Books
The TTW book club ‘Bookworms’ started meeting in September 2022. The group meets every couple of months. It is a lovely mix of the social, (there’s usually wine, tea and cake), and literary, with a bit of education thrown in. The books and themes chosen for discussion tend to focus on ecological subjects, but there has been a significant variety of styles and genres. ‘Rebirding’ by Benedict MacDonald, for example, is an inspiring book that doesn’t just lament the decline of British wildlife, but offers a vision of how things could be, with plans for how working with nature would actually make sense for the economy. Another of our choices, ’H is for Hawk’, is a personal memoir by Helen Macdonald, about her recovery from the grief of losing her father by immersing herself in training a goshawk. An unusual theme but a gripping read.
Bookworms
In addition to the books mentioned above, we have reviewed ‘Entangled Life’ by Merlin Sheldrake, ‘Regenesis’ by George Monbiot, ‘Rebugging the Planet’ by Vicki Hird and ‘What a Plant Knows’ by Daniel Chamovitz. Other books of interest include ‘Braiding Sweetgrass’ by Robin Wall Kimmerer who is both a scientist and a member of the Citizen Potawatoni Nation. She speaks of her hopes for an ‘integrated science’, where an objective scientific approach can be informed and enriched by indigenous wisdom and a more intuitive and spiritual way of relating to all of the natural world. In reading Braiding Sweetgrass one is taken on a journey that is mythic and sacred as well as providing a guide to the value of attentiveness to what is around us. Another is called ‘Wanderland’ by Jini Reddy, which is about a young woman’s search for ‘the magical in the landscape’. So the theme of that meeting was about the spirituality that many of us find in nature and the way that this can deepen the scientific approach that has dominated most of our education in western culture.
Another Bookworms session was when we invited people to bring books that meant something special to them as children. These included The Secret Garden, Winnie the Pooh, Tom’s Secret Garden and several others. People found them meaningful as they conveyed a child’s enchantment with the natural world, something we tend to lose as we grow up.
The aim of our meetings is to provide a pleasant social atmosphere in which to talk about some of the more fascinating and deeper themes that underpin TTW’s work for nature. In Merlin Sheldrake’s ‘Entangled Life’, for example, he describes the way that all of the natural world, including humans, rely in some way on fungi for our existence, and we learn that, amazingly, fungi can solve problems and manipulate animal behaviour. One can easily end up wondering if it’s fungi that’s actually in charge of the world. You don’t need to have read the books, just come along and enjoy the discussion and pleasure of sharing ideas.
Previously reviewed books
‘Rebirding’ by Ben Macdonald
Rebirding is about all wildlife, not just birds, and looks at practical ways of how we can restore our landscapes and all our feathered, furry and invertebrate companions on the planet.
‘Regenisis’ by George Monbiot
Monbiot’s book is a controversial look at where life sciences could meet high-tech by making synthesised organisms in laboratories. Drawing on our knowledge of soil ecology, he describes the damage that the industrial model of farming has done to the soil and discusses how our changing understanding of the world beneath our feet could allow us to grow more food with less farming. This book is available as an audiobook.
‘Designing Regenerative Food Systems’ by Marina O’Connell
Marina O’Connell is a successful grower, farmer and educator, and has action- researched the use of biodynamic, organic, regenerative and agroforestry methods on her farm near Totnes. Her book describes exactly how she and her family have turned bare land into a productive, beautiful, community-connected and profitable farm. She is consulted by farmers all over the world asking her to help them undertake the successful transition to resilient food systems.
‘Feeding Britain’ by Tim Lang
Lang’s argument is that the food Britons eat is unhealthy, catastrophic for the environment, and reinforces inequality between rich and poor despite being unrealistically cheap. On top of this, the way it’s produced and delivered to us rewards the wrong people, leaving farmers dependent on subsidies, and relies too much on imports with long supply chains that are vulnerable to disruption. In short, it’s an unsustainable system. This book is available as an audiobook.
‘Entangled Life’ by Merlin Sheldrake
This extraordinary book brings into sharp focus how much fungi shape the world and all who live within it. It’s described by Robert Macfarlane as ‘dazzling, vibrant and vision-changing’, and by Helen Macdonald as a book that ‘can truly change the way you see the world around you’. Definitely a ‘must read’ option for one’s book list. This book is available as an audiobook.
‘Rebugging the Planet’ by Vicki Hird
This book not only details the dreadful decline in insects but shows us how beautiful, inventive and economically invaluable they are, pollinating plants, feeding birds, defending crops and cleaning water systems. But not enough is being done to prevent the destruction of these little allies and describes how we can all help to create the space they need to flourish.
