In this episode Cathy and Jo travel east to Poland. Join them along the way as they cross borders and head into the primaeval forests of Bialowieza and the vast marshlands of Biebrza - both complex ecosystems, alive with the sounds of mammals, birds and amphibians. The variety and abundance of species they encounter are astounding but also give them pause to reflect on what Britain has lost and why. With thanks to Tomasz Jezierczuk of www.wildpoland.com...
May 31, 2025•54 min•Ep. 29
Jo and Cathy spend this episode with National Trust project officer and ecologist Steve Hindle on the slopes of Calderdale, in what looks like an ordinary field… but isn’t. They discuss the fascinating lives of fungi and their vital but often overlooked role in the ecosystem, not only as decomposers or parasites, but also as symbiotic partners engaged in a range of very sophisticated relationships with plants. Steve’s partner Sarah Flood scours the field for waxcaps, pinkgills, clubs, corals and...
Oct 20, 2024•58 min•Ep. 28
If you go up to Calderdale’s rough pasture and moorland during the spring and early summer you might encounter a variety of breeding birds – small ones like meadow pipits and skylarks and larger ones like oyster-catchers, golden plover, snipe and lapwings. There is perhaps none more distinctive though, both in its look and sound than the curlew – a large, elegant, brown wader with a very long curved beak and a strange, some say ghostly, bubbling song. Whilst numbers across Britain are going down...
Aug 13, 2024•52 min•Ep. 27
It’s always a pleasure to hear from our listeners and on occasion people have asked for an episode dedicated purely to nature sounds. This is one such episode. It’s a compilation of ambient field recordings made around the coastline of the Hebridean island of Tiree. Slow radio indeed, and we recommend listening on headphones. This is an energetic and vibrant landscape. You can immerse yourself in the elemental sounds of waves and wind, and experience a wide variety of birdlife. We begin the epis...
Apr 20, 2024•45 min•Ep. 26
A stone’s throw from the river in Hebden Bridge town centre Jill and Kathryn make a discovery under their eaves: House Martins have arrived. A summer of ups and downs follows and we track events over the year to learn more about the lives of these ‘epic’ little migrant birds, and how to love a ‘pile of poop’. We also find out more about Britain’s other Spring arrivals swifts, swallows and sand martins, and how to tell them apart.
Mar 30, 2024•51 min•Ep. 25
What does rewilding in the British Isles mean, how do you start it off, and what happens when you do? In this episode we visit the 3000 acre Broughton Hall estate in Yorkshire with Rewilding Britain’s Alastair Driver to see how nature is bouncing back. A wide range of interventions and actions are now underway on land that was conventionally farmed for sheep and crops until very recently. Whether it’s tree planting, leaky dam construction, the introduction of ecosystem engineers (beavers), or ju...
Sep 03, 2023•50 min•Ep. 24
In an episode centred on climate change and community resilience, Jo and Cathy stay in their local town - Todmorden - to chat with Barbara Jones, a pioneer of natural building methods. Sustainable materials including clay, lime, wool, wood fibre and straw as well as stone and timber come into their own. We find out practical steps we can all take in our homes, whether they are old or new, to improve breathability (thus minimising unwanted condensation and mould), reduce heat-loss, and shield ind...
Aug 16, 2023•53 min•Ep. 23
In this episode we visit Gronant and Talacre dunes with Mandy Cartwright from the Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Trust to investigate the only Welsh population of Natterjack Toads, re-introduced after the Second World War. The shallow pools (scrapes) and sandy burrows provide a perfect habitat, but development pressures, predation, human activity and climate change mean life for these small, yellow-striped amphibians is precarious. How exactly do Natterjack Toads live, and what are landowner...
Jul 27, 2023•52 min•Ep. 22
What does the future hold for the ancient trees of the New Forest? Join us inside the Forest, at Denny Wood, for an in-depth discussion with ecologist Adrian Newton and naturalist Lynn Davy. Long term ecological monitoring of the woodlands is revealing the rapid and dynamic transformation of much-loved habitats that have existed for thousands of years. Why is this happening? Who are the winners and losers? How should we assess the condition of an ecosystem that is changing so rapidly, and how do...
