The Plodcast

Meet nature writer and campaigner Hannah Bourne-Taylor who hit the news in recent weeks after walking from Hyde Park Corner to the Houses of Parliament to call for urgent action to help our declining swifts. So what you might ask? Well, Hannah walked the two miles naked, covered only in paintings of feathers…We met up in a forgotten woodland in South Wales to about her extraordinary “Feather Speech” – and to go looking for wildlife.Find out more at Hannah's website.Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: editor@countryfile.com. If read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.comPPA Podcast of the Year!Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You wake in the small village of Butterton in the Staffordshire Peak District. With the window of the cottage set ajar, you return to bed, rest your head on the pillow and listen as the village slowly wakes. The brook plays like the wind in the trees, which in turn mimics the brook. Blackbirds trill. A garden gate clunks. A milk truck crosses the ford.BBC Countryfile Magazine's Sound Escapes are a weekly audio postcard from the countryside to help you relax and transport you somewherebeautiful, wherever you happen to be. Recorded by Daniel Graham, presented by Hannah Tribe. Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: editor@countryfile.com Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Explore a wild and craggy stretch of the Anglesey coast path with Plodcast host Fergus as he wanders in search of rare choughs and curlews.Later, in the studio, the team discuss the good, bad and ugly of Bonfire Night. Is this traditional UK festival of fire and fireworks a big problem for pets and wildlife?Image from Getty.Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: editor@countryfile.com. If read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.comPPA Podcast of the Year!Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Come with us to the gentle pasturelands that link the summit of Y Fal with the bustle of Grwyne Fawr far below. Pause a while amid the patchwork of sheep field, farmyard and hedgerow, and a version of bliss envelopes you; a light wind picks hazel leaves from the hedge and sends them down the lane. BBC Countryfile Magazine's Sound Escapes are a weekly audiopostcard from the countryside to help you relax and transport you somewherebeautiful, wherever you happen to be.Recorded by Daniel Graham, presented by Hannah Tribe. Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of thecountryside – to: editor@countryfile.com Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com PPA Podcast of the Year 2022 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we’re off to the Hebridean island of Tiree, a stronghold of one of Britain’s rarest and strangest birds. Naturalist James Fair heads out into the wilds to search for the corncrake with local expert John Bowler of the RSPB. It’s a bird not famed for its looks – but it’s voice – well, that’s a different matter.Back in the studio, the team enjoy a very eerie sound of the week – recorded deep in an ancient burial mound.Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: editor@countryfile.com. If read out on the show, you could win a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.comPPA Podcast of the Year!Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On the southern flanks of the Usk Valley beneath the damp uplands of Mynydd Llangatwg are the remnants of an old limestone quarry. Paths slink between the stepped hillside, now a miscellany of meadow, scrub and tree. When rain falls, the stunted hazel and oak woods are a joy to be among.BBC Countryfile Magazine's Sound Escapes are a weekly audio postcard from the countryside to help you relax and transport you somewhere beautiful, wherever you happen to be.Recorded by Daniel Graham, presented by Hannah Tribe.Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: editor@countryfile.comVisit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.comPPA Podcast of the Year 2022 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Now the clocks have gone back in the UK and we’re heading into the dark days of winter it feels like a good time to let a burst of light and song into our lives. So this week we’re heading back to spring and an adventure I took in the New Forest with naturalist Dominic Couzens.Dominic is brilliant at recognising birds by their song and he give some clever tips to help you learn them too – a neat trick for impressing friends and family on your next spring walk. Image by Getty.Look out for Dominic's new book An Identification Guide to Garden Insects of BritainBack in the studio, the Plodcast team 'interview' The British Cheese Awards Supreme Champion cheese and discuss how to cope with the dark nights of winter.Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: editor@countryfile.com. If read out on the show, you could win a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.comPPA Podcast of the Year!Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To be in an autumn woodland after rain is a tonic for a great many ills. Perhaps it’s the simple joy of the leaves so lustrous with rainwater, or the way the mosses swell like lungs. Or the maybe it’s the scent of the Earth – of leaf litter and microbes and fruiting fungi – that seems to connect the ground with the air, and thus you with all of it. It’s certain that the streams appear contented.A short walk through woodland brings you to a small waterway, where you pause for a while and breathe it all in.BBC Countryfile Magazine's Sound Escapes are a weekly audio postcard from the countryside to help you relax and transport you somewhere beautiful, wherever you happen to be.Recorded by Daniel Graham, presented by Hannah Tribe. Image from Getty.Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: editor@countryfile.comVisit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.comPPA Podcast of the Year 2022 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Jenny Agutter has been a household name since her starring role in the 1970 film The Railway Children. This year, she reprises her role in The Railway Children Return, set 30 years later in 1940. Hear all about her connections to the countryside and her very surprising choice of favourite wildlife species.Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: editor@countryfile.com. If read out on the show, you could win a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.comPPA Podcast of the Year!Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You open the back door and look out into the garden. Rain streaks down, steady and hypnotic. From a bush a robin sparks up occasionally but nothing else stirs in the downpour. It's a day to cosy up indoors by the fire.BBC Countryfile Magazine's Sound Escapes are a weekly audio postcard from the countryside to help you relax and transport you somewhere beautiful, wherever you happen to be.Recorded by Maria Hodson, presented by Hannah Tribe. Image from Getty.Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: editor@countryfile.comVisit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.comPPA Podcast of the Year 2022 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices