tony Craggs, giving them a greater surface area, increasing complexity. We think like a songbird or a moth in the rain, looking for shelter.

3. Annual and meadow seed collection – If you have a meadow and have managed to establish some yellow rattle, collect the seed and keep it dry. Spreading the fresh seed once the meadow is cut and cleared in late August or early September will help increase the yellow rattle and keep the grass from outcompeting the wildflowers. Early summer annuals like poppies, Orlaya, Ammi, Nigella, cornflower and marigolds will be seeding now. Collect, label and dry them now for next year, or presents for friends!

4. Editing and disturbance – volunteer plants (sometimes known as weeds) have become dominant with the warmth and rain. We edit out self-heal, fleabanes, clovers, disturbing the soil for solitary bees and wasps and leaving clear ground for self-seeding perennial seed.

5. Cue–to–care for late summer show – late summer flowering perennials like asters, dahlias and sedums may be crowded with other vegetation. Cut back or clear around them – giving a cue to care and letting them bask in their full glory. It’s a good time to make a note of any gaps where more late food for pollinators and an extension of flower shapes could be added in the autumn or spring ready for next year.

What we’re reading 

“A Big Year for Ragwort” – The Plant We Love to Hate – Knepp 

Rewild Your Vegetable Garden Workshop – Knepp Estate, West Sussex 

NFU sounds alarm on water crisis threatening UK food security – FarmingUK News 

An update on the Sustainable Farming Incentive  – Farming 

Water supply resilience and climate change POST-PB-0040.pdf 

The National Framework For Water Resources 2025 

England’s water crisis needs more than just new reservoirs – here’s what will help 

The Garden Against Time — Olivia Laing 

Charles Dowding: Home 

Home – Tolhurst Organic 

Birch Farm Woolsery | Natural farming in North Devon 

Creating a Forest Garden – The Agroforestry Research Trust 

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