Building wetlands with Holistic Planned Grazing in Zimbabwe

This video, recently recorded and narrated by Allan Savory, shows a new wetland developing at the Africa Centre for Holistic Management (ACHM) in Zimbabwe.
At this location, a wet vlei (seasonal marsh) would often occur after a heavy rain but then dry up quickly. Over the last few years, this new wetland has been developing and is even higher upstream this year than previously observed in similar conditions. With small fish, geese breeding, and other small birds flocking to this new wetland, this is - to the best of Allan's deep local knowledge - something quite unique.
"I can find no record of open water here from any past record or old timer remembrances," says Allan "including having once owned this land and being familiar with it since the late 1960's. As far as I know, this is the only case of so improving the water cycle using livestock and our Holistic Planned Grazing process that wetland is developing."
At a time when anti-livestock advocates clamor about how many gallons of water are needed to raise cattle (side note: more than 95% of that water usage is rainfall, not irrigation), the solution to our broken water cycles is standing right in the pastures in front of us. Further, it is well-established that a 1% increase in soil organic matter can store an additional 20-25k gallons of water across an acre of land, with the exact amount dependent on the soil's bulk density.
So how exactly did Allan and the team at ACHM bring about this wetland? It is commonly believed that droughts cause bare ground, but the truth is the opposite - a broken water cycle starts with bare ground. Sure, you can invest loads of manpower on water-harvesting earthworks projects or building swales to trap water in your soils, but the most resource-efficient way to fix a broken water cycle is to ensure there is maximal vegetative cover, and in a grass-based environment this is best accomplished through holistically managed livestock.
For ACHM, establishing this wetland cost nothing yet it resulted in both increased production and income. It's a win-win-win scenario for the land, the wildlife, and the local community.

[@wandaacat]

I love this so much - my tears are rising with overwhelming joy to know of this... and deep sadness that so few can let down their guard enough to allow their minds to contemplate that such simple interventions can and do make a huge difference to Earth's capacity to heal herself - bless you Allan Savory and Savory Institute and all those working in holistic observance with the land.

[@sebastianbroich8458]

Thank you. I think such quick shot short impressions are very valuable. Do more of these.

[@carinapienaar8649]

I'm really excited to see where this will go in the future!

[@NaMe-ku4cl]

Woah! 😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍

[@susandoerr3896]

wonderful, keep it wisely up.

[@darlawrence9295]

So where did the small fish come from? Did you put them in? If so, then for what purpose? Do the fish help sustain the wetland that you have created?

[@SavoryInstitute]

Fish eggs can travel on bird feet resulting in naturally-occurring fish in new bodies of water.

[@darlawrence9295]

@@SavoryInstitute No Way! Wow! I just figured fish were carried by floods. I've always wondered how fish and marine life would show up in remote ponds that weren't accessible to flooding. Thank You

[@wendyscott8425]

@@SavoryInstituteThanks, that's incredible! Who knew?

[@SavoryInstitute]

@@wendyscott8425 Nature is pretty incredible, huh?!

[@ZennExile]

@@SavoryInstitute the most incredible parts of nature are invisible to any survey and happen below the surface. What would be incredible would be to see someone like you saying "Rhizosphere" when you talk about holistic approaches to ecological rehabilitation. Without the Rhizosphere, the Carbon Cycle can never be repaired. It's the infrastructure and the storage system. Until the organic waste is fully digested and incorporated with the Rhizosphere, its carbon might as well have never left the atmosphere.

[@jamesbailand4311]

Oh, so we call it Zimbabwe now..

[@ZennExile]

But does that soil have enough microbial activity to reform a functioning Rhizosphere capable of digesting the waste these plants and animals are creating on the surface? And has any effort whatsoever been made to determine and monitor the digestive potential of said soils? Life is Carbon-12 and more Life alive is less Carbon-12 in the atmosphere. We can very strongly agree on this. But the bulk of terrestrial biomass cannot be surveyed visually. Does anyone at the Savory Institute or even the ACHM specialize in the Rhizosphere? Because it seems to my illness addled internet hobo mind that the Rhizosphere is being canceled out of the equation. Considering it contains the vast bulk of all terrestrial biomass and without it actively digesting waste then decaying from the bottom to trap carbon beneath a layer of living biomass there is no sequestration occurring, it should be a very prominent part of the dataset, should it not? Even a perfect algorithm will return erroneous results if you omit important data. Can this type of land management work if the Rhizosphere is being omitted from the data? And is it truly holistic?