Showing titles in Nature & Ecology

I discuss a variety of topics in both the natural and social sciences, exploring the many fascinating insights that the scientific method yields about the world around us.

What is it about the humble pig that holds such a special place in our hearts? In a frosty field on the longest night of the year, eight little piglets snuffle their first breaths, and jostle close to their mother to feed... So begins the life of the farm animal that you think you already know...

‘A formidable, brave and important book’ Robert Macfarlane ‘Absolutely brilliant…You cannot read this book and defend the establishment’ Alastair Campbell, The Rest is Politics Who owns England? Behind this simple question lies this country’s oldest and best-kept secret. This is the...

From the 1948 US edition: This is the story of the most publicized jungle animal that ever lived. In his best-selling Man-Eater's of Kumaon, Jim Corbett told of his battles with many man-eating tigers. In this book he tells a sustained and climactic story of his hard-won battle with a single leopard. Leopards very rarely become man-eaters, but those few that do are the peers of the man-eating tigers in ferocity and possess an even greater cunning.

When the wedding of her oldest friend ends with a shocking murder, Dr Nell Ward is once again caught up in a web of subterfuge, secrets and lies... Dr Nell Ward is delighted when her childhood friend Percy announces she's engaged to handsome businessman Hawke McAnstruther - and rashly offers to...

After years of unexplained health problems, Polly Atkin's perception of her body was rendered fluid and disjointed. When she was finally diagnosed with two chronic conditions in her thirties, she began to piece together what had been happening to her - all the misdiagnoses, the fractures, the dislocations, the bone-crushing exhaustion, the not being believed. Some of Us Just Fall combines memoir, pathography and nature writing to trace a fascinating journey through illness, a journey which led Polly to her current home in the Lake District.

Sloths are the slowest mammals on earth. They can hardly see. They live in rainforests among jaguars, pumas, and countless other predators. Yet they survive. And they do it by being so incredibly slow, and living a life covered in algae. In this episode, we hang with a sloth in the jungle of Costa Rica as he spends a month digesting one single leaf, and we see the symbiosis and collaboration that surrounds him.

Written on the eve of the Second World War, this memoir tells the remarkable story of how 21-year-old Thomas Firbank decided on impulse to purchase a 2,400-acre hill farm in the rugged, inhospitable mountains of Snowdonia, and how he and his wife struggled to build it back into prosperity.

From the cave walls at Lascaux to the last painting by Van Gogh, from the works of Shakespeare to those of Mark Twain, there is clear evidence that crows and ravens influence human culture. Yet this influence is not unidirectional, say the authors of this fascinating book: people profoundly influence crow culture, ecology, and evolution as well. John Marzluff and Tony Angell examine the often surprising ways that crows and humans interact. The authors contend that those interactions reflect a process of "cultural coevolution." 

Bloomsbury presents Wild Woman written and read by Philippa Forrester. 'Deeply personal and poignant' BBC Countryfile An engaging blend of conservation stories and humorous, personal anecdotes from Philippa Forrester about women who, like her, choose to live and work in the wild. In Wild Woman...

Humans used to be embedded in the natural world, but today many of us live sedentary screen-based lives indoors, treating nature as something distant – to be watched on television or reached by flying elsewhere.

Bloomsbury presents Cornerstones by Benedict Macdonald, read by Joshua Picton. FINALIST IN THE PEOPLE'S BOOK PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION 2022/2023 – WRITTEN BY THE WAINWRIGHT-CONSERVATION-PRIZE-WINNING AUTHOR OF REBIRDING. Transform your understanding of the natural world forever and discover the...

Bloomsbury presents Spinosaur Tales by David Hone & Mark Witton, read by Gavin Osborn The spinosaurs – the dinosaur group that includes the largest land predator of all time, the awe-inspiring Spinosaurus – star in this cutting-edge review. The giant sail-backed carnivorous dinosaur...

Brought to you by Penguin. Join engineer Lucy Rogers in the timeless tradition of stargazers, cloud watchers, and dreamers – and let the skies inspire you. The sky is a world of endless wonder. From the intricate dance of clouds and the vibrant hues of the aurora borealis to the marvel of...

In this lyrical, radically expansive self-portrait, celebrated poet, author, and lecturer Sophie Strand explores—with searing insight and honesty—the intersecting spaces of her own chronic illness, the complex ecology of a changing world, and the very nature of the stories we tell ourselves...

He's climbed Everest not long after a heart bypass operation, he's run seven marathons on seven continents, he's hauled loaded sledges across both polar ice caps and he's circumnavigated the earth. Ran Fiennes truly is the world's greatest explorer, and this book celebrates his 80th birthday by showcasing his greatest achievements in his own words.

Brought to you by Penguin. Roger Deakin set out in 1996 to swim through the British Isles. The result a uniquely personal view of an island race and a people with a deep affinity for water. From the sea, from rock pools, from rivers and streams, tarns, lakes, lochs, ponds, lidos, swimming pools...

The British countryside is renowned for its natural beauty and diverse wildlife and any walk, whether it be in woodland, wetland or open country, is always accompanied by the varied songs and calls of our birdlife.

What is it like to be a dog? A bat? Or a dolphin? To find out, neuroscientist Gregory Berns and his team began with a radical step: they taught dogs to go into an MRI scanner - completely awake. They discovered what makes dogs individuals with varying capacities for self-control, different value systems, and a complex understanding of human speech. And dogs were just the beginning. In What It's Like to Be a Dog, Berns explores the fascinating inner lives of wild animals from dolphins and sea lions to the extinct Tasmanian tiger.

LONGLISTED FOR THE WAINWRIGHT PRIZE 2022 ‘A remarkable and powerful book, the rarest of things … Nicolson is unique as a writer … I loved it’ EDMUND DE WAAL Few places are as familiar as the shore – and few as full of mystery and surprise. How do sandhoppers inherit an inbuilt compass...