The Plodcast

Swollen by winter rains, a tiny stream, known as a rill, swarms almost vertically down a cleft in the hillside. As you listen from a bridge above, the stream feels alive, its cleansing sound washing away all weariness.

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 Sarah Williams, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Enjoy a wander and deep dive into some of the big issues facing our wild world with zoologist and BBC tv presenter Gillian Burke during a beautiful walk along the Cornish coast near Falmouth.

Gillian hosts her own podcast If I Ruled the World which explores big ideas and big themes, looking at the challenges facing the modern world and finding potential solutions. Listen on for a fascinating discussion.

If I Ruled the World is available on all good podcast providers.

The BBC Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme tune was written and performed by Blair Dunlop

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Early morning on the farm and a song thrush's strident spring call rises above the chatter of starlings and jackdaws. Beautiful and haunting in the cool morning air, the clear notes herald warmer, longer days.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Join intrepid folk duo Ninebarrow (Jon Whitley and Jay Labouchardiere) for a Plodcast wander over Ballard Down to Old Harry Rocks on the coast of Dorset. Along the way, they sing and play some of their song to evoke landscape, nature and old legends. Pure, unmissable magic.

See more of Ninebarrow on their Wandering Minstrels YouTube channel – and listen to their music on Spotify, Apple and other streaming services.

The BBC Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme tune was written and performed by Blair Dunlop

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's a bright morning on the Falmouth seafront after a week of rain and wind. The air is still, the sunshine warm, yet the sea is still full of storm energy and crashes on the shore, followed by a seethe of pebbles as the waves retreat.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We climb a little-known hill in the Bannau Brycheiniog (Brecon Beacons) called Allt yr Esgair to search for a mysterious tower lost in the woods. Who built it and why was it abandoned? Join us for a Plodcast of exploration, with wildlife encounters and signs of spring along the way.

The BBC Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme tune was written and performed by Blair Dunlop

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

After three days of snow and deep cold, a westerly weather front has swept in – a warm breath to thaw the frozen landscape. You stop outdoors among chirruping redwings, transfixed by the steady drip of meltwater and falls of slush from barn roofs and hedgebanks.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Poorly trained dogs can be a menace to wildlife and livestock – and are a major issue in the UK countryside. This week, host Fergus is joined by friend of the Plodcast James Fair and his dog Dakota to explore the issue.

Dakota, James and Fergus spend a day with dog trainer extraordinaire Helen Merrett in the Gloucestershire countryside to discover the most effective methods for understanding and controlling your dog so that you can have enjoyable, stress-free walks.

Helen Merrett is the owners of Just Paws – find out more at https://justpaws.co.uk

The BBC Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme tune was written and performed by Blair Dunlop

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's not quite a white Christmas but early in the New Year, the land is transformed by a thick layer of snow. You can't resist the joyful urge to be the first to make footprints across the sheep fields. Ahead, smoke rises from farm cottages – everyone else is snug indoors.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Writer, angler and Plodcast regular Kevin Parr is your host this week, exploring the wild of the Forest of Bowland in Lancashire.

Kev is on a quest for material for a mysterious new book and the object of his mission in Bowland is finally revealed in the studio with the Plodcast team at the end of the adventure.

The BBC Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme tune was written and performed by Blair Dunlop

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Overnight, temperatures fell sharply and you awake to fields made ghostly pale by frost. You put on your boots and shake off the cold with a tramp through the sheep fields accompanied by crows, redwings, ravens and, best still, the brooding calls of a distant stock dove.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As the RSPB's Big Garden Birdwatch approaches (24-26 January 2025), the Plodcast team of Fergus, Hannah, Jack and Lewis explore what birds are visiting their own very different patches. Check in to hear their tales and local dramas.

And get involved in the Big Garden Birdwatch by visiting www.rspb.org.uk

The BBC Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme tune was written and performed by Blair Dunlop

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's bitterly cold outside but the fire is lit and crackling in the hearth. You sink into a favourite sofa and sip from a cup of hot chocolate – the gentle chatter of the fire providing all the company you need.

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 Annabel Ross, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Explore the murky world of fog and mist with Laura Pashby. Laura has devoted much of her adult life to experiencing how these strange weather phenomena change ourselves as much as our surroundings.

Plodcast host Fergus Collins meets Laura at the mysterious hill fort of Uley Bury in the heart of the Cotswold Hills and discovers that there's a frightening modern-day story hidden in the fog.

Chasing Fog: Finding Enchantment in a Cloud is published by Simon and Schuster

Follow Laura Pashby on Instagram @circleofpines

The BBC Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme tune was written and performed by Blair Dunlop

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We're on the south coast of Gower. You’re using a rocky outcrop as a perch to watch the tide come in. The scene is a wash of grey and the sunshine is as watery as the sea.

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 and introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Join a quest in the little-visited no-man's land between Monmouthshire and Herefordshire to seek out a mysterious church built by the Knights Templar 800 years ago. Who were these warrior monks and what were they doing in this corner of the British countryside? And should we believe any of the modern legends about the Templars? As ever, there will be wildlife surprises along the way.

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected]. If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs.

The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

After a long roam across the vast mountains of the Bannau Brycheiniog, you stop to catch your breath. The timid chirps of starlings echo through farmland overlooking the misty, early morning valleys.

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 Lewis Dobbs, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Plodcast team of Fergus, Hannah, Jack and Lewis – with special guest Kevin Parr, attempt to climb a mountain in the Bannau Brycheiniog (Brecon Beacons) with myths, wildlife and midwinter winter magic all the way to the summit.

Have a very happy new year from all of us at the BBC Countryfile Magazine Plodcast – may it be filled with wild adventures – and Plodcasts!

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected]. If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs.

The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're walking up a shallow valley, smoky with mist, on the border between Wales and Herefordshire. Ravens and jackdaws rule the airwaves here while hungry sheep gather around in the hope that you might be the farmer with a bag of feed. In the hedge, a dunnock gently calls.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's Christmas Eve and the Plodcast team of Hannah, Jack and Lewis have gathered at host Fergus' cottage on a farm in the Monmouthshire countryside. The fire is lit, the mulled wine is poured and guest Kevin Parr is about to deliver the infamous Plodcast Christmas Quiz. Plus, we take a look back at highlights from 2024.

So pour a drink, grab paper and pen, make yourself comfortable and join the festivities. And from all the team, have a wonderful and merry Christmas.

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected]. If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs.

The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's nearly Christmas, and you've escaped the preparations and the bustle to find a moment's peace on a short walk to your local woodland. In a tangled copse, a stream sings merrily, its waters cold and clear.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The siege of Ludlow in Shropshire was one of the earliest skirmishes in the vicious 15th-century civil known as the Wars of the Roses. It was also home to Cecily, mother of two kings and protagonist of Annie Garthwaite’s celebrated novels about the period.

Podcast host Fergus Collins meets Annie at the gates of Ludlow Castle to hear tales of betrayal and bloodshed - and the important, little-told stories of the powerful women at the heart of the action.

Cecily and The King’s Mother by Annie Garthwaite are published by Penguin.

The BBC Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme tune was written and performed by Blair Dunlop

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

When snow falls, all other sounds recede. All you can hear is the soft pattering and gentle hiss of millions of snowflakes falling onto the track ahead of you. For once, you stop to listen, to really listen, to the song of snow.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Meet brothers Ben and Ethan who farm sheep and beef on the edge of Cardiff in harmony with nature. Annabel Ross is your host this week, learning how the farmers are making their land more welcoming to the local wildlife – and better for their livestock.

