You may have been hearing the term “rewilding” a lot recently. It was all the rage at the Chelsea flower show this year. Some celebrity gardeners have embraced the idea, while others dismissed it as “nonsense” and brainwashing.
But what does rewilding actually mean? Is it just letting things go?
Gardening author Isabella Tree insists that rewilding is not all about stepping back, doing nothing and letting nature take over. She says: “Turning your back on a garden… is not the way to improve it for wildlife. Thuggish pioneer plants take over and, eventually, colonising trees shade out the light for other plants. Lack of plant diversity leads to lack of insect diversity and abundance of other life. A garden is only complex and species-rich because of the interventions of the gardener.”
I’ve always loved the parallels between gardening and the gut microbiome – my two passions in life! Just like a garden, your gut can be devastated by chemicals and pollution. Just like a garden, it takes time and patience to restock your gut with the beneficial life forms that encourage health.
And just like a garden, you can’t simply stand back and let the weeds take over inside your gut. You’ve got to take charge, and do the work.
The difference is the purpose of your effort. What’s the goal? What’s the point of all the work? Is it to create a blasted monoculture landscape with weakened life forms, fed with chemicals and protected with pesticides?
Or is it to create a thriving, rich, diverse biological culture with lots of different kind of life forms in it?
(Hint – it’s the latter. Did you guess? ; )
In your gut, just as in your garden, the health of an ecosystem is tested by its diversity. A diverse ecosystem is a resilient ecosystem, with many more options for fighting off disease, pathogens and infection.
And diversity doesn’t happen by accident. To truly rewild your gut takes work.
Kefir is the idea hero product to help you down this road, because it is a traditionally fermented product with naturally occurring bacteria. These powerful microbial allies are living and thriving in their own food matrix, growing and increasing in benefit by the minute. Drinking kefir is exactly like applying good home-made compost to your garden – you’re boosting diversity and healthy growth potential by adding live, beneficial cultures. Those living cultures then help everything else to thrive.
For too long, we’ve been trying to control nature, with the end goal of putting it in a sterile holding pattern – blasting every bug and pest with horrible chemicals. But we should all know by now – there’s no such thing as sterile. And trying to kill things off never got us anywhere.
The goal is healthy balance. Work to create a thriving, rich environment for lots of different kind of life forms, both in your garden and inside your gut.
Rewild your garden.
And rewild your gut!
Hugs from the garden –
Shann.x
