About The Long Graze

The name works two ways, and I like both of them.

A long graze is what happens when animals move across living grassland, eat, rest the plants, and leave the ground better than they found it. It is also what I hope you will do here: settle in for a long read about the land, the people who care for it, and the food that follows.

Welcome to The Long Graze. I write from a simple place. I’m not a farmer. I’m someone who loves the countryside and good food, and who has come to believe that the two belong together. I live in Devon, among red cattle, deep hedgerows and green pasture, and that is where the love grew.

What I celebrate

This site celebrates the pioneers who showed that grazing animals can be the engine of soil and habitat restoration. I write with warmth about Allan Savory and Holistic Management, about Richard Perkins and the small, working farm at Ridgedale, and about Gabe Brown, who turned a run of disasters into living soil and first-class meat.

I also celebrate the farms, festivals and food of regenerative farming in the UK: places such as Groundswell, Pasture for Life and Knepp, and the growers and graziers who are doing this work in British weather, on British ground.

If you want the ideas in one place, start with my guide to what regenerative agriculture is.

Where I stand

I am strongly in favour of regenerative farming, and I am grazing-first. I think livestock, moved with care, are how so much living grassland is made, and how habitats come back to life. I think pasture-raised meat and dairy are hero foods. I think meat and dairy should be the mainstay of a good diet. That is my view, not a medical claim.

Vegetables, fruit and grain grown in living soil have a place too, especially from mixed farms where animals help build the ground. The centre of the story, for me, is still the long, careful graze, and the plate that comes from it.

Climate comes up from time to time. I mention it briefly. The everyday case, as I see it, is simpler: healthier land, more wildlife, better food, and farms that can make a living.

How I write

I try to keep these pages easy to read, a little opinionated, and light on statistics. When I state something as fact, I want it to be true and sourced. I credit my sources in the articles, and I would rather attribute a farmer’s own figures to them than dress them up as mine. I do not invent quotes, and I do not invent numbers.

I will get things wrong from time to time. When I do, I will try to put them right.

If you love a living countryside, and if you care what ends up on your plate, you are in the right place. Pull up a chair. This is a long graze. I’m glad you are here.

The Hedgerow Gourmet