‘What a Plant Knows’ by Daniel Chamovitz & ‘Thus Spoke the Plant’ by Monica Gagliano
These intriguing books explore how, in their own way, plants experience our shared Earth, through sight, smell, touch, hearing, memory and awareness. We are all more similar than we might realise
‘H is for Hawk’ by Helen Macdonald
This remarkable, beautifully written book is hard to categorise. One reviewer, Rachel Cooke, says: “ I can’t remember the last time a book made me feel so many different things in such quick succession.” A simple description is that it’s a memoir of the author’s way of grieving the death of her father, but within that format is woven her extraordinary connection to nature through training that wildest of birds, a goshawk. A book that’s hard to put down. This book is available as an audiobook.
‘Gathering Moss’ Robin Wall Kimmerer
This author is both trained scientist and a Citizen of the Potawatomi Nation, and through her writing shows how the factual, objective approach of science can be enriched by the ancient knowledge and deep wisdom of indigenous people. In her blend of botany and Native American mythology she guides us towards a more attentive approach to everything around us. This book is available as an audiobook.
‘Braiding Sweetgrass’ by Robin Wall Kimmerer
In this inspirational book, Hopkins, the founder of the international Transition Towns movement encourages us to think imaginatively and creatively about the future we’d like have and how we might achieve it. By unleashing the power of imagination he suggests ways we can revive and reclaim the direction and potential of our communities. This book is available as an audiobook.
‘What Is to What If’ by Rob Hopkins
In this inspirational book, Hopkins, the founder of the international Transition Towns movement encourages us to think imaginatively and creatively about the future we’d like have and how we might achieve it. By unleashing the power of imagination he suggests ways we can revive and reclaim the direction and potential of our communities.
‘Dirt to Soil’ by Gabe Brown
This book could hardly be more timely, as many farmers are beginning to see the problems and damage to the land that the industrial farming method is causing, and so are beginning to move towards a self-renewing, regenerative farming system. In his book Gabe Brown provides us with his complete story of how he made this transition and the way that it has radically improved the quality of the soil and therefore the nutritional value of his produce in a remarkable way.
‘Sound’ by Bela Bathurst
When Bella Bathurst began to go deaf, she felt that she wasn’t just missing the punchlines in jokes, she was missing most of the conversation. For the next twelve years deafness shaped her life, until, in 2009, everything changed again. Sound draws on this extraordinary experience, exploring what it is like to lose your hearing and – as Bella eventually did – to get it back, and what that teaches you about listening and silence, music and noise. In this engaging text, Bela provides insights into our relationship with sound and reveals how it is not only personal, but far more complex than we might expect.
‘Birdsong in the Time of Silence’ by Steven Lovett
As the world went silent in lockdown, something else happened; for the first time, many of us started becoming more aware of the spring sounds of the birds around us. Birdsong in a Time of Silence explores the uplifting way these sounds affect us. Steven also looks at how birds sing, the science behind their choice of song and nest-sites, and the varied meanings that people have brought to and taken from birdsong. It is the story of a collective reawakening brought on by the strangest of springs. This book is available as an audiobook.
‘The Nightingale’ by John Clare
In these poems we looked at the way a love of nature, and in particular an attachment to the nightingale, has been expressed by different poets. What is it about poetry that, for many people, seems to get to an emotional centre in such an effective way?
‘The Nightingale’s Nest’ by John Clare
Book review will appear here if available
‘Ode to a Nightingale’ by John Keats
Book review will appear here if available
‘The poetry’ of Mary Oliver:
Mary Oliver has been described (by Maxine Kumin) as an “indefatigable guide to the natural world.” Personally, I would say that she is that plus a guide for us to make the most of being alive in nature and to live our best lives. In her famous poem, “A Summer’s Day”, she writes: “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
‘The Wilderness Cure’ by Mo Wilde
Mo spends a year living only on foraged food as an experiment, expecting scarcity and hardship but instead finding abundance. She expresses something very wise and beautiful about our relationship with the Earth and ends the year feeling that the algae, animals, plants and fungi that sustained her are her ‘kin’. This book is available as an audiobook.
‘Late Light’ by Michael Malay
This was a special session as the author himself joined us. His prizewinning book is a mix of nature writing and memoir and explores the richness and variety of our animal neighbours. Michael explores the parallels between his own life and that of the animals, with themes to do with migration, belonging and extinction. This book is available as an audiobook.
‘Late Light’ by Michael Malay
This was a special session as the author himself joined us. His prizewinning book is a mix of nature writing and memoir and explores the richness and variety of our animal neighbours. Michael explores the parallels between his own life and that of the animals, with themes to do with migration, belonging and extinction. This book is available as an audiobook.
