The Listener Podcast

I have always believed that natural sound is one of the clearest barometers of the health of our planet. When an ecosystem is thriving, you can hear it. The layers of birds, insects, frogs, mammals, wind, and water all exist in balance. Sound tells the truth long before statistics do. When human made noise enters that space, the balance shifts. As a young sound recordist, I could sit in the woods...

One bird, above all others, embodies that sense of planetary connection: the Arctic tern. I have recorded Arctic terns in many places, including the Southern Hemisphere, but encountering them in Shetland feels especially profound. Here, they breed at the northern end of the world before embarking on a journey unlike any other. The Arctic tern holds the record for the longest migration of any anima...

That book changed me. It told the story of a man who turned his back on London and the rat race, and chose wilderness instead. He found sanctuary in Scotland, at Camusfearna, where he lived with an otter named Mij. More than a story about an animal, it was a story about escape, solitude, and choosing a life shaped by nature. That book planted a seed. It introduced me to the idea that wild places m...

Use headphones to hear the low frequencies Deep in the forest at Finca Austria in Guanacaste, Costa Rica, a sound rolled through the trees so low it was almost subliminal. A soft, booming pulse that you don’t so much hear as feel. It stopped me in my tracks. That sound was the giveaway. The Great Curassow. A bird once common across tropical forests, now eliminated from much of its range by hunting...

Most people think night is silent. It isn’t. It’s just happening beyond our hearing. In this podcast, you’ll hear strange clicking sounds that don’t belong to birds or crickets. Those sounds were captured using a bat detector , a piece of equipment that converts ultrasonic frequencies into sounds we can hear. What you’re listening to is an ancient conversation between bats and moths. Bats hunt by...

(apologies for the sound of my voice) I didn’t find these birds with my eyes. I found them by standing still long enough for the forest to trust me. From Costa Rica to Panama, Mexico, Peru, and deep into the Amazon, I recorded five antbirds living low in the understory, following army ants, waiting patiently for the forest to provide. Their voices are small, intimate, easily lost beneath chainsaws...

If you have ever been lucky enough to witness a prairie chicken lek, you will never forget it. To me, it feels like a Friday night pub back in the UK. All the lads are already there. Standing around. Waiting. They puff themselves up, stamp their feet, and boom out these extraordinary sounds, doing everything they can to impress. Pure confidence. Pure theatre. Then the females arrive, and suddenly...

When I was about eight years old, I stood in a science museum staring up at a hologram of the Irish elk. One word sat beneath it: Extinct . I asked my stepdad what it meant. He said, “It’s gone forever.” At that age, I honestly thought if something was gone, you could just buy another one in a shop. Then I saw a picture of the dodo with the same label, and something in me shifted. As I grew older,...

I’ve spent my life recording wildlife, listening to the world in a way hunters never will. And I’ve also infiltrated the Safari Club International conference five times —rooms I was never meant to walk into. Inside, trophy hunting isn’t sold as “conservation.” It’s sold like a shopping spree. Booths offering “guaranteed tusker,” “exportable lion,” “aged-out leopard.” Price tags instead of respect....

Every summer, a vast “dead zone” forms where the Mississippi River meets the Gulf of Mexico — a place where oxygen levels drop so low that marine life simply can’t survive. It’s one of the largest in the world, caused by nutrient runoff from farms and industry thousands of miles upstream. This isn’t just a Gulf problem — it’s a reflection of how our actions ripple far beyond where we live. Fertili...

When I was born in 1955, there were just over three billion people on the planet. I began recording at the age of eleven, when the world still had long stretches of silence — real silence — the kind that carried the wingbeat of a pigeon or the distant bark of a fox across open fields. Back then, I hardly ever saw a plane in the skies above my neighborhood. Motorways were few, and the roads that li...

Dear friends, I’ve just released a new episode of The Listening Planet —and it’s a very personal one. It’s about the bird that most likely introduced me to nature recording: the blackbird . As a child, I would lie hidden in the bracken and listen. The blackbird’s alarm call taught me that something—or someone—had entered the woods. Its song, rich and flute-like, became the soundtrack to countless...

Deep in the emerald heart of the Amazon, a small, grey bird commands the forest with a voice that could rival a rock concert. The Screaming Piha’s two-note whistle can cut through layers of tropical noise — a sound so pure, it’s become the soundtrack of countless rainforest films. In this 10-minute episode, I take you into the canopy at dawn, where mist clings to the trees and the air vibrates wit...

One of my favourite birds has always been the crow. From the carrion crows of my English childhood to the ingenious New Caledonian crow that crafts its own tools, these birds have been constant companions in my travels. In the UK, we share our towns and countryside with eight species of corvids — from the rook and jackdaw to the magpie and raven. Across the globe, there are over 130 species, each...

Today I’m thrilled to share something close to my heart—and ears. I’ve just released a new episode of a life in sound , where I take you deep into the Peruvian Amazon to meet one of the rainforest’s most unforgettable characters: the Screaming Piha . If you’ve ever wandered beneath the canopy and heard a sound that pierced the very air, chances are it was this elusive gray bird. Loud as a chainsaw...

Hello my friends, This week, I want to take you into the Peruvian rainforest—where one of the strangest and most beautiful birds I’ve ever recorded made me stop in my tracks. Imagine this: a high-pitched squeak echoes through the trees. At first, I thought it was an insect… maybe even someone’s lost rubber toy. But when I looked up, there it was— the Plum-throated Cotinga —an astonishing flash of...

There’s a clock in nature that never needs winding. No batteries. No digital screens. Just sunlight, shadow, and instinct. When I lived in Costa Rica, I discovered a ritual that took place every evening—almost to the second. Along the Pacific coast of Guanacaste, the sun begins its descent around 5:55 PM. But it’s not the setting sun that first grabs your attention—it’s the sound . At 5:50 PM, lik...

In the autumn of 1978, I had the incredible privilege of recording the hauntingly beautiful rutting sounds of fallow deer in the New Forest, Hampshire. Back then, the forest was untouched, a pristine sanctuary where nature's rhythms thrived. With nothing but two Shure microphones mounted on a makeshift tripod, I ventured into the heart of the mist-filled woods to capture the raw power and beauty o...

The sky was still bleeding out the last of its ochre as the sun dipped behind the acacia trees. A slow hush fell across the savanna—not silence exactly, but a deliberate pause. The kind that comes before something sacred happens. The wind shifted. A coolness crept into the grasslands. And then… it began. From somewhere out there, beyond the brittle grass and the gathering dark, came a low rumble—d...

A friend of mine, filmmaker Nick Lyon, told me most of the sound effects in the film came from the natural world . That stopped me. So I watched Star Wars IV . Still felt far-fetched—but the sound design? Now that was fascinating. Chewