Humans work hard to hold back succession - mowing, weeding, plowing, and spraying. If the successional process were the wind, we would be constantly motoring against it. Why not put up a sail and glide along with the land’s natural tendency to become forest?

Cumbria University, Exeter Unversity, Tomas Remiarz and The Permaculture Association Britain collaborated in conducting an online survey of temperate forest gardens, the first of its kind. The survey received over 100 responses. These provide extensive data on location, size, crops grown, motivation, successes and failures.

The East Devon Forest Garden has been an attempt at a lyrical and creative response to our environmental issues. It is in part: