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A Tale Of Restoration 

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Wild Hollow is really an emalgamation of places I love to spend time walking in, observing the seasons, mapping plants and foraging. The name originated from the place on the right, here an old tree surveyed the landscape beneath like a mystical watcher. The fields and woods there were a place of refuge and inspiration where I would seldom see another soul spare a deer or fox.

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The tree has long gone, lost in a storm but 'Wild Hollow' remains both in the real landscape and that of my vision to create natural herbal products.

 

Now we are custodians of some lovely land next to our house, around six acres of meadow dropping steeply away from our garden and the quarry edge that marks our boundary. The field undulates in a downward direction to a lovely tree-lined hollow where the river Devon meanders at the bottom.

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This land has had quite a turbulent history, once the site of a windmill in the late 19th century which like my 'watcher' above, was damaged in a storm and dismantled. Below is I believe is the only picture in existence of the old mill.

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Quarrying began on a huge scale in the area for ironstone, this was very damaging process involving the removal of tonnes of soil to reach the rock below. Many native plant species must have been lost in at this time and it is very much our mission to restore this lost habitat as best we can.

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To some extent the land had recovered and when we first walked aroud the field many years ago I noted with delight that there were Orchids. 

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Several years of heavy stock grazing has disturbed the balance, thistles dominate, Ragwort is rife and I cannot find a single Orchid.  Ragwort can be a controversial subject, many landowners and farmers despise it but I see how valuable it is to the Cinnabar moth. Its all a question of balance, where land is damaged and depleted, certain species will dominate.

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I see our job now, as custodians of this land, to restore balance by firstly resting the land and waiting and watching to see what appears. We will soon have bees here to forage the plants and work their magic. 

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