Ep. 033: An Agriwilding Evolution with Matt Swarbrick

·55 min·3 clips

Matt says Henbant is exploring “agriwilding” as a sweet spot between productivity and biodiversity.

1. Wilder Podcast episode 33 centers on Matt Swarbrick, a farmer at Henbant in northwest Wales, and the idea of agriwilding. 2. Matt speaks as the Henbant farmer with his wife Jenny and a team, and Chloe and Tom frame the conversation from their farm in Monmouthshire. 3. The episode asks whether a small farm on a mortgage can produce nutrient-dense food, build soil and biodiversity, and still be enjoyable. 4. Matt describes Henbant as 80 acres of a former gravel quarry with a house that was boarded up and then left to decay. 5. He says he and Jenny wanted a place to “grow babies and cabbages,” and they found a man in a Bristol pub who helped make the purchase work. 6. Matt explains that he did not come from farming stock and grew up in a terrace house near Leeds. 7. He names John Seymour as the childhood writer who shaped his view of self-sufficiency and land use. 8. Matt says he became an ecologist, then did a PhD on penguin and seal babies, before moving into natural history filmmaking. 9. He mentions work on Planet Earth, Life, and Frozen Planet, and says that job was difficult for domestic life. 10. Matt says he wanted to stop traveling and become part of an ecosystem rather than only filming one. 11. He and Jenny started with a caravan, no electricity for six months, and a house that needed basic repairs. 12. Matt recounts Jennifer writing an email about a “pregnant lady in freezing wheel field in Wales,” which helped bring 20 Land Rovers and electricity after a storm. 13. Matt says the farm was built step by step, with borrowed money and reinvestment rather than a large cash reserve. 14. He describes the site as a mix of sheep pasture, wet willow from the quarry, ponds, sandy spoil, and planted trees. 15. Matt says the whole farm is now covered in productive trees and small orchards that lead toward the farmyard hub. 16. He explains that holistic decision making asks what he and Jenny want from life and from the land before decisions are made. 17. Matt says regenerative agriculture was useful for him, but he now sees it as narrowed to soil, water, or carbon metrics. 18. He argues that agroecology adds social, human, and biodiversity dimensions, and he uses “agriwilding” for the sweet spot he is trying to create. 19. The conversation feels practical, reflective, and detail-heavy, with Chloe and Tom asking direct questions about production, risk, and farm design. 20. Listeners who like farm planning, land design, and ecological food production will get the most from it, while people wanting quick entertainment may skip it.

As heard by us

A grounded farm conversation about keeping food and nature moving in the same direction.

This episode asks a practical question: can a farm keep producing food while also helping nature and people thrive? Chloe and Tom draw on their own work on the land, which keeps the conversation rooted in lived experience as it moves through agri-wilding, holistic decision…

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Why you'd press play

A farm conversation where regenerative thinking, agri-wilding, and biodiversity stop being rivals.

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