The BBC Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme tune was written and performed by Blair Dunlop

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

After a cold night, the sun rises brightly in a brilliant blue sky. You take advantage, walking across the nearby fields, wellies swishing through the long, dewy grass. The low dawn light makes long shadows of your footprints.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, we return to a summer Plodcast hosted and recorded by historian Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough. Here Eleanor visits the National Forest, a project transforming 200 square miles of the Midlands from industrial landscape into wildlife-rich habitats.

Eleanor meets Stuart Dainton, head of land management and estates in the National Forest, who explains the importance of this incredible transformation. Later, join the Plodcast team in the studio for listener messages and other nourishing nature chat.

Find out more about the National Forest at www.nationalforest.org

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected]. If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop. Image by Getty

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's a foggy, gloomy day on the hill and you've strayed into a quiet farmyard - quiet that is except for the mutterings of starlings. The gang's dark silhouettes are scattered across the rooftops of the cow shed and farmhouse. Their earthy conversations of whistles, rattles, whoops, cackles and chuckles helps dispel some of the heavy atmosphere.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe. Image from Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Plodcast host Fergus walks with campaigner Guy Shrubsole in the Chilterns' woodlands that inspired Roald Dahl's famous children's book: Danny Champion of the World.

And rather like Roald Dahl's characters, Guy uses the issue of pheasant shooting to challenge conventional ideas of how land is owned and managed in Britain today and suggests that things need to change if our wildlife and wild habitats are to survive.

Guy's book, The Lie of the Land is out now and is published by William Collins.

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs.

The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop. Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As the sun is setting over the Welsh coast, we’re sitting above a cleft in the cliffs. Rhythmically, the waves rush and recede in this open-roofed cave. The mist throws up the scent of salt and cold water. As the daylight fades, a blackbird scolds us to go home to bed.

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 and introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Take a walk though the leafy suburbs of south Birmingham with historian Corinne Fowler.

Corinne's studies of how the British Empire impacted rural Britain and her report into how some National Trust properties are linked to slavery drew a chorus of protest from some quarters. Here she explains her work to Plodcast host Fergus Collins and reveals why an honest understanding of rural history is so important.

Corinne's book, Our Island Stories: Country Walks Through Colonial Britain is published by Allen Lane

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's a sound that seems more attuned to the uplands of the north and west: the deep haunting bellows of red deer. But we're on the edge of London, among the heaths and woods of Richmond Park. With a backdrop of rose-ringed parakeet chatter, it's a curious blend of wild and exotic.

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 Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough, introduced by Hannah Tribe. Image from Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Catherine Carr is a podcaster and creator of BBC Radio 4's famed 'About the boys' series on what it's like to be a teenage boy in 2024. Hear her insights on a wild walk through the Cambridgeshire Fens with Plodcast host Fergus Collins.

Listen to Catherine's award-winning podcast Where are you going? www.whereareyougoing.co.uk

And hear her ground-breaking Radio 4 series About the Boys https://bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001yshm

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Forbidding sheets of rain and flooding mean that outdoor adventures must be postponed until tomorrow. But there's something cosy and deeply comforting about being in the dry, listening to the torrent outside. And as you listen, the downpour eases and birds begin to sing with gratitude.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We've gone fishing! The Plodcast team of Fergus, Hannah, Jack and Lewis plus angler-writer Kevin Parr are given a unique opportunity to spend a day fishing at at lake where anglers are seldom allowed. Sutton Bingham Reservoir is a vast body of water just south of Yeovil in Somerset and is only usually open to flyfishers going after trout. So what else lives beneath the waves?

Under Kevin's mentorship, the team enjoy an extraordinary day... Listen on for magic and drama.

Huge thanks to Wessex Water and Rich the ranger for allowing us access to Sutton Bingham Reservoir. To find out more about fishing at the reservoir, visit: www.wessexwater.co.uk/visit-and-learn/fishing-at-sutton-bingham-reservoir

Also to the Angling Trust for granting day rod licences to the team. Visit https://anglingtrust.net/

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Walking in a wide vale of crumbling relics of a long-lost industrial age, you stumble across a small stream, caught in the act of tumbling over a waterfall. For a moment there is mesmerising movement and sound, then the water disappears down the brackeny slope.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Nature writer Robert Macfarlane and singer-songwriter-actor Johnny Flynn take Plodcast host Fergus on a ramble along the River Lea in East London. Having collaborated on two albums, the two men are keen to talk about their new children's book of nature produced with illustrator Emily Sutton called The World to Come.

Set among the wilds of the River Lea, The World to Come is a message of hope and beauty. And listen on for a live performance from Johnny of the song that inspired the book.

The World to Come is published by Magic Cat Publishing.

Photo by Peter Flude.

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's early afternoon after heavy rain and you've followed a small brook past waterlogged fields and a stand of willows. The trees' feet, submerged in the swollen water, are tickled by the current while their leaves are tousled by the wind's long fingers.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Wildlife cameraman and TV presenter Hamza Yassin joins Plodcast host Fergus on a walk through an urban oasis deep in the city of Manchester. Hamza talks about his new book, Hamza's Wild World, and reveals the extraordinary determination and sacrifice he needed to get a break in the world of wildlife film-making. It's a piece of Plodcast magic.

Hamza's Wild World is published by Macmillan and available to buy now.

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're in a small, steep sided valley with a clear stream fizzing through it. Sheep graze among anthills, and while buzzards and crows call from the clear blue sky, the grass is studded with parasol and waxcap fungi, revealing that autumn has swept 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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We welcome historian and BBC radio presenter Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough back to the Plodcast this week, with a walk through an ex-industrial landscape near Leeds in Yorkshire. With her historian husband John-Henry Clay, Eleanor looks for stories and echoes of lost lives in a landscape reclaimed by nature.

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs.

The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're climbing a small mountain in the Bannau Brycheiniog – and it's hot. So hot, you stop early for your picnic. High on the peak, ravens, buzzards and a single red kite are enjoying the thermals, calling and mewing in the deep blue. From the moorland grass, meadows pipits peep and grasshoppers fizz.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Plodcast host Fergus Collins enjoys an autumn walk by the River Avon near Bath with Emma Brisdion of the Rivers Trust to take part in a Big River Watch. This citizen science project hopes to make an important difference to the health of Britain's polluted waterways. But it's also a chance to pause, watch the world go by and see what wildlife characters might turn up. Join them for a marvellously mellow adventure.

For more on the River Trust and to take part in the Big River Watch, visit https://theriverstrust.org/take-action/the-big-river-watch

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's late morning on a quiet autumn day and you're sitting on a welcome bench beside a small lane that winds between wooded pasture and a small estuary. Cheerful robin, chiffchaff and sparrow song blends with the distant laments of curlews, while the sea murmurs in the distance. Even the odd passing car seems strangely soothing.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Take a magical walk on the last day of summer to find a hillfort on the edge of the town of Brecon and the Bannau Brycheiniog. Plodcast host Fergus looks for ancient stories and nature along the way.

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're beside a canal, enjoying a few stolen hours fishing – but really it's an opportunity to relax alone beside the water after the busy summer. A September breeze jostles the weary leaves and the dark, damp, earthy smells of autumn rise with the songs of robins.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe. Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we return to our visit to the Global Birdfair in Rutland. In the second Plodcast interview of the festival, Plodcast host Fergus met wildlife expert, writer and TV presenter Ajay Tegala to talk about his extraordinary life as a wildlife ranger at legendary Wicken Fen nature reserve.

