How we work

Where we got our ideas, and what we owe to the people who had them first

The thing nobody wants to talk about

Wyrtun is built on AI, and AI has a problem. The models that power tools like this were trained on books, articles, and ideas whose authors were never asked for permission. A lot of the best thinking in naturalistic planting - Nigel Dunnett, James Hitchmough, Piet Oudolf, Beth Chatto, Noel Kingsbury, Claudia West, Thomas Rainer - almost certainly sits inside the model somewhere, uncredited and uncompensated. That's not a small thing. These are people who spent decades in trial beds and on hands and knees in real soil to work out what we now treat as common knowledge.

We can't undo that. But we can refuse to pretend it didn't happen, and we can try to do better from here.

What we're doing about it

When Wyrtun draws on an idea that traces back to a particular author or book, it says so. If Hitchmough's matrix planting shapes a suggestion, you'll see his name. If a recommendation owes its logic to Planting in a Post-Wild World, the book gets named and linked. We'd rather over-credit than quietly absorb someone's life's work into our chat bubble.

We also link to the books themselves - to the publisher, the author's site, or an independent bookshop where we can. Not affiliate links designed to skim a margin. Actual links to actual books, because the people who wrote them deserve readers and royalties.

And if you've already bought one: send us the receipt and Wyrtun is free for a year. One book, one year. We may not keep this offer open forever - it depends on whether we can sustain it - but while it runs, we mean it. The people who funded these authors with their own money shouldn't then have to pay us to interact with ideas those authors developed.

On plants, and getting them right

Garden advice is easy to fake and hard to do well. A confident-sounding sentence about hardiness or flowering time can be completely wrong, and you'd only find out two seasons later. So we don't ask the AI to invent plant facts. The botanical data underneath Wyrtun - names, families, ranges, tolerances - comes from established sources like Kew's Plants of the World Online and GBIF. The AI's job is to reason about your garden, your soil, your light, your taste, and to suggest plants from that grounded library. Not to make things up.

We'll still get things wrong sometimes. When Wyrtun is uncertain, we'd rather say so than bluff.

On your data

Your garden is yours. We don't sell your data, we don't share it with advertisers, and we don't train models on your private plans and notes. If you ever want your data out or deleted, ask and it's done. No dark patterns, no five-step cancellation maze.

On how we ask for your attention

A lot of software is designed to pull you back in. Streaks, badges, notifications timed to catch you scrolling. Wyrtun doesn't work that way. You'll hear from us when it matters - a frost warning for plants you actually grow, a reminder that something needs dividing, a note when conditions are right for sowing. Not to manufacture urgency. If we ever send you something that feels like noise, tell us. We might send you an email when we've added something we're really proud of too.

On the AI itself

The model that powers Wyrtun is capable, but it isn't a horticulturalist and it isn't standing in your garden. It doesn't have a nose, or eyes, or even hands. Treat its suggestions the way you'd treat advice from a knowledgeable friend at the garden centre: useful, worth considering, not gospel. Cross-check anything that matters. Trust your own eyes on your own soil.

Gardens are a long game, and so is earning your trust.

The reading list

The thinkers whose work shapes how Wyrtun reasons about a garden, with one book each as a starting point. Search links go to uk.bookshop.org, which routes purchases through independent UK bookshops. If your local shop stocks any of these, even better.

Cassian Schmidt's work at Hermannshof is mostly published in German trade journals rather than a single English-language title. His thinking on stress-tolerant perennial communities is in here all the same.

When Wyrtun cites a book in chat, the citation sends you to the same place: a uk.bookshop.org search for the title. Always one link, never an Amazon listing.

Wyrtun · Your garden, beautifully understood