#580: Nature's Heartbeat

Ben Hennig has produced a range of maps on the Worldmapper website and also on his own blog.

Some of them are animated.

Nature's heartbeat visualises the Earth "breathing in and out" through the year.

See the cartogram here (PDF download) from Geographical magazine.

#579: Natural History Reading List #26: Fenland Nature

A cross-posting from my GeoLibrary blog, which currently features over 700 books.

This was picked up in Topping Books just before the summer 2025. It's a really detailed and comprehensive guide to the nature to be found in the Fens. It's a book to dip into rather than read cover to cover, with chapters exploring different aspects of the Fenland landscape.

There are lots of excellent photographs, mostly taken by the authors themselves, who have certainly put in the legwork and mileage to cover the region they are writing about.

Publisher's description:

This book showcases the natural history and landscape of the Fens, an area now responsible for a third of Britain’s food production and worth over £3 billion to the economy every year. It describes the geology and geography across the Fenland Basin over the last 14,000 years, a period dominated by the flux of wetlands and movement of water. The human relationship with this landscape is traced through history: from Mesolithic hunters to the prosperity of a medieval economy based on the currency of eels, through the taming and draining of the vast wetlands, to modern farming on an industrial scale.

While recognising that only a fraction of the Fens is left, Fenland Nature celebrates the breadth of wildlife still to be found in the region, from vast flocks of visiting wildfowl in the winter months, to rare and specialised plants and insects – all illustrated with detailed and evocative photographs.

The book concludes by contemplating an uncertain future where there are possibilities for a sustainable agricultural industry alongside increasing biodiversity, requiring new ways of thinking and working with the land. The fenland landscape is a microcosm of the huge global challenges caused by habitat loss, ecological degradation and climate change. If solutions can be found to these complex issues in the Fens, then there is hope that these can also apply to similar places across the world.

It's written by two local authors who really know their local patch well. A great coffee table / browsing book.

A good review by Mark Avery.

It sits nicely with my other Fenland books - dipped into to inform my teaching about the local area.

My copy was published by Pelagic Publishing.

Paperback, 376pp

ISBN: 9781784274108

#578: Deepdale Podcast

I am fortunate enough to live close to the North Norfolk coast. I used to live on the coast itself at Snettisham for 12 years which allowed me to cycle to the beach. 

On the edge of the village is Ken Hill, which has latterly become a venue for Springwatch and a regenerative farm.

The Deepdale Podcast is now live, and there are several posts which would be of interest.

#577: Natural History Reading List #25: 'How to read a Tree'

Another really useful book by navigation expert Tristan Gooley.

I have a signed copy of his previous book: 'The Natural Explorer'

This book explores what a tree can tell us about the landscape. It says a great deal about the value of trees and how they interact with the soil, atmosphere, weather and biodiversity. They influence the drainage and fertility of the soil, and can also tell us a lot about where we are, and how the landscape is changing.

The loss of a tree can touch millions, as we saw with the felling of the Sycamore Gap tree.

It would make a useful book to add to the library for those who are considering work in local woodlands for fieldwork. We are still waiting to see to what extent woodlands are featured in the final specification.

My thinking would be that the final specification would involve students investigating a range of ecosystems and the value of a tree is something which students should certainly be asked to consider, perhaps when thinking about the wider 'value' of nature in our lives and landscapes.

Published by Hodder Press

Paperback, 320pp

ISBN: 978-1529339628

#576: The path more travelled

 I'm currently reading Nicholas Crane's new book on the history of Britain's footpaths: how they came about originally following the drowning of Doggerland, and were then refined by successive waves of change: horses, the Roman invasion etc. It's a dense and scholarly work, with plenty of points of interest and relevance to geographers exploring the connections between people and the landscape.

He's taking his book on the road in a series of talks, with three confirmed so far. Here's the description for his talk at Stanford's book shop at the end of the month. He's also speaking in Exeter and Stamford.

Walking is a cornerstone of British identity and the most popular form of exercise in the UK. But how much do we know about the paths that we walk? What is their history? Why do they follow the routes that they do? Are they permanent? Can we designate more of them?​

The Path More Travelled is a coast-to-coast history of footpaths from the stone age paths walked by migrants 12,000 years to the industrial revolution and the birth of map and walking apps – from beloved writer and broadcaster Nicholas Crane.​

In The Path More Travelled, acclaimed geographer and writer Nicholas Crane explores this coast-to-coast web that is both ancient and futuristic. Starting with the stone age paths walked by European migrants 12,000 years ago, he traces their development - from early pilgrim paths and coffin tracks, through to the industrial revolution and the birth of the bicycle and car, sat-nav and walking apps. We discover how land-grabbing Norman barons set a precedent for the enclosure of our countryside, and how out of the ashes of World War Two came our beloved national parks. 