Later join the Plodcast team for a round up of listener emails and messages – and updates on the latest wildlife news.

Ajay's latest book Ranger Life and Rewildling Wicken Fen, published by The History Press, is out now in paperback.

Special thanks to Charlie Bingham for organising the podcasting at the Birdfair and to Oscar Henderson for the onsite production.

The Countryfile Magazine Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team. The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs.

The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop. Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, you're perched on a mossy bank, listening to a gentle stream pass through a Dartmoor forest. The water is crystal clear, revealing a microcosm of glistening stones and earthy weeds swaying along the bed.

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 Lewis Dobbs, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Will eagles return to Wales in the next couple of years? Sophie-Lee Williams of Eagle Reintroduction Wales is confident that mighty white-tailed eagles will be soaring in Welsh skies very soon, just as they are in southern England and western Scotland. But how realistic is her plan and how will she deal with the objectors?

Plodcast host Fergus met Sophie-Lee at Kenfig Pool on the coast near Bridgend, where the eagles were last seen in Wales.

For more on Sophie-Lee's project visit eaglereintroductionwales.com/. And to take part in a survey about what you think about reintroducing eagles, www.smartsurvey.co.uk/s/WTEPublicOpinionSurvey/

The Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team. The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs.

The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop. Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's early morning and we're alone beside the River Towy estuary just downstream from the ancient town of Carmarthen. The tide is rising in mini surges, softly smothering the saltmarsh and tickling the feet of the sea defences.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Head out on a Highland road trip with Plodcast regular Kevin Parr as he explores the wildlife of some of finest peaks and glens of Scotland. A marvellously mindful meander.

The Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team. The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs.

The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop. Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Walking through a lakeside woodland, you become aware of a shimmering, ghostly whisper rising snd swirling around you. A light breeze is gentle bewitching the leaves of a grove of aspen trees.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Join folk singer and sound designer Alice Boyd in Epping Forest on the eastern edge of London as she explores the eerie, little-know soundscapes of ponds with creative sound recordist Action Pyramid, AKA Tom Fisher. Prepare for sounds of the countryside you'll have never experienced before.

Find out more about Action Pyramid and his quest to explore and restore ponds: www.actionpyramid.com/ Image by Jon Rulton

The Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme music was written and performed by Blair Dunlop. Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're walking along a seawall above a forgotten stretch of the Severn Estuary – a gentle tang of seaweed is a reminder that the open sea is not far – as are the waves that surge against the shingly shore.

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 Lewis Dobbs, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Plodcast team of Fergus, Hannah, Jack and Lewis jump on a little train from central Bristol to explore a wilderness of mudflats, saltmarsh and wildflowers looking for adventure – and new bird species for the Plodcast. Join them for an entertaining wildlife ramble…

The Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It’s early evening as you follow a long path that disappears into the woods. The trees create a green tunnel high above you. A recent downpour has left the air fresh and the leaves shining. A song thrush celebrates a break in the weather with a song. Invisible at the top of a tall pine, it’s accompanied by the gentle purr of a wood pigeon and the wind in the trees. 

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 Rachael Stiles, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, we look back at the amazing Global Birdfair in Rutland, which took place in July. Plodcast host Fergus was on stage to record some plodchats – and in this episode he meets birder and naturalist Nick Acheson to talk about Nick's passion for geese in his native Norfolk. And what's the best way to raise attention about the state of the natural world?

Nick's book is called: “The Meaning of Geese”, published by Chelsea Green.

Later, join the Plodcast team in the studio for a round-up of listener messages, nature chat and sounds of the week.

The Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's a hot summer's day and you're heading from the open slopes of a small mountain to the welcome cool of woodland in the valley below. But before you reach sanctuary, the mesmerising songs of yellowhammers rise with the heat haze from the gorse and bracken.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Join Plodcast host Fergus on the Thames foreshore with legendary mudlarker Lara Maiklem searching for historical artefacts and oddities among the sand, shingle and mud. What will they find? Listen on for a thrilling treasure hunt...

Read Lara's latest book: A Year of Mudlarking, published by Bloomsbury.

The Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we're striding out across a wider moorland ridge with bilberry, bracken and heather flanking the path. It's a rare calm day in the uplands and the meadow pipits and skylarks sing their wild songs.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we're exploring the Royal Botanical Gardens of Wakehurst in Sussex exploring why meadows filled with grasses, herbs and flowers are so vital for wildlife and for our own wellbeing. Annabel Ross is your host, exploring these all-too-rare delights with Wakehurst expert Iain Parkinson.

Later, join the Plodcast team for a 'studio' chat in the meadows of Severn Beach near Bristol to hear your emails and sounds that you've sent in.

Visit kew.org/wakehurst to find out more about Wakehurst, home to the Millennium Seed Bank.

The Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're walking an ancient tree-line lane up a hillside when a brief summer rain shower takes you by surprise. Sheltering under a kindly horse chestnut, you are lulled by the gentle patter of raindrops on the broad leaves.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week the Plodcast heads into the uplands of the Bannau Brycheinog to explore the summer wildlife that abounds there. Plodcast host Fergus is hoping to find and record the songs of yellowhammers, which dwell on the lower slopes. Or so it's said.

These once-common bright yellow birds have suffered a steep decline in recent decades. Do they still live here? Join the quest – and enjoy numerous other encounters along the way.

The Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The anglers have departed, the dog-walkers have gone home. The lake is still. You are alone by a strip of woodland on the edge of the water, listening to a gentle melodies of song thrush, blackcap and chiffchaff.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Head into the deep dark wood with composer and pianist Alexander Chapman Campbell to hear about his quest to raise awareness of the perils of conifer plantations – and their impact on wildlife, landscape and the human spirit.

Plodcast host Fergus Collins meets Alexander in one of Wales' larger conifer plantations, Hafren Forest in Powys, to talk about trees and listen to some of Alexander's music.

Where Now A Dark Wood Stands - composed by Alexander (Chapman Campbell), featuring Alexander at the piano and vocals by Julie Fowlis. Lyrics written by Alexander (Chapman Campbell), and translated into Scots Gaelic by Raghnaid Sandilands.

Beneath The Northern Stars - composed and performed by Alexander, from the album Journey To Nidaros.

The music video for Where Now A Dark Wood Stands can be viewed, and more of Alexander's work discovered, on his website: www.alexanderchapmancampbell.com

The Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's evening, just after midsummer's day, and a walk has taken you down a winding lane to a tiny medieval church. In the churchyard, lichen-crusted gravestones emerge from what has been left to become a flower-filled meadow. Only a few goldfinches break the mellow stillness.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Plodcast heads to the dreamy surrounds of Richmond Park in south-west London to discuss the wonders of flights with author and conductor Lev Parikian. Along the way, Lev and Plodcast host Fergus Collins encounter a host of examples of strange and exotic winged creatures.

Lev's book Taking Flight: How Animals Learned to Fly and Transformed Life on Earth is published by Elliott and Thompson

The music Lev mentioned in the Plodcast was:

Olivier Messiaen – Catalogue d'oiseaux

Einojuhani Rautavaara - Cantus Arcticus 

Igor Stravinsky - Right of Spring

The Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Morning has broken. A wood pigeon coos its lazy welcome to summer, surrounded by a chorus of chaffinches, blackbirds, wrens and chiffchaffs. The new green leaves of June filter the sunlight into watery pools on the forest floor and the tall tree trunks create an acoustic effect of ancient columns and buttresses.

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 Caroline Greene, introduced by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Join an unusual Plodcast adventure in an urban car park with artist and author Anna Chapman Parker. Anna spent a year watching and drawing the wildflowers in her local town – plants normally dismissed as weeds. And she created an astonishing diary of overlooked beauty.

Here she take Plodcast host Fergus Collins an urban journey of discovery to open our eyes to the magic in every crack in the pavement.

Anna's book: Understorey: A Year Among Weeds is published by Duckworth Books.

The Plodcast is the Publishers Podcast Awards Special Interest Podcast of the Year 2024 and the PPA Podcast of the Year 2022.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we're walking across the open grassland of Richmond Park in south-west London. While jets grumble overhead, rose-ringed parakeets can't resist a bit of back-chat from the fringing woodland. And in the brambly scrub, we hear the gentle mutterings of chaffinches and whitethroats.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Take an adventure with the Orchid Outlaw – a man braving danger and risking his freedom to rescue Britain's endangered orchids.

Plodcast host Fergus meets Ben Jacob in the glorious meadows of the Stroud Commons to look for these incredible flowers – with a special quest to find the bizarre bee orchid.

Read Ben's book: The Orchid Outlaw, On a Mission to Save Britain's Rarest Flowers (John Murray).

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We're walking in a summertime Narnia of dappled pathways, whispering leaves and the tall, smooth-skinned trunks of beech trees. This is the Blackwood Forest in Hampshire and as dusk falls on an evening in early June, a woodland choir marks the passing of the day.

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 Caroline Greene, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Savour the joys of foraging – this time in an urban green haven in the middle of Bristol. Plodcast host Fergus joins foraging expert Andy Hamilton for a journey into unusual flavours – and learns how to use wild plants to enhance everyday meals – and drinks.

Andy's latest book is The First-Time Forager, published by The National Trust.

Later, join the Plodcast team in the studio for a very special celebration!

Listen to Episode 192. A quest for rare wildflowers in the Avon Gorge - with Mike Dilger:

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/3PhEIpZDJZftG3a0b4B4U0?si=c0920a1075504655

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-plodcast/id886112661?i=1000611378135

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Visit the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's a hot midsummer day and sunlight sparkles along a stretch of gentle rapids on the River Usk. On the riverbank, floods have carved small cliffs enticing a colony of sand martins to create a stronghold. The birds sally forth to hunt insects – chattering as they go.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Should some animals be killed in order to protect rarer species or precious habitats? Everything from hedgehogs and mink to crows and deers has been targeted in recent years in order to 'save' something else and it's a controversial issue that has troubled conservationists and land managers in the UK for many years.

Naturalist and hedgehog champion Hugh Warwick discusses the rights and wrongs of culling wild animals with Plodcast host Fergus on a late spring walk in a Welsh meadow.

Hugh's book Cull of the Wild: Killing in the Name of Conservation is out now, published by Bloomsbury.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop. Don't forget you can claim a free copy of BBC Countryfile Magazine – simply head to try.countryfile.com/plodcast and sign up for the latest edition.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is read out on the show, you could WIN a Plodcast Postbag prize of a wildlife- or countryside-themed book chosen by the team.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dusk is falling after a busy bank holiday and a welcome peace is settling over the neighbourhood. The flowering clematis and roses seem to breathe a sigh of relief, exhaling a calming perfume. As you sit down on a garden bench, a blackbird sings his sultry love song from the gable of next door's house.

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 Fergus Collins, presented by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Portland Bill in Dorset is famous as a first landing site for thousands of migrant birds as they arrive to breed in the UK this spring and summer. Join Kevin Parr as he wanders this peninsular meeting these avian travellers – and he makes some extraordinary finds along the way. How many bird species can you hear in this recording?

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop. Don't forget you can claim a free copy of BBC Countryfile Magazine – simply head to try.countryfile.com/plodcast and sign up for the latest edition.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We're walking on the white sands of Luskentyre on the Isle of Harris. A gentle line of surf teases the beach. Above, a common tern bobs by on its strangely buoyant flight before suddenly plunging like a downed paper aeroplane to catch small fish in the shallows.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Enter Rivendell – or what might as well be – a hidden valley on the edge of Eryri (Snowdonia) in North Wales. Plodcast host Fergus takes a nature ramble with the writer Julie Brominicks who lives off-grid with her partner here in a caravan beside a magical stream.

Julie is a passionate advocate for the Welsh language and explains how it is interwoven with the landscape, nature and the rural culture of Wales.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

Don't forget you can claim a free copy of BBC Countryfile Magazine – simply head to try.countryfile.com/plodcast and sign up for the latest edition.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We're on the edge of a settlement on the Isle of Harris - lochs and mountains flow from where the houses end. In the quiet of the morning, a willow warbler sings his descant; turning the music of a mountain stream into birdsong.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Explore a landscape of craggy mountains, turquoise seas and deep blue lochs on the Isle of Harris in search of rare wildlife – and especially golden and white-tailed eagles. Join Plodcast host Fergus on an epic search for these mighty birds – in a series of wild adventures in the Outer Hebrides.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's bright early morning in East Devon, the ground is still damp from the rains during the night but the light brings an optimistic view of the day ahead. You are between open farmland and a small woodland, sitting with your morning brew and drifting away into the morning soundscape of beautiful birdsong.

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 Jack Bateman, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A new rewilding project has been announced in Somerset. Created by the charity Heal, the project aims to transform several hundred acres of farmland into wildlife-rich habitat that offers huge benefits for people, too.

Listen on as Plodcast host Fergus meets with Heal CEO Jan Stannard to hear about the plans and what wildlife to expect – and they find some real wildlife surprises along the way.

Find out more about Heal at www.healsomerset.org.uk

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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: www.countryfile.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

After a healing night in a cabin beside a stream, you awake to a cup of tea and a glorious serenade from a song thrush. Wild garlic sweeps along the banks, the tang fresh and invigorating in the early morning.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Plodcast host Fergus heads to deepest Herefordshire to meet Alice Sainsbury, who is championing greater access to the countryside for people with visible and invisible disabilities. Her own story is deeply moving – and offers powerful insight into the challenges so many people face in simply enjoying the outdoors. Plus, enjoy beautiful spring wildlife along the way...

The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme tune was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hidden under the canopy of a Cumbrian forest, you sit, listening to the creaking of branches and snapping of twigs. Tiny closed-cup mushrooms are scattered across the brown-ish ground, shimmering in a gentle wash of rain. The dense evening fog descends and life beyond the wood is shrouded in mist.

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 Lewis Dobbs, introduced by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's dusk in the Forest of Dean and Plodcast host Fergus is on the trail of wild boar with author Chantal Lyons. Chantal has been studying these extraordinary mammals for 10 years. How did the boar get here, what impact do they have and will Fergus and Chantal ever set eyes on them?

Chantal's new book is Groundbreakers: The Return of Britain's Wild Boar, published by Bloomsbury. The Plodcast is produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. The theme tune was written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're sitting on a tree stump in a vast clearing, deep in the Forest of Dean. It's dusk and the rapidly failing light takes the last humans with it, leaving the stage free for the dusk chorus of song thrushes, blackbirds and robins.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Enter the mysterious Golden Triangle on the borders of Herefordshire and Gloucestershire to discover one of Britain's glorious spring wildlife spectacle – the blooming of millions of wild daffodils through the woods and fields. Join Plodcast host Fergus for a special ramble to witness this rare wonder.

Later, join the Plodcast team in the studio for nature news, listener emails and a rare countryside joke.

