In 1993 Carlisle Bereavement Services planned the first municipal Green Burial Ground. Since then the idea has spread rapidly, not only in the public but also the private sector.
 
This is sound ecology. But, initially, it was accompanied by an insistence that the trees which were planted over each grave were somehow a substitute for a more personal memorial. It was met with little enthusiasm, and soon lost favour. Apart from the need to commemorate a particular life, it seems that stones play an important ecological role in temperate forests, encouraging ants and their enormous contribution to bio-diversity.
 
So permanent markers, albeit small, are regaining favour in these new wilderness sanctuaries. This page shows a few of the possibilities for green memorials, ashes stones and pet graves.