Jun 29, 2023•50 min•Ep. 21
Cathy and Jo join wildlife biologist and hare expert Carlos Bedson on location in the Dark Peak to find out more about the only mountain hares in England. Their ancestors arrived on a train from Scotland! 500 metres up on the moor looking out for ‘white fluffy blobs’ Carlos explains more about the likes and dislikes of this amazing creature, his long-term survey work to map the extent and size of the Peak District population, how to go about seeing one, and what we can do to ensure their continu...
Feb 20, 2023•47 min•Ep. 20
Join Jo and Cathy for a Gaelic adventure to find out more about one of Britain’s rarest bumblebees – the Great Yellow Bumblebee ( Bombus distinguendus ). We meet ecologist Janet Bowler on the dunes to discover more about what one small island has done to keep its special bee buzzing. Charlotte Vale and Molly Knowles contribute readings in Gaelic from Beataidh Banrigh Super-Bee, a story book created by the children of Tiree.
Sep 08, 2022•47 min•Ep. 19
“Come, summer visitant, attach to my reed roof your nest of clay”. In this episode Jo and Cathy look back to the Victorian era with poetry scholar Clara Dawson. Clara introduces us to poems by Charlotte Smith, William Wordsworth, Christina Rosetti, Edward Thomas and Thomas Hardy, and the interweaving of human and bird worlds. What is revealed about the poets’ relationships with nature as industrialisation took grip across the country? And how might these poems spark our own imaginations, both in...
Jul 26, 2022•50 min•Ep. 18
This episode takes Cathy and Jo to Shropshire to explore a church graveyard. Harriet Carty, from the charity Caring for God’s Acre, explains all about these oases of species-rich grassland, and how to manage them. As well as meeting some of the plants and other creatures that make the graveyard their home - bats, rooks, butterflies, bees - they have a close encounter with an ancient yew tree, and find out how important burial grounds are to people, past and present.
May 10, 2022•43 min•Ep. 17
Following on from Episode 15 Jo and Cathy make a return to the peatlands, this time to a lowland raised bog on the outskirts of Manchester and Salford. Little Woolden Moss formed over thousands of years but was almost totally destroyed in the 1990s by peat extraction – it became a barren, lifeless place, swirling with clouds of black dust. Jo and Cathy meet Jenny Bennion from the local Wildlife Trust and Dave Steel, a birdwatcher and bog volunteer, to find out how it’s now being brought back to ...
Apr 11, 2022•45 min•Ep. 16
Jo and Cathy venture into squelchy upland territory in search of sphagnum moss, a key species of the peat bog. Discovering that a third of the UK was once bog or fenland, and that most has now been degraded, they find out what needs to be done to restore these watery wonderlands and their carbon capturing powers. Up in Galloway they meet environmental artist Kerry Morrison and learn all about a tasty project which reconnects a local community with their peatlands.
Feb 07, 2022•47 min•Ep. 15
Jo takes a trip up the west coast to the Inner Hebrides to join Cathy who is helping with the RSPB’s annual corncrake census on the Isle of Tiree. Locating these elusive birds involves listening for calling males in the dead of night. Join Jo and Cathy on a midnight journey to track them down, followed by an in-depth conversation with RSPB officer John Bowler who shares the story of the corncrake, why the Inner Hebrides remains one of the UK’s last strongholds for these birds, and what is being ...
Jul 04, 2021•47 min•Ep. 14
Jo and Cathy resume learning birdsong in lockdown, this time tuning into the calls of the blue tit, great tit and coal tit. With Spring fast approaching, gardens, parks and woods are alive with the sounds of these three common UK tit species, but it’s easy to be confounded by all their chirping and tweeting, and treat them as background noise. In this episode Jo and Cathy set about investigating their individual sonic signatures and explore how to distinguish and disentangle (most of the time!) ...
Feb 27, 2021•44 min•Ep. 13
Setting out to explore the River Colne, Jo and Cathy start at its source on the edge of the moors and journey downstream through urban West Yorkshire to its confluence with the River Calder. Their trip takes in weirs, walls, abandoned mills, industrial pollution, combined sewer overflows, liminal space and river life. As well as exploring the historical and present day human impacts on the river, they begin to question more deeply our relationship with rivers and the role they can play in our li...
