Meet The Woodland Realm Team

Rex the German Shepherd

Between the Wye and the Severn, where the forest folds itself around the day, Rex walks beside me — not as a pet, but as another presence shaped by the wild. He came a long way before finding this place, travelling from the streets of Kosovo through Serbia to GSDR, carrying a history he never speaks of. Yet the moment he stepped into the cottage, he behaved as though he had simply returned to a place he already knew.

Rex has his own way of belonging. He favours shoes, footballs, and eggs with a seriousness that borders on ritual, and he keeps a steady watch on the squirrels who run the high branches like they own them. He has claimed a leather chair as his chosen perch, where he sleeps with his head hanging toward the floor in a posture that looks impossible but seems to suit him. Clever and quick to learn, he approaches trick training with a quiet, thoughtful focus, as though each new skill is another way of settling into his new life. There is a steadiness to him — a kind of patient curiosity — that fits the rhythm of this place.  

Out in the Woodland Realm, he moves with purpose. Long walks are where he comes alive — nose low, ears forward, reading the paths as if the forest is speaking directly to him. He helps me gather reference for my artwork, though “help” is generous; he specialises in stepping into frame at the exact moment the light behaves, turning every photograph into a reminder that the woods don’t care for tidy plans. Even so, his presence has become part of the process. The forest offers what it offers, and Rex folds himself into it without fuss.  

He is learning the land in the same way I once did — slowly, by repetition, by weather, by the quiet language of trees. The foxes intrigue him. The crows keep him guessing. The shifting scents on the wind seem to anchor him more firmly each day. Here, he has settled into himself — a guardian of shoes, a watcher of squirrels, a companion who understands the pace of this place without needing to be taught. In his own steady way, he has become another thread in the Realm, woven into the life and land that shape my work. He doesn’t try to belong. He simply does.