Wild Voices Project

Louie Psihoyos is a Greek-American filmmaker, photographer and director. He began his career as one of the first new photographers that National Geographic had hired in several years. He is perhaps best known as the Director of The Cove, about the slaughter of dolphins in Japan, which won an Oscar in 2010. He has also made the film Racing Extinction, about the sixth global mass extinction. And he’s currently working on The Gamechangers with James Cameron, a film about vegan super athletes due out later this year. He’s also the Founder and Chief Executive of the Oceanic Preservation Society which works to bring together artists and activists to protect the oceans and the planet.

In the course of this conversation we talk about how Louie pioneered a new form of environmental journalism when he was at National Geographic, how a chance meeting with Stephen Spielberg, and a passion for dinosaurs, ignited an interest in extinction, and why he believes that a plant-based diet is the best for our health, our wallets and the planet. This is a fascinating conversation with one of the world’s leading environmental filmmakers and advocates.

The Wild Voices Project podcast tells the stories of people saving nature. We are part of WILDVoices media, a global production team bridging emerging storytellers with aspiring environmental professionals. Find out more about us at wildvoicesproject.org. Learn more about the global community at wild-voices.org.

Dr James Borrell (@James_Borrell) is a conservationist, explorer, scientist and communicator.

He describes himself as a conservation biologist who has been involved in expeditions and fieldwork around the world. His main interests are the impacts of habitat fragmentation and of climate change on species.

He’s known for his uncompromising and challenging attitude towards conservation orthodoxies and practices. You can read many of his opinions on conservation on the blog on his website (http://www.jamesborrell.com/). And you can watch his brilliant TEDx talk on optimism in conservation here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lJg4GEjj6M.

During this episode we cover why optimism plays such an important role in his conservation outlook, why James thinks we shouldn’t be spending our money and time trying to protect wildlife in the UK. He reminisces about his early expeditions to Madagascar and talks about the important role expeditions and exploring can play in forming new conservationists and he explains why he thinks more healthy disagreement is what’s needed to help secure environmental progress. James is one of the most well-rounded guests I’ve had the pleasure to interview and this is a really good conversation.

The Wild Voices Project podcast tells the stories of people saving nature. We are part of WILDVoices media, a global production team bridging emerging storytellers with aspiring environmental professionals. Find out more about us at wildvoicesproject.org. Learn more about the global community at wild-voices.org.

This conversation was recorded by Kate Snowdon (https://kateonconservation.com/ and @KateConsrvation) and kindly shared with the Wild Voices Project podcast. It’s a conversation with the renowned international conservationist Dr Jane Goodall. Jane is best known for her work studying chimps in Gombi which she did predominantly with National Geographic in the 1960s. She was the first person to observe chimps in the wild using tools which redefined the way we saw chimps, and humans in relation to them.

Kate was lucky enough to talk to Jane about her time in Gombi, as well as about Roots & Shoots (https://www.rootsnshoots.org.uk/), which is a major part of Jane Goodall’s life today. She works with education groups across the globe in over 100 countries to put together projects and programmes related to the environment, people and wildlife. This conversation was recorded at the 2017 global Roots & Shoots summit.

A huge thanks to Kate for sharing this audio with us, and it’s likely that Kate will be bringing us a few more interviews in the future.

The Wild Voices Project podcast tells the stories of people saving nature. We are part of WILDVoices media, a global production team bridging emerging storytellers with aspiring environmental professionals. Find out more about us at wildvoicesproject.org. Learn more about the global community at wild-voices.org.

A few weeks ago I was lucky enough to be invited to ‘curate the BBC’s Tweet of the Week’ archive. This meant I was given the chance to introduce the Tweet of the Day (daily birdsong) on BBC Radio 4 for two weeks. This was an incredible opportunity and I’d like to say a big thank you to Andrew Dawes, the Tweet of the Week producer, who invited me.

This episode is a little behind the scenes glance at my day at BBC Radio Bristol. I managed to record a conversation with Andrew, a seasoned natural history producer, as well as with Emily Knight (@EmilyPKnight) and Becky Ripley (@Becky_Ripley), the presenters of the amazing Blue Planet II podcast. The Blue Planet II podcast is incredibly informative and fun and well worth having a listen to.