Produced by Jack Bateman and Lewis Dobbs. Reading by Hannah Tribe. Music written and performed by Blair Dunlop.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we're relaxing to a delightful piece of writing about nightingales by Dominic Couzens accompanied by the birds themselves – and read by Fergus Collins. Nightingales is from a collection of BBC Countryfile Magazine articles published new book Countryfile: A Year in the Countryside introduced by John Craven and edited by podcast host Fergus Collins.

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.

Read by Fergus Collins.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Join Plodcast host Fergus and adventurer Phoebe Smith as they take a day-long pilgrimage across the Oxfordshire countryside to explore spring nature - and experience the healing power of walking with purpose. It's a beautiful experience among the skylarks and red kites.

Don't miss Phoebe's fabulous new book about her life-changing experiences while on pilgrimage: Wayfarer: Life, Love and Loss and Britain's Ancient Paths

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're wandering beside a lake in early spring sunlight. A newly arrived chiffchaff sings from nearby willows while the plaintive calls from a scattered flock of Canada geese rise from the lakeside meadows. Celandines and marsh marigolds dance in the fringes.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Step out into spring with Plodcast host Fergus for a wander on his local hill to find who's up and about in the wildlife world on this early spring morning. Will we find the much longed for adders and merlins? Join Fergus for a mindful meander through woodland, moor and vale.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're beside a stream at the bottom of a wooded valley. You're nearing the end of a long walk so you pause to rest. But soon the rushing water whispers spells and ancient charms of such power that time drifts away.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to spring on the Plodcast and a new season of nature-themed episodes! But first, we have an exciting development! Musician Blair Dunlop and songwriter Duncan Haskell have created an utterly charming theme tune for the Plodcast – so host Fergus met them in a wild corner of Bristol to hear the music live and talk about the inspiration behind the songwriting. It's pure magic - with a natural accompaniment of wild birdsong. Discover more about Blair's music, his new album and upcoming tour dates on his website blairdunlop.com

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're on the edge of a the ruins of a Roman town lost in the Hampshire countryside. Only the crumbling outer walls remain, enclosing daffodil-fringed meadows. You plunge down an avenue of trees to emerge into a wide, oval space. You stop beathless, this is the amphitheatre. Half expecting the clash of weapons of ghosts of gladiators – you hear only the stirrings of spring.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we're spending the day on a waterway in Gloucestershire in search of a creature that has spawned a thousand myths and monster stories – we're hoping to meet the mighty pike, Britain's largest predatory freshwater fish.

Angler and TV presenter Will Millard is joined by the Plodcast team of Fergus and Jack – and later Annabel – to see if they can get close to one of these beautiful and extraordinary creatures.

Plus we discuss the ethics of fishing – is it cruel?

Listen on for a truly extraordinarily tense end to this season of Plodcasts.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're beside a small pond where toads are thronging the margins, jostling and tootling as they prepare to spawn. Through the magic of a hydrophone, you can hear the extraordinary symphony of the toads' underwater world.

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 and introduced by Alice Boyd. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we're off to the Roman town of Silchester deep in the Hampshire countryside. Plodcast host Fergus meets legendary broadcaster Matthew Bannister to talk about folk music and the British landscape and his own podcast: Folk on Foot.

Plus, Matthew reflects on his astonishing career with the BBC – and has advice for the corporation and its future.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We're in the Bannau Brycheiniog – and an overnight snowfall has dusted the hilltops. It's melting fast so we've headed to the nearest peak for a satisfying dog walk along snow-covered paths marred only by the footprints of foxes and pipits. A skylark rises and sings of warmer days.

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 Fergus Collins, and introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we're off to Epping Forest on the eastern edge of London on a night walk to hear from those who encounter barriers to accessing nature and the countryside because of their social class, race, gender or sexuality. We'll also be talking to organisations that are trying to change things for the better, for everyone.

Our guide is folk singer and sound designer Alice Boyd – who joins the Plodcast for the first time. www.aliceboyd.info. Images by Getty.

The organisations featured include

William Morris Galley

https://wmgallery.org.uk/

The Hive

https://thehiveintheforest.co.uk/

Misery Party

https://www.instagram.com/miseryparty/

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Saturday in a suburb of gardens full of daffodils and crocuses - and the birds are awake long before the human population. House sparrows chatter in the hedges, a coal tit pipes from cherry blossom while goldcrests and jackdaws add their own joyful spring banter.

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 Fergus Collins, and introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Join the Plodcast team of Fergus, Maria and Jack in the studio to chat about their latest wild adventures and discuss country matters and rural issues that have cropped up in recent Plodcast episodes. Plus, we share some brilliant emails and audio recordings sent in by listeners.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We've stopped in a forgotten, overgrown green lane on a hillside. A bright sun sears deep into the woodland. Winter's blanket is being unstitched by the songs of three birds – a great tit calls, insistently, to his new partner. A song thrush tries out his phrases, testing and repeating them. A goldcrest in the ivy giggles at the throught of spring.

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 Fergus Collins, and introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we're off to Sussex in the great company of Plodcast regular Maria Hodson. Maria heads to the town of Lyminster to hunt for a terrifying creature called the Sussex knucker. What is the knucker, you ask? Listen on to hear an extraordinary tale drawn from the British countryside.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we’re at Horsey Gap, a long and sandy beach in Norfolk. Over the roar of the North Sea, we can hear the moans and growls of a nearby colony of grey seals. These seals have made their home here, and can be spotted year round on the beach or swimming nearby. Today, they’re sunbathing in the February sun.

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 and introduced by Alice Boyd. Image by Getty.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Enjoy a walk and talk with documentary maker, writer and TV presenter Philippa Forrester.

While exploring a flooded landscape between Bath and Bristol with Plodcast host Fergus, Philippa talks about her inspiring new book: Wild Woman – exploring the challenges and obstacles women face in the world of nature conservation.

If you've enjoyed the plodcast, don't forget to leave likes and positive reviews

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we're stuck in the greenhouse. We came up to check on the winter salad leaves, and the skies darkened. It’ll only be a short shower, the edges of the cloud are visible through the veil of raindrops on the roof. So, we’ll wait here for a bit, breathing in the rich smell of the earth and listening to the irregular rhythm of the drips off the guttering.

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 and introduced by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Between the villages of Purton and Sharpness on the River Severn, dozens of barges and ships lie on the riverbank, slowly decomposing into the landscape. But the reason why they're here will surprise you. Plodcast host Fergus takes a walk among the river with countryside writer Simon Heptinstall to learn the story of the Purton Hulks.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Deep in the Cambrian Mountains, just outside Wales' remotest chapel, a small stream flows out of the barren hills. Now, in the depths of winter, a skin of ice has formed but the water still runs beneath, a soft voice in an empty landscape.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Join Plodcast host Fergus and countryside writer Professor Fiona Stafford in the curious hilltop village of Brill to learn how to find hidden history in the landscape around you. Fiona's new book, Time and Tide (John Murray) is a series of fascinating adventures looking at how our countryside is transformed over time - and how quickly things are forgotten.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're walking an old tram road in an abandoned quarry in the Welsh hills. It's been deadly cold for weeks and water that normally cascades off the high ground has frozen into dramatic icicles as it runs down rock faces and over cave mouths. But this morning's warm sun has started a thaw and there is a gentle music of water released.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Plodcast regular Kevin Parr explores a lost church in Dorset. St Luke's Chapel was built to serve the village of Sterte near Abbotsbury, in the 1240s. The chapel remained in use until the mid 16th Century when it was abandoned following the Act of Supremacy (1534) that gave Henry VIII the power to disband religious buildings.

