I’m a postgraduate researcher working in ecology and conservation science, and I’m looking for book recommendations that sit somewhere between popular science and academic non-fiction.
I really enjoy Redmond O’Hanlon’s travel writing – the strong narrative voice combined with deep dives into ecology, species, and wild landscapes. I like learning about plants and animals in context, through story and field experience rather than through a purely didactic structure.
I’ve also enjoyed W.H. Hudson’s Far Away and Long Ago for similar reasons – immersive natural history, close observation, a strong sense of place and an interesting social history.
I’m looking for something high-level, but not a textbook. Ideally, it would combine ecological insight (plants and/or animals), interesting habitats, and human experience in the field. Any suggestions appreciated.
by DanM1234
1 Comment
**Field Notes From A Hidden City, by Esther Woolfson.**
This is a book about the time the author decided to create a detailed field journal – over the course of a year, she wanted to observe and record the behaviour, development and variation of animals, plants and meteorological conditions in a defined area, which in her case was the environment around her home. You know what field journals are. You’ve probably done at least one yourself.
But. But, but, but…
Esther Woolfson lives in the middle of Aberdeen. Her environment is an **urban** one, so the patch of environment she’s observing includes things like city pigeons, the spiders in her kitchen, the weeds that sprout from the pavement just outside. The trees in her local park.
I thought this was a beautiful, thoughtful book about having a meaningful relationship with the natural world in any context. You do not necessarily need access to pure wilderness to touch a little of the wild.