Nov 23, 2020•52 min•Ep. 12
Vast swathes of Britain's upland are currently managed for grouse shooting. As the official start of the shooting season kicks off (12th August) Jo and Cathy finally decide to confront this controversial topic. Listen in from their local grouse moor to find out about the history of this peculiarly British pastime, the ecological and environmental consequences of managing the moors in this way, the range of stakeholders involved, and possibilities for the future.
Aug 10, 2020•48 min•Ep. 1
In this episode we take the opportunity to meet the warblers, millions of whom travel thousands of miles every year, returning to the UK to breed, and sing - possibly in a tree near you! We then reveal the often overlooked acoustic charm of the long tailed tit. [Timings: Willow Warbler @ 2mins 19secs; Blackcap @ 13mins 45secs; Long tailed Tit @ 25mins 03secs]
Jun 11, 2020•40 min•Ep. 10
As lockdown continues Cathy and Jo go out to explore their immediate locality: a post-industrial valley cut deep into the South Pennine hills. They survey the landscape from the moor tops, with the skylarks high above them, then journey down to a small wooded valley to investigate what’s living in the stream. The episode wraps up with a visit to an area of nearby upland fenced off some 20 or 30 years ago for tree planting, and a chat about the positive impacts of this small ‘rewilded’ patch of t...
May 15, 2020•40 min•Ep. 9
This episode is a long field recording of a dawn chorus made at the beginning of April, and accompanies our podcasts on learning birdsong in the coronavirus lockdown. We provide a short spoken introduction, but then just leave the birds to it.
Apr 21, 2020•45 min•Ep. 8
Coronavirus lockdown continues, but song thrushes and blackbirds are singing away in parks and gardens. Join Cathy and Jo in this episode to listen to and learn about their distinctive songs. Meanwhile the first summer visitors are back (chiff chaff), and chatty goldfinches seem to be everywhere. (Song Thrush @ 1min 55secs; Blackbird @ 8 min 35 secs; Chiff Chaff @ 18mins 0 secs; Goldfinch @ 26mins 26secs)
Apr 14, 2020•37 min•Ep. 7
Cathy and Jo can't go nature tripping, so instead they're listening to birdsong on their doorstep, and sharing some tips on how to identify song from three of the nations's commonest species. (Robin @ 8min 15secs; Wren @ 15mins 0secs; Chaffinch @ 25mins 58 secs).
Mar 31, 2020•35 min•Ep. 6
Storm Ciara has not long passed. Cathy and Jo are on a Hebridean Island and take a trip to the beach to experience wind, waves, stacks of seaweed and an encounter with the local seals.
Mar 23, 2020•45 min•Ep. 5
It’s the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch weekend. Jo and Cathy stock up the bird feeders and settle in to observe what’s going on outside the back door. With small microphones attached to the garden tree, close-up sounds of birds pecking for food, beating their wings and squabbling with each other are revealed. The podcast ends with an extended recording of activity at the bird feeders.
Feb 26, 2020•50 min•Ep. 4
As day is breaking Cathy and Jo visit the local allotments to listen to the winter dawn chorus and chat about identifying bird species by their song. After singing alone in the darkness, robins are joined by wrens, blackbirds and tits, as well as some less familiar British species, proving that although it's cold and dark, winter can be a fruitful time to listen out for birds.
Jan 10, 2020•39 min•Ep. 3
It's a windy weekend in December and Cathy and Jo are at Caerlaverock on the Solway Firth. They listen to the wild ducks, geese and swans over-wintering in the vast merse (salt marshes) for which this area is famous. It proves to be one of the nosiest wildlife experiences to be heard in the British Isles during winter. The podcast includes (at the end) a long recording of the busy wetland soundscape at dawn, featuring wigeon, whooper swans and even some curlew.
Dec 12, 2019•35 min•Ep. 2
Cathy and Jo take a field trip to Morecambe Bay - a popular winter feeding ground for many wading birds and ducks. Join them as the tide rushes in for a discussion about this vast estuarine habitat and its different bird species, their feeding behaviours, and migratory patterns. Time is also spent discussing the plight of the curlew - present on the Bay, but also one of Britain's most endangered birds.
Nov 21, 2019•35 min•Ep. 1