You can hear the podcasts of my Tweet of the Week here (https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p068w3tf) and here (https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p069jt4n) on the BBC website.

The Wild Voices Project podcast tells the stories of people saving nature. We are part of WILDVoices media, a global production team bridging emerging storytellers with aspiring environmental professionals. Find out more about us at wildvoicesproject.org. Learn more about the global community at wild-voices.org.

In this conversation I talk to Ashley Bell (@AshMichaelBell), actress and director of a new film about the plight of the Asian elephant. We discuss the little-known story of the threats to Asian elephants, whose numbers are far fewer than those of the African elephant. Ashley talks about the process of producing the film and working with renowned Asian conservationist Lek Chailert, and she also explains what lessons and techniques she took from her work in horror movies into producing an environmental documentary.

Ashley Bell is a film, television and theatre actress. She won an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best Actress for her role in The Last Exorcism as well as an MTV Movie Award. Ashley wrote, directed and produced the feature-length documentary Love and Bananas: An Elephant Story (http://loveandbananas.com/ or @LoveandBananas), and she’s a US Ambassador for Cruelty Free International.

The Wild Voices Project podcast tells the stories of people saving nature. We are part of WILDVoices media, a global production team bridging emerging storytellers with aspiring environmental professionals. Find out more about us at wildvoicesproject.org. Learn more about the global community at wild-voices.org.

This conversation is with scientist and primate expert Erin Kane (@Diana_monkey). In the course of this podcast we talk about Erin’s work on Diana monkeys in Côte d’Ivoire and her work on orangutans in Borneo. We discuss her research findings on monkeys, collecting poo samples and how dancing helped her build up confidence for fieldwork. We also cover the cognitive load and impact of sexual harassment faced by many women in the scientific setting and in fieldwork settings.

Erin Kane (https://erinelizkane.net/) is a postdoctoral research associate at Boston University, working with Dr. Cheryl Knott on a project examining life history influences on orangutan feeding ecology in Gunung Palung National Park, West Kalimantan, Indonesia, with an emphasis on nutritional and endocrine analysis. She completed her PhD at Ohio State University in 2017. Her dissertation examined the social, ecological, and reproductive consequences of seasonal changes in food availability for Diana monkeys living in Taï National Park, Côte d’Ivoire. She is broadly interested in understanding primate responses to fluctuating food availability, particularly from socioecological, endocrine, and morphological perspectives. She also aims to make anthropology and primatology more inclusive and accessible sciences for a diverse group of scientists. When Erin isn't in a rain forest chasing primates and collecting their urine and feces, she loves taking ballet and spending time with her fantastic cat, Triceratops.

The Wild Voices Project podcast tells the stories of people saving nature. We are part of WILDVoices media, a global production team bridging emerging storytellers with aspiring environmental professionals. Find out more about us at wildvoicesproject.org. Learn more about the global community at wild-voices.org.

Dr Richard Benwell (@RSBenwell) is a policy advisor at the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. He’s former Head of Government Affairs for the Wildfowl and Wetland Trust (which is the role he was in at the time of this interview).

In this conversation we discuss how we can restore our waterways to good health, why regulation, policy and legislation are so important for our wildlife, how Brexit can be an opportunity to increase environmental protection and his advice on the skills that are needed for a career in environmental politics.

Richard is a good friend and we’ve worked together over a number of years, particularly when we were both working at the RSPB. So it was really good fun to interview him for the podcast. He’s one of the most eloquent, well-informed and friendly people I know in the environmental movement.

The Wild Voices Project podcast tells the stories of people saving nature. We are part of WILDVoices media, a global production team bridging emerging storytellers with aspiring environmental professionals. Find out more about us at wildvoicesproject.org. Learn more about the global community at wild-voices.org.

Hannah Fraser is the world’s leading underwater dancer and mermaid. Hannah uses her incredible abilities to create breathtaking photos and videos drawing attention to the plight of marine wildlife.

