The Butterfly Farmer Is Beginning to Stir
It all starts with the click of a form....
“Where joy grows, and children feel safe enough to emerge.”
There are moments when a project stops being an idea and starts becoming a living thing.
Today was one of those moments.
Standing on open land, walking boundaries, talking about soil, seasons, and what can be done now to prepare for what comes next, it became clear that The Butterfly Farmer Project is no longer something we’re imagining, it’s something we are actively shaping.
Spring is close enough to feel. Summer is already being planned for. And quietly, carefully, the groundwork is being laid.
Preparing the Ground
Over the past weeks, and especially through meetings shared today, we’ve begun preparing for the months ahead, not just in calendars and documents, but on the land itself.
This project is rooted in partnership. It exists because of trust, shared responsibility, and a belief that schools can be places where conservation is not something talked about, but something lived.
Through the Butterfly Farmer Project, schools are being invited into a wider ecology of learning one that connects children to real spaces, real soil, and real responsibility.
Three Places of Learning
Schools joining the project can now access a growing network of spaces, each offering a different way of learning and being outdoors:
The Enchanted Gardens (Whitstable) - a place for curiosity, creativity, and a full day of gentle, nature-led activity. A small contribution supports the care and upkeep of the space, ensuring it remains welcoming and alive.
The Quiet View - a softer educational environment designed for listening, reflection, and slower forms of attention. This is a space where learning happens through noticing, pausing, and being present.
Heart’s Delight Farm - a working conservation and meadow-making site where children can engage directly with land enhancement, wildflower planting, and ecological thinking. This is where science meets story, and where long-term care is made visible.
These spaces are close enough to be connected, yet different enough to offer distinct experiences. Schools may visit one or journey through more than one depending on what best suits their children.
What Happens on Your Site
One of the most important aspects of the Butterfly Farmer Project is that it doesn’t end with a visit.
Schools are invited to identify a site of their own a patch of land, a boundary, a forgotten corner and begin preparing it for life.
Once a school completes the project form, a wider partnership steps in. Land can be assessed and prepared, soil can be improved, and plans can be made well in advance of planting. Later this year, seeds will be sown so that next spring and summer bring colour, movement, and return.
This is long-term thinking. It’s conservation that respects time.
There are meaningful actions children can take now, even before the first flowers bloom learning about habitats, cycles, responsibility, and care.
Butterflies, Moths, and Meaning
As the project grows, schools will also be invited into shared learning moments including future butterfly-focused events where children explore life cycles, transformation, and ecological balance.
And, as we are always reminded, butterflies are not the only story here. Moths matter too. Quiet, overlooked, essential.
This project invites children to widen their attention to notice what is often missed, and to understand how small actions ripple outward.
Where the Wonder Begins
Everything begins with the form.
It may look like a practical step, but this is where the wonder truly starts.
Completing the form is an act of commitment. It’s a school saying: we are willing to take responsibility and accountability for a living site. This project only works because schools choose to hold the work with us.
Many schools are already benefiting from this remarkable partnership. Ten schools are now signed up, and the energy is building.
For this year, participation is limited to 20 schools so that the project remains thoughtful, supported, and meaningful.
If your school would like to be part of this year’s journey, you can begin here:
👉 The Butterfly Farmer Project – School Interest Form
https://forms.office.com/pages/responsepage.aspx?id=wtaJoh87xEuPoGhm_zAAUjzINda8cJ1Cm36Z_m4rCJVUMTZTT0FHOTdISVNRUlIyRFFPR1I0QzRPUy4u&route=shorturl
From that single step, everything else follows.
What Schools Are Telling Us
We’re beginning to receive a steady stream of feedback from schools already involved in this work, and what’s striking is how consistent it is.
Again and again, schools speak about joy, safety, and changes in children that feel both subtle and profound.
One school shared this with us:
“It’s impossible to fully express what the children have gained from spending time with Tom. As a poetry school, we’ve witnessed changes we didn’t think were possible — especially in children whose voices had not yet emerged. Something shifted. Confidence, safety, joy. We saw children step forward in ways that surprised us all.”
What’s important here is not performance or outcomes, but permission -permission for children to arrive as they are, to feel safe enough to explore, and to discover what they carry inside them.
This is what the Butterfly Farmer Project is growing toward. Not just butterflies, not just meadows but conditions where something previously unseen can finally appear.
And Something More Is Coming
Later this week, I’ll be meeting with the illustrator.
The book, The Butterfly Farmer is beginning to take visual shape. Soon, there will be images to share, characters to meet, and a story that children can hold in their hands alongside the soil they are caring for.
That update is coming very soon.
For now, something quieter and perhaps more important is happening. Land is being prepared. Schools are stepping forward. Children are being trusted with responsibility.
And somewhere beneath the surface, life is already beginning to stir.
I am doing it all for him, Mot. The sparkle in the eyes of the Hobopoet.