‘The Serviceberry’ by Robin Wall Kimmerer
‘The Serviceberry’ is a slim, beautifully written volume that explores ’the gift economy’, a way of living that involves a culture of reciprocity and gratitude rather than competition and self-interest. In other words RWK asks us to reconsider our relationships of exchange with each other and with the planet, and to think about developing a way of living based on generosity and gratitude. She describes how this works in indigenous societies where the gift economy provides for everyone.
Our current capitalist system in the West is not going to disappear overnight, however much damage and devastation it is causing, but this book does provide a gently radical view of a very different direction that we might explore. This book is available as an audiobook.
‘How Animals Heal Us’ by Jay Griffiths
Review to follow
This book is available as an audiobook.
‘A Year with Gilbert White’ by Jenny Uglow
Jenny Uglow refers to Gilbert White as one of the first great nature writers and ‘father of ecology’, and her book was acclaimed as ‘Book of the Year’ by many reviewers. She describes White as being a ‘philosophical muser’, rather than an aspirational scientist and says that his was a ‘new kind of writing… imbued with such feeling’, linking his scholarly knowledge with everyday observation of ‘frost, seeds, birds, trees, insects, clouds and bees’.
‘Deer Man’ by Geoffroy Delorme
This is about the seven years that Delorme lived in the wild, a time in which he formed a very close connection with the deer who lived there. Jane Goodall praises the book, calling it “unusual and fascinating” and describing it as an opportunity to “enter into another world.”
’Raising Hare’ by Chloe Dalton
An exquisitely written memoir of when Dalton rescues a baby hare, a leveret, and raises it to adulthood. The book chronicles the extraordinary relationship between human and animal, and the way that it rekindles Dalton’s sense of awe towards nature and wildlife.
Podcasts & audiobooks
If you are doing a manual task that doesn’t require too much brain power.. driving perhaps? Weeding the garden? Painting the walls et cetera, then why not tune into one of these podcasts? There is a plethora of interesting information… Regenerative farming, nature, mycelium, global warming, invasive species, processed foods, dreaming of beautiful interconnected wildlife friendly futures but to name a few topics…
Please note: This section is still under construction, it probably won’t work on all devices. We would love your feedback or recommendations for new pods!
If you think recycling is boring, think again. James and Robbie are here to prove that recycling is not only important but also downright hilarious. Ever wondered what happens to the lime in a recycled Corona bottle? Or, why a cucumber needs to be wrapped in plastic? The answers may surprise you.
Exploring the uncut, uncorked, unleashed truths behind the work that our soil, livestock, plants, and people are doing to tackle climate change and save our planet whilst creating nutrient-dense food and injecting life back into our rural communities. It’s simpler than you may think, completely traceable, and 100% verified. Join us on our journey and conversation about the healing power of Six Inches of Soil, and tap into the community our film screenings have created.
If there was ever a time for fresh thinking, for being bold, for being visionary and imaginative – for reimagining everything – this is it. Each episode, writer and Transition Movement founder, Rob Hopkins, invites cutting edge thinkers to visualise a new future. Join us as we ask What If…
Farmerama Radio is an award-winning podcast sharing the voices behind regenerative farming. We are committed to positive ecological futures for the earth and its people, and we believe that farmers of the world will determine this. Each month, we share the experiences of grass roots farmers instigating radical change for the future of our food, our health, and the planet.
TONAL – Rivers Beyond Sewage explores water issues nationally with a special focus on the River Tone in Somerset. Through riverside conversations with people who have different and profound relationships with water Feral Practice leads us on a deep dive into the politics, law, art and science of rivers with curiosity and humour. There is more information on our water page
Inspiration to help you garden the organic way, with advice, tips and interviews from the UK’s leading organic gardening organisation, Garden
Organic. Hosted by Fiona Taylor and Chris Collins.
The podcast dedicated to everything electric. Here we will be discussing everything to do with electric travel, so whether it be cars, bikes, scooters, boats or planes, rest assured we’ve got it covered. You can also expect regular guests from within the industry, reviews of electric cars, electric motorsport coverage and a few surprises here and there.
The regenerative agriculture podcast is a show for professional growers and agronomists who want to learn about the science and principles of regenerative agriculture systems to increase quality, yield, and profitability.
The No-Till Growers Podcast Network (formerly known as The No-Till Market Garden Podcast) is a nuts and bolts (and earthworms and microbes) look at how to run a productive, profitable no-till market garden for small and mid-sized farmers. It’s also where you can hear everything else about what No-Till Growers can produce.
The environment and wildlife show returns with a celebration of the humble microbe. Tom Heap and Helen Czerski are joined by a ‘microbe explorer’ who travels to some of the Earth’s most hostile environments in search of microbes with a huge appetite for carbon dioxide. They also be visit the crop trial field station of Imperial College London where researchers are studying changes to bacteria in soil that could help agriculture and the environment.
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