“In the end we will conserve only what we love; we will love only what we understand; and we will understand only what we are taught.”
Baba Dioum
Moving to a pioneering rewilding project at Bamff, Perthshire, in late 2018 set our lives on a permanent new trajectory, as the dynamic essence of an increasingly uncultivated landscape became fully intertwined with our core being.
I have steadily invested more time, energy, and responsibility into Bamff Wildland – managing local flora and fauna, monitoring landscapes and habitats, and responding artistically, broadening my experiences in ways I’d never previously imagined. This work has also helped promote the project, beginning with developing the Bamff Wildland websites – and later taking on all social media content, which became outlets for some of my photographic and filmic/musical endeavours.
Additionally, I initiated a complimentary, aspirational food growing project that has emerged from this since 2022.
Sophie Ramsay, my partner, assumed the role of Bamff’s Wildland Manager, and has since overseen some remarkable transformations that will also extend far beyond the boundaries of Bamff itself. However, the process of rewilding Bamff actually began as far back as the early 1990s, when her father, Paul Ramsay, initiated numerous efforts to restore wetlands and woodlands and reintroduced the first wild beavers in the UK in 2002.
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Being increasingly absorbed into this land has highlighted, through shocking contrasts, how rare it is in Britain to encounter anywhere that feels remotely “wild” and untouched by human activity. Learning that Britain – especially Scotland – is among the most nature-depleted regions on Earth adds urgency to this endeavour, as if it weren’t already urgent enough.
The relative remoteness of this location further instilled a nagging sense that being simply a “musician” or “artist” was no longer enough – though, in truth, it never had been. Injustices towards the planet’s biosphere have always been intertwined with, and indeed heralded by, global injustices against humanity. Ignoring one means ignoring the other; to disregard both is doubly irresponsible.
Thus, having access to ample resources here – while a rare privilege – compels me to use them meaningfully, always seeking ways to offer solutions to sometimes tricky ethical or political conundrums. This is the ethos I share proudly with my partner as we work towards a viable future here with our daughter. It’s not a journey that can be obviously or meticulously planned, but we’re making progress.
Of course, the climate and biodiversity crises won’t be solved by rewilding projects like this alone. Yet they offer hope in a bleak world still largely wedded to the destructive systems that brought us here – systems that must be reversed.
As tangible, transformative results emerge – often supported by mounting empirical evidence gathered by academics visiting Bamff – the local impacts (from biodiversity recovery to carbon sequestration and flood mitigation) become measurable. This, in turn, may encourage governments to listen, accelerating the proliferation of similar projects elsewhere – many of which are long underway and already showing great promise.