All that remains of the chapel (and the village) is a single wall and arch, which stands deep in the woodland of Ashley Chase, although a more recently constructed altar carries votive offerings and painted stones left by the handful of visitors who pick through the trees to pay homage. Kevin samples the atmosphere of this eerie place and looks for ghosts.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's an icy cold morning and you're walking through a once-waterlogged meadow now made crisp by frost. Low winter sun slants across the surrounding hills, picking out shadows and contours, silhouetting lone trees. As you descend into a shallow valley, distant rooks call from an ancient woodland.

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 Fergus Collins, introduced by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hidden in a peaceful corner of the Monmouthshire countryside is a site steeped in blood, treachery and revenge. Plodcast host Fergus and his son Owen set out one cold January morning to uncover the secret of medieval Castell Arnallt (Castle Arnold) - and track down what remains of this ill-fated and now forgotten Welsh castle.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You are on high country farm road in the Hakataramea Valley in deepest South Canterbury, New Zealand. Skylark song pours from the heavens, cascading over paddocks of ewes with noisy lambs at foot.

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 Nick Allen. Image by Getty.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We're beachcombing on Orkney this week. Plodcast regular Annabel Ross meets Martin Gray who has been finding curiosities on the seashore here for several decades. What will they find today? And what are the greatest treasures Martin has ever found? Listen on for more tales from the landscape.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're walking a muddy track beside a farm on the edge of a vast expanse of flooded land, the water perfectly reflecting a rare January blue sky. From the barns, a heady odour of sweat and dung rises from the cattle within. Across the marshes, swans sail, occasionally taking to the air on heavy, whoomping wingbeats. And from out of the ancient landscape, the eeries cries of cranes rise above tractor and quad bike engine.

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 Fergus Collins, presented by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Plodcast goes fishing this week with plodcast regular Kevin Parr and author and TV presenter Will Millard. Host Fergus meets them on his local waterway, the Monmouthshire and Breconshire Canal, to talk about why fishing matters to much to them. It's the perfect combination of gentle adventure, chat and humour. But will they catch any fish?

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're walking beside a stream swollen by rain, which tumbles through a wooded valley, crashing over rocks and weirs. Dippers chatter and dive for food, a heron hunts eels in the mill leat and watery sunlight breaks through the leafless canopy. A heavy scent of deep winter leaf decay fills the air.

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 Fergus Collins.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Plodcast host Fergus joins historian and battlefield tour guide Julian Humphrys at the site of a Civil War battlefield in the hills just north of Bath. It's a dark winter's day and fog descends creating an atmosphere of 'gunsmoke' and eerie sounds. Listen on to hear about how the dramatic battle unfolded...

Find out more about the Battlefields Trust of which Julian is a trustee at https://www.battlefieldstrust.com. And Julian's own website is full of great information:  http://www.julianhumphrys.com/

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

After weeks of rain, it's a clear, calm rosy sunrise. A pair of robins in neighbouring gardens welcome the early sun with wistful phrases as if chatting over the fence. It's a duet to warm the soul in the depths of winter.

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 Fergus Collins. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Plodcast host Fergus joins broadcaster, writer and, best of all, brilliant birder Stephen Moss on a wild stretch of the Somerset coast to look for winter birds on the marshes and mudflats. Stephen also talks about his time as a BBC Natural History Unit producer and his lifelong love of wildlife. But what did they discover today?

Stephen's new book The Owl: A Biography is published by Square Peg. Link https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/455675/the-owl-by-moss-stephen/9781529908268

Image by Getty

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected]. If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we're on the Ceredigion coast - a lonely cove of shingle with the Irish sea rolling with a soothing rhythm. No one else is around, no one that is apart from a seal bobbing just offshore.

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 Catrin Collins.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is it like to swim outdoors under a full moon in the depths of winter? Maria Hodson braves the inky waters of Clevedon Marine Pool with the Bristol Blue Tits to learn about what cold water swimming can do for you.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Where the Somerset Levels meet the sea, broad, marshy pastures and forgotten fields host gulls, rooks, crows and egrets, foraging for food stirred up cattle and horses wintering here. But the birds are ever watchful – there are hunters here, peregrines roving the overcast sky ready to strike.

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 Fergus Collins.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Join Plodcast host Fergus and regulars Kevin Parr and Annabel Ross as well as editor Dan Kramer-Arden for a lighthearted look back at a year of recording nature – and take part in Kev's great Christmas quiz! Plus plenty more natural silliness to enjoy.

Wild wishes from the Plodcast team and have a very merry Christmas.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're in a wintry valley following a boisterous stream high into the Welsh hills. After recent rain, the water boils and churns and the river's song is wild and free. Fighting against the current are huge salmon, leaping lightning fast through the rough waters to reach the calmer spawning grounds.

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 Fergus Collins

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Come with us deep into the Welsh hills, to Gilfach Farm, a magical Radnorshire Wildlife Trust reserve in Powys. Here, in the tumbling River Marteg, salmon still leap waterfalls and rapids to reach their spawning grounds. Will plodcast host Fergus spot this incredible natural spectacle. With huge thanks to naturalist Megan Shersby and Radnorshire Wildlife Trust's head of conservation Sylvia Cojocaru for the wildlife insights and expertise.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It’s a chilly evening and you are gathered with a crowd of others next to a large bonfire. The warmth it provides is a welcome break from the chilly air and the glow lights up the faces of joy around the neighbourhood park.

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 Jack Bateman, presented by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Explore the magic and myth of the Ring of Brodgar – an astonishing neolithic stone circle on Orkney in the company of local ranger Sandra Miller and the Plodcast's own Annabel Ross. Enjoy a blend of history, mystery and folklore…

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're on the wild and windy beach of Orkney’s South Ronaldsay. You listen to the cry of turnstones, plovers, sanderlings and redshanks, competing for the lead solo part, as they take flight from the water’s edge with the grey seals peacefully watching on.

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 Annabel Ross, presented by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Join Plodcast host Fergus and wonderful storyteller Duane Fitzsimons as they following in the footsteps of St Patrick along the coastline of Co Down. As they search for St Patrick's Well and his final resting place, Duane recounts tales of local folklore, shipwrecks and chilling ghost stories. This is the final episode of 4 in 2023 exploring St Patrick's Way in Northern Ireland.

For more about Duane and the magical Lecale Peninsula see www.lecalepeninsula.com/

A huge thanks to Tourism Northern Ireland for making these adventures possible.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As the fluttering of pigeons' wings loosen the last beech nuts of the season, you stand under a gentle shower of nature’s crackles and pops, reminding us that autumn is in full flow. Majestic beech trees envelop you, offering up their fruits to passing wildlife.

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 Annabel Ross, presented by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Enjoy a night walk in an ancient forest in Gloucestershire with the Plodcast team of Fergus, Hannah and Jack. What is it like walking in the pitch black – and what stories and wild encounters will they experience? To help them in their quest, they deploy night vision scopes…

The night vision devices used by the team were:

Bushnell Equinox X650

Nightfox Corsac Night Vision Binoculars

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Where the Burn of Latheronwheel meets the North Sea, you sit silently on the ancient harbour wall soaking in autumn sun, The waves draw the pebbles back down into the the depths of the peaty water. Once home to fifty boats, where salmon was a regular catch, Latheronwheel is now a ghost of its past, with the voices of long gone fishermen whispering onto the shore.

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 Annabel Ross, presented by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, the Plodcast tales are as ancient as can be. We’re in Dorset with Plodcast regular Annabel Ross hunting 500-million-year old fossils in the company of author and paelontologist Wolfgang Grulke, who has amassed an extraordinary collection of the strangest and rarest fossils on earth.