In fact Hannah Fraser (or Hannah Mermaid (@HannahMermaid) as she also likes to be called) created the vocation of 'freelance mermaid' and has been featured worldwide for her underwater ocean conservation and performance art, creating her own spectacular tails, performing for film, music videos, campaigns, photo shoots, public speaking events, festivals & environmental actions. She swims with sharks, whales dolphins, seals, turtles, rays and more in the open ocean.

Hannah can hold her breath for minutes at a time and freedive to depths of over 50 feet. She broke records as the first person to dance with Tiger Sharks on the ocean floor with no scuba or snorkel gear, and was part of an activist group who paddled out to protect dolphins from slaughter in the academy award winning film ’The Cove’.

She has worked with my previous guest, Shawn Heinrichs (underwater cameraman and photographer) and together they released a short film called Mantas Last Dance that propelled Manta rays into the public eye and helped pass a law to protect mantas worldwide.

She is an advocate for ocean protection, female empowerment, animal conservation and universal love!

In this incredible conversation we talk about where her passion for the oceans stems from, how she thinks we can reconnect with marine wildlife and of course she describes some of her incredible experiences dancing underwater with humpback whales, tiger sharks and manta rays.

You can find more about Hannah at her website www.hannahmermaid.com.

Here are just a few of her incredible videos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHY1gYZdyy0 (TEDx talk)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0Epc6v9Z5A

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SG1dzH_VFzY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q250FnLH74M

The Wild Voices Project podcast tells the stories of people saving nature. We are part of WILDVoices media, a global production team bridging emerging storytellers with aspiring environmental professionals. Find out more about us at wildvoicesproject.org. Learn more about the global community at wild-voices.org.

Joe Harkness (@birdtherapy) is a birdwatcher and blogger who focuses on the benefits of birdwatching for mental health. He runs the Bird Therapy blog (birdtherapy.blog) sharing these stories, and is currently fundraising to get his book on this topic published (unbound.com/books/bird-therapy).

This is a hugely powerful and important conversation about a tough topic that doesn’t get enough coverage. And I’m so grateful that Joe is taking it on in such a public and bold way. I’ve had personal experience of mental health issues and so it was a huge privilege to speak to Joe, whose writing I’ve been following for a few years. I’m really proud to publish this conversation with him.

In this conversation, which is gritty, raw and honest, we cover Joe’s battles with drugs and depression and he talks about his attempts to take his own life. And we also cover some amazing, beautiful and hilarious stories about birdwatching, and how rediscovering this passion helped him at one of his lowest moments.

The Wild Voices Project podcast tells the stories of people saving nature. We are part of WILDVoices media, a global production team bridging emerging storytellers with aspiring environmental professionals. Find out more about us at wildvoicesproject.org. Learn more about the global community at wild-voices.org.

This is a special episode of the podcast to coincide with International Dawn Chorus Day, which is celebrated in over 80 countries worldwide and has been running since the 1980s. It brings people together to listen to one of the most amazing spectacles in the natural world - the cacophony of birdsong at this time of year.

This episode is a short recording of a walk I did on this morning in early May, covering some of the birds I can hear at my local nature reserve. If you’re interested in hearing the dawn chorus, then you can go out and find it in your local garden, park, nature reserve or woodland. If you’d like to learn about birdsong or do it as part of a group then lots of organisations run birdsong and dawn chorus events, like the National Trust, the RSPB and the Wildlife Trusts.

As I promised during the episode, here are a few of the birds I heard and some of the more common ones you might hear if you go out and listen for yourself:

Blackcap https://bit.ly/2IgiD0J

Goldcrest https://bit.ly/2FNrfXm

Chiffchaff https://bit.ly/2HRYYFb

Song thrush https://bit.ly/2JSyfog

Blackbird https://bit.ly/2rnbH8l

Cuckoo https://bit.ly/2JXoZiG

Willow warbler https://bit.ly/2FNNtbY

Great tit https://bit.ly/2FLDcwU

Skylark https://bit.ly/2rmhRWs

Robin https://bit.ly/2rpVyOI

Whitethroat https://bit.ly/2jySSe3

The Wild Voices Project podcast tells the stories of people saving nature. We are part of WILDVoices media, a global production team bridging emerging storytellers with aspiring environmental professionals. Find out more about us at wildvoicesproject.org. Learn more about the global community at wild-voices.org.