Nature Tripping

It’s rare to come across a snake in the British countryside.  They are seldom seen, and often feared and demonised, with most of us basing our views on what we see in cartoons, movies and myths.  Britain has three native species of snake and whilst elusive, they are not impossible to find if you know how. In this episode Jo and Cathy set out in search of these secretive reptiles, travelling to a dry heath in East Dorset in the south of England to meet herpetologist Harry Ward-Smith. A very long snake hunt ensues across two nature reserves managed by the Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Trust (ARC).  Along the way we get to understand and appreciate the lives of these amazing creatures and the many challenges they face in today’s fragmented landscape.  Check out ARC’s website for photographs of the three British snake species and so much more.

Join Cathy and Jo on Norland Moor with moth expert Anthony Arak as we leave a moth trap out overnight and return in the morning to see who’s arrived.  This episode is Part 1 of a two-part series devoted to exploring the life cycle of the majestic Emperor Moth.  We listen to the experiences of four Bridestones Rewilded volunteers weaving their lives around some very hungry Emperor Moth caterpillars as they moult, grow, change colour and each spin themselves a silk cocoon. What is the difference between butterflies and moths? What’s it like to bring up caterpillars?  How does a caterpillar transform itself into a moth? And what are moth experts witnessing on the moors of Calderdale as climate change brings warmer conditions across England?  See the podcast website page for the pictures of moths seen in this episode, and more resources on moth identification and trapping. With thanks also to Ian Curley, Sheila Tilmouth, Wren and Greta.

This episode is a departure from the usual format and is an immersive listening experience of the sounds of Dobarz.  Earlier in the year Jo and Cathy visited Eastern Poland, returning to an area near the Biebrza Marshes with an intense abundance and diversity of birds and other wildlife. Made from a series of continuous soundscapes recorded by Jo in a variety of habitats around the hamlet of Dobarz, the podcast begins with the dawn chorus, and continues through the day, including a chorus of fire-bellied toads and the underwater sounds of pond life, ending with a windy late afternoon soundscape featuring insects stridulating incessantly. You’ll hear many birds familiar to the British landscape, but also some unusual species: check out our website for more details. Enjoy!

Jo and Cathy meet with Ashar Aslam, a post-doctoral climate researcher at Leeds University who studies tropical storms.They discuss Jo and Ashar’s 2025 collaboration as part of Leeds Cultural Institute’s Creative Labs programme.  This brought scientists and artists together to think about climate change: Jo and Ashar decided to explore what happens if you recontextualise the climate as a living entity. How do people respond to this proposition?  Is it too hard to imagine, or conversely, could it be a way of engendering more care for the climate, and prompting a shift in thinking that leads to pro-environmental behaviour?  We hear about Jo and Ashar’s experiences of discussing this with friends and colleagues, and listen to ‘Climotherapy’ – the sound art piece they made.  ‘Climotherapy’ documents responses collected as part of the project, and shares meteorological information on the nature of storm formation. With thanks to those we interviewed including Ronika Cunningham, Diane Greenwood, Katie Jukes, Arundhati Kalyan, Kathryn Loftus, Alison Ruck and Sam Williams.

Bryophyte curious?  Join Jo and Cathy in this episode of Nature Tripping for a walk through Hardcastle Crags in Calderdale with bryologist Johnny Turner.   It might just look like green stuff but get close-up and the trees, rocks and streams are home to specialist species of mosses and liverworts indicative of Atlantic rainforest, as well as more common species once lost from the woods but now back in abundance.We learn what makes an Atlantic rainforest and how to tell if you’re in one.  We find out about a long lineage of local bryologists from 1700s onwards and how their records reveal the impact of human activity on Calderdale’s temperate woodland across the centuries.  It’s not all bad news!  Johnny also shares his thoughts on his life-long relationship with these very ancient plants.

Jo and Cathy meet Bailey for an introduction to Regenerative Farming and a discussion about the experimental field work he has been doing with the University of Oxford on the impact of different types of grazing management on biodiversity.   Three different scenarios - conventionally grazed pasture, mob-grazed pasture, and passive restoration (where land is left untouched) -  have been monitored for all sorts of biodiversity, with Bailey’s focus on the life beneath our feet. Soil might look pretty dull, but in fact it’s alive with invertebrates, and is a vital component of ecosystems.  Can listening to it provide important information on soil health? If so, what does a robust experimental method for doing that even look like? Bailey has some of the answers… and the sounds. 

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

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 earthtongues.  Each has their own ecological niche, and all are indicators of ‘ancient grassland’, a rare habitat which Calderdale, with its challenging farming conditions, has managed to hold on to.  Landowner Liz tells of the sometimes confusing journey her and her partner took to work out the best management options for the field, the steps they are taking to protect it, and of course, her new found passion for fungi! 

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 and down, here in the South Pennines, we still experience their arrival every spring and seem to be holding on to our breeding curlew population. In this episode Cathy recounts her lifelong love for this iconic bird and discusses her British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) survey work, sharing insights on local population levels and how we might conserve them. We also visit a nearby beauty spot (the Bridestones) and speak to local expert Andrew Cockcroft about a community-led initiative to buy the 114-acre site and restore its peat bog and acid grassland ecosystems for the benefit of wading birds as well as other wildlife, and people.

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 episode with the faint cry of sea eagles high in the sky, then move back to the seashore, plunging down to listen to the underwater sounds of a limpet steadily munching its way across a rock, and the popping and crackling of a forest of sea kelp. Back on dry land and a little way inshore a fulmar colony prepares for the 2024 breeding season on a small cliff outcrop, in the close company of nearby starlings.  We also meet common gulls, oyster catchers and redshank going about daily life on the shore and as darkness falls pay a visit to a grassy shoreline field to hear the night-time activity of snipe and graylag geese, before finally returning to the waves.