Join them for a weird and wonderful adventure into prehistory.

For more about Wolfgang Grulke, inclusing details on how to visit his collection, head to https://wolfganggrulke.com/author.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We’re in a little cottage deep in the Dorset countryside. The fire is lit. Steam swirls from a mug of tea. The curtains are drawn and we wait. Outside, there is a moment of calm as though the world is taking a deep breath. A storm is rolling in off the Atlantic, but before the wind comes the rain. Thudding into the brickwork and flicking off leaves and guttering. In the warm, we cosy up to listen.

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 Kevin Parr, presented by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Meet the new boss of Countryfile and learn about what he has planned for the UK’s most popular countryside TV show. Plodcast regular Annabel Ross takes Mark for a walk in a wonderful Mendip vale in north Somerset – listen on for some fascinating insight into rural passion and programme making.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We're following a narrow mountain path through thickets of inpenetrable birch. It's been a long, hot, footsore day and so you are easily seduced by the sound of a tumbling stream. From a rocky cleft, ice-cold clear water pours. You stop to bathe your feet and splash your face. It is delicious.

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 Fergus Collins, presented by Hannah Tribe.

Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It’s dusk in a valley somewhere in Dorset. Plodcast regular Kevin Parr has joined a local deer stalker to talk about why – and how – he culls these large mammals. Join the Plodcast team later in the studio to discuss some of the issues raised.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We're resting on a field gate. Late summer warmth spills into the autumn. The sun slow to rise but blazing when it does.

The overnight dew clings on in the shadows, while the long grass of the field margins rattle with the chirrup of grasshoppers.

Flies and bees buzz. A nuthatch bubbles from the hedgerow. A last hurrah before the first frost.

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 Kevin Parr, presented by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In our latest quest seeking tales from the British landscape, musician Tiny Leaves takes Plodcast host Annabel Ross onto a mysterious hill in Shropshire known as the Long Mynd. Here, Tiny Leaves has discovered a way of recording the songs of trees and plants and incorporating them into his music. But what do the ‘voices’ of trees sound like? Listen on to find out – it’s pure magic.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We’re on a small, wooded hill in Herefordshire. Sullen clouds gather over the trees, which cloak the brooding ramparts of an ancient hillfort. It’s silent now, its people long gone, replaced by birds and badgers. A gentle rain falls, pattering through the canopy of hazel and oak.

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 Fergus Collins, presented by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Come with us to a mighty hillfort, all but forgotten on a wooded hill deep in the Herefordshire countryside – and discover tales of dark deeds long ago.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine, Eagle House, Bristol, BS1 4ST

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It’s early autumn and the sunshine has brought bustle to a small harbour on the south coast. There is a light breeze and the air is soft.

Families find fun with crab-lines, lowering baits between the fishing boats and dinghies. The sea a gentle swell beneath the sound of footsteps on the flagstones.

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 Kevin Parr, presented by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Wander through a Sussex woodland with Julia Donaldson for a joyous mix of story-telling, mushroom foraging and Gruffalo-reenactment! Relive Julia’s journey to becoming one of the world’s most famous children’s authors as well as hearing the tales behind the Gruffalo and other family favourites, You’ll hear about her new book – The Oak Tree, illustrated by Victoria Sandøy who also joins the Plodcast along with Julia’s mushroom-hunting husband Malcolm.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We’re in the garden in a small village in Picardy in Northern France. The early evening warmth teases sweet scent from the lavender bushes and myrtles while a single cicada plays its eternal silvery zither, drawing down the night.

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 Fergus Collins, presented by Hannah Tribe. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to a new season of Plodcasts, a new series of quests to explore overlooked corners of countryside where folklore and mystery create curious tales. And along the way, we’ll be encountering wonderful wildlife and fascinating human characters.

In this first episode, Plodcast host Fergus and his son Owen wander out into a corner of the Bannau Brycheiniog lost to the ravages of the industrial revolution in search of lost standing stone. Here’s what they found.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What weather! At times like this you forget it can rain so hard; the clouds overturned and emptied like water buckets on the ground before you. You find a step in the porch of the old farmhouse and make yourself comfortable. The rain continues to cascade. Puddles sparkle. Leaves spiral down, caught up in the storm.

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: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It’s the end of summer and the end of a season of Plodcasts. Join the Plodcast team of Fergus, Hannah and Jack in the studio for a look forward to what you can expect over the autumn and winter months – plus a fabulous listener email… and cake.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A late summer stroll through the shingle and sand of the south coast. There is warm sunshine between the cloud and a busy beach with families making the most of the holidays. Splash and laughter, ice-cream and sun-screen. And the gentle wash of the sea.

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 Kevin Parr, presented by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Walk in the company of Jack and Fergus and they tackle Macmillan's Mighty Hike, a half marathon through the Wye Valley. Joining thousands of others, the Plodcast pair explore beautiful scenery, endure ferocious heat and hear the inspiring tales of cancer survivors and affected families along the way. A beautiful, uplifting adventure to end season 16 of the Countryfile Magazine Plodcast

For more information on Macmillan Cancer Support Mighty Hikes, visit https://mightyhikes.macmillan.org.uk/

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected]. If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You’ve wandered into a fairy glen where pure clear water tumbles from pool to pool though mini-gorges of moss covered rocks. As your eyes adjust, you spot small trout swaying in the current, illuminated by soft sunlight that has been sieved by the tree canopy.

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 Fergus Collins, presented by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Talk a wander through a forest in the Ardennes region of north-east France with Plodcast host Fergus – and discover unfamiliar woodland sights and sounds in a land once torn apart by war.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Your path down through the meadow’s edge is transformed in late summer as thistles, comfrey and Himalayan balsam swallow up the human-made track. You push gently through, avoiding thorns and clouds of hoverflies while goldfinch song trickles down from ash trees.

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 Fergus Collins, presented by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It’s as close to a fairy glen you’ll ever experience. Plodcast host Fergus sets off into Tollymore Forest in County Down with local guide Vikki Canavan to find strange tales and curious wildlife along a river brimming with magic.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Your cool, shady walk through a riverside woodland is pierced briefly by a kingfisher's wheezed whistle. The water roars as you approach rapids, then subsides as you turn away deeper into the trees. A wren sings and a robin scolds the earthy smells that tell of autumn.

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 Fergus Collins, presented by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Be transported to the tranquil shores of the Cromarty Firth on the east coast of Scotland. Here, thousands of waders and wildfowl gather as autumn approaches, providing a magical spectacle for human visitors. Join Plodcast regular Annabel Ross and birders Fiona and Graham Reid so see what might turn up in this wild estuary.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast,

Countryfile Magazine

Eagle House

Bristol BS1 4ST

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After a sunny afternoon of exploring the rock pools you take a seat and listen to the waves crash gently against the rocky shorefront. Down the beach visitors enjoy a quiet lunch whilst enjoying the sea breeze.

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 Jack Bateman, presented by Brittany Collie.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Enter the wild worlds of Narnia and Game of Thrones as Plodcast host Fergus and local outdoorsman John Keating seek out the great Mourne Wall deep in the magical Mourne Mountains of Northern Ireland. What is this strange monument and why was it built? And why is this land associated with great fantasy epics?

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's early morning and as the sun breaks through the canopy of leaves and the wrens, blue tits, robins begin their cheerful chatter.

A new day is coming to life and you're in the centre of it.