Along the way, Crane takes the reader on some of his most memorable walks, including the Hadrian's Wall Path, the outer reaches of the Cairngorms, and the banks of the Severn where he discovers footprints from over 7,000 years ago.​
​
From one of our most beloved travel writers, The Path More Travelled is a passionate ode to footpaths and a call to rediscover this most fundamental part of our landscape.

Book a ticket here.

#575: Happy Birthday Sir David!

On David Attenborough's 100th birthday.

 

A century of storytelling and curiosity...

 

#574: Rewilding Britain

 Rewilding Britain is an organisation which is aiming to rewild large parts of the country .

What is rewilding?

Will this be a focus for the GCSE Natural History specification in the end?

They say:

Rewilding is the large-scale restoration of ecosystems to the point where nature can take care of itself. It has a vital role to play in the challenges we face. In the world we want to see, we all recognise and take responsibility for this. We all understand that we’re part of nature and not separate from it, that we can only thrive if nature thrives.

Rewilding re-establishes natural processes and allows them to lead the way, free from set outcomes and fixed end points. It encourages the return of threatened and missing species and embraces the ebb and flow of nature, allowing animals, plants, birds and the elements to shape our landscapes and habitats over time. Acceptance over dominance is vital in the world we want to see.

#573: The Atacama's fashion graveyard

Where do your old clothes to to? You might be surprised.

A BBC Assignment programme explores a clothing graveyard which started to develop outside the town of Alto Hospicio in northern Chile, in the Atacama Desert.

Available on BBC Sounds.

Chile’s Atacama Desert is one of the driest places on earth – often likened to Mars. It’s also home to piles of dumped clothes from fast fashion labels across the world. Because it’s so dry nothing decomposes. And that means that clothes ditched 10 to 20 years ago still look recognisable. Sometimes the mountains of clothes are burnt causing toxic fumes which harm the local community of Alto Hospicio.

This environmental crisis has been going on for years. It’s a complex situation with multiple players involved. But different groups are starting to take action.

For Assignment, Jane Chambers travels to the Atacama Desert to meet activists and locals trying to raise awareness. An enormous giant – El Gigante Vestido – is being created in the desert out of used clothes to get people talking.

We’ll hear if Chile’s authorities, businesses, activists and members of the local community are doing enough to make a significant difference to the clothes crisis.

Producer: Jane Chambers
Sound engineer: Neil Churchill
Production co-ordinator: Katie Morrison
Editor: Penny Murphy

(Photo: El Gigante Vestido, a huge replica of the Gigante de Tarapacá built out of used t-shirts by architects Andrés Echeverría and Victoria García to raise awareness of the clothes being dumped in the Atacama Desert. Credit: Andrés Díaz)

This connects with the organisation that was set up by local residents to recycle some of the clothing, much of which has now been burnt.

I show this France 24 piece...

#572: Natural History Playlist #5: Hedgerow

A lovely song by the progressive rock band: Big Big Train.

The closing track on their 2012 album 'English Electric Part One' which really grew their audience.

Tell me do you know the song of the hedgerow?

I love the repeated refrain at the end of the song, and the brass bands tone...

Song thrush, yellowhammer
Lacewings, ladybirds
Fox earths, rabbit warrens
Badger's sets, partridge nests

Rose hips, haw berries
Hedgerow, dry stone
Dog rose, honeysuckle
Blackbirds, red wing

#571: Live Ospreycam

One resource that may be used when preparing to teach the GCSE Natural History will be webcams or streams which show wildlife and environments. I can imagine creating a wall of webcams.

The Norfolk Wildlife Trust has shared a new live webcam of an osprey pair who successfully fledged two chicks at NWT Ranworth Broad and Marshes in 2025, making the nature reserve the first known site in the region to make a home for breeding osprey in hundreds of years.

Just before the birds returned this spring, NWT carefully installed a wildlife camera that offers views into the nest the pair used in 2025, which will be streamed online thanks to support from NWT corporate partners, MelBek.

The avian couple returned to Ranworth Broad nature reserve in late March, making 2026 the fourth consecutive year that the site has welcomed a pair of osprey. They settled back into the same nest site as last year, within close sight of the new camera.
The osprey pair has already been seen settling into life in Norfolk, feathering their nest, hunting for fish, and laid three eggs! 

Watch the live camera stream to stay updated on their journey.

I've been a member of the Norfolk Wildlife Trust for over 25 years. You can join them here for just a small monthly fee which gives access to all of their reserves including the place that started it all: Cley next the Sea.