Standing on my land in the Lake District on a clear night, and I do that as much as I can, it is still possible to see the Milky Way. The skylines of the surrounding fells are dark, the only lights being a possible farmhouse in the valley, the brilliant glow from Ambleside, or a scatter of vehicle headlights moving along the region’s roads. Yet even here, the night is no longer what it once was.

Week 43 I suppose, for a renaturer, I should not be planting anything, but simply allowing Nature to steer me. Yet I admit to having...