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 Jack Bateman, presented by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Island poet Kenneth Steven reveals the wildlife marvels on his doorstep – the Isle of Seal in the Inner Hebrides – and introduces us to a range of avian characters. Plus, enjoy his wonderful poetry. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we're paddleboarding on the River Wye, Leave all your worries on the riverbank and be lulled by the gentle, rhythmic swish of the paddle blade. The water swirls around you, shoals of fish shoot away from your bow, birds peep from the stooping alders.

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.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

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In the second part of our exploration of the St Patrick's Way pilgrimage in Northern Ireland, Plodcast host Fergus Collins and guide Peter Rafferty walk south along the Newry Canal in Armagh. Abandoned in the mid 20th century, the canal is now a haven for wildlife – with whispers of history at every turn. Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

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We're in Beinn Eighe (Ben Ay) in the Scottish Highlands

The mountains this morning are ill-manner; the trails rough, the gullies deep, the mist consuming. Winds elbow by like rushing commuters, and with them they bring rain. But such is the nature of summer in the Scottish Highlands that just as afternoon breaks the skies clear and a new day appears. Jubilant with the sparkling light, you pause by a high loch among even higher peaks to dry off and soak up the scene.

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: [email protected]

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This week we’ve invited a former Plodcast guest to take the reins. Back in episode 199, I met James MacDonald Lockhart to hear the songs of skylarks in the Cotswolds.

This week, we’re releasing him into his natural habitat – the wilds of Glenfeshie and surrounding Cairngorm mountain range – in a quest to meet one of Britain’s most unusual birds: the dotterel.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast, Countryfile Magazine Eagle House Bristol BS1 4ST

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It’s night in a tent on the coast of Pembrokeshire. At some point during the dark hours, you stir. The rain is still falling, and there are layers to its sound. Great marbles of water fall from the beech tree above the tent; the wind throws buckets; then both become consumed by a deluge like no other, a shower so heavy that you could be in the raincloud itself. You’re grateful for your warm sleeping bag, and before you know it you’ve dropped once more into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Recorded by Daniel Graham, presented by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team - and send your sound recordings of the countryside - to: [email protected]

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This week we’re heading back to early spring in the Welsh hills. But for the second Plodcast in a row, we’re not on foot. Following last week’s paddleboarding on the river Wye, plodcast host Fergus takes to two wheels to explore the hills of his beloved Bannau Brecheiniog.

Borrowing an electric bike, he follows an old railway line into the wild to see how far he can get on a single battery charge – and get home again.

This is episode 13 of season 16: Get Active in Nature

Thank you to Merida for supplying the Merida eBigNine model for this podcast.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us: Plodcast,

Countryfile Magazine

Eagle House

Bristol BS1 4ST

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Huddled between the urban brawn of Cardiff, Caerphilly and Newport is small woodland of spruce and birds and dank gullies. There is a stream in this woodland, the kind of you may not even notice, should your mind be elsewhere. Out of view beneath the path, it is the cool air welling up from its jostling waters that first alters you to it. You soon smell it, all earth and minerals, before finally reaching it with sight.

Recorded by Daniel Graham, presented by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

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This week we’re out on the water – a two-day paddleboarding adventure on the Wye the great river that flows through the borders of England and Wales. Maria Hodson is our host, and with an enthusiastic raft of fellow paddlers she meets the river’s wildlife and explores some of the darker issues facing this troubled waterway.

This is episode 12 of season 16: Get Active in Nature

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us:

Plodcast, Countryfile

Eagle House

Bristol BS1 4ST

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It’s a sunny evening in a wooded glade on quiet stretch of the Isle of Wight's northern shore. Just beyond the trees, the sea bustles. But here, jolly holiday makers, blackbirds, woodpeckers and even bees are celebrating the end of a fine day.

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 Jack Bateman, presented by Hannah Tribe.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

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This week Annabel Ross ventures forth to the tangled rainforest of Wistman’s Wood on Dartmoor to meet poet Elizabeth Jane Burnett.But their mission isn’t to celebrate the revered twisted oak trees or the famous song birds – nor even the ferns and flowers. It’s the mysterious, magical and mesmerising… mosses – especially wonderful when heard through the words and verse of Elizabeth-Jane. Her new book, 12 Words for Moss champions these unsung heroes of the plant world.

This is episode 11 of season 16: Get Active in Nature

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected]. If your letter, email or message is 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.com

Write to us:

Plodcast, Countryfile

Eagle House

Bristol BS1 4ST

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You spot a shelf of rock at the far end of the moon-shaped bay and make for it, the fine sand giving way to warm, angular, salt-rough ground. The scramble comes almost without thought, your bare feet gripping nimbly to the rock. You soon come to rest in a nook facing back to the shore. Kelp rolls in the mineral-blue waters at your toes; beyond that is the moon beach, your footprints already washed clean by the gently shelving waves.

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: [email protected]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Plodcast host Annabel Ross is on a musical mission, discovering how nature and wild sounds can influence a modern composer – in

this case, acclaimed musician Erland Cooper. Hailing from the Orkneys, Erland combines field recordings and environmental messages with electronica and classical motifs and we’ll be hearing some of his music later: Solan Goose and then Movement 5 from his new album Folded Landscapes.

But first let’s go with Annabel to meet Erland to have a nature ramble at a studio just outside of bath –a studio belonging to that legendary music maker Peter Gabriel.

This is episode 10 of season 16: Get Active in Nature

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected] 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.com

Write to us:

Plodcast, Countryfile

Eagle House

Bristol BS1 4ST

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It's a still summer's evening on a beach on the Isle of Wight. It’s still very warm and the heat seems to affect the sea itself. Wavelets sweep lazily onto the beach and then flop and sink into the shingle.

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 Jack Bateman, presented by Fergus Collins.

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

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The Plodcast team of Fergus, Hannah and Jack explore the River Frome in search of kingfishers, which some of the team have never seen. Along the way, they discover delightful urban wildlife, glorious wildflowers and a series of curious encounters… but do they find complete their mission?

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

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.com

Write to us:

Plodcast, Countryfile

Eagle House

Bristol BS1 4ST

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This week we're heading deep into the Sussex countryside in the company of writer and angler Chris Yates. In this, the first chapter from his book The Secret Carp, Chris heads out on an eerie late summer's evening to find the perfect pool for fishing. The whole work is now available as an audiobook from merlineunwin.co.uk/products/”

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.Presented by Hannah Tribe.Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected] the Countryfile Magazine website: countryfile.com

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This week we’re going back to early spring and a trip to the north Cotswolds in Warwickshire to meet James Macdonald Lockhart who has written a book inspired purely by birdsong. Rather like our Plodcasts, James has spent several years on quests to listen to some of Britain’s most famous – and curious – avian melodies – and his book Wild Air reveals his adventures and the little known stories behind each species.

In this quest, we were after perhaps the most written about – the most composed about – bird of them all: the skylark.

Contact the Plodcast team and send your sound recordings of the countryside to: [email protected].

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.com

Write to us:

Plodcast, Countryfile

Eagle House

Bristol BS1 4ST

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We’re near Loch Maree in western Scotland. You’re not sure what woke you first, the light or the birds. Either way, you stir peacefully in your bed, the sun casting half-light across the stone walls of the cottage as the lilts of Scotland’s avian world pour in through the open windows. A wood pigeon, a cuckoo, a blackbird. Sparrows in the eaves.

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 Fergus Collins. Image by Getty

Email the Plodcast team – and send your sound recordings of the countryside – to: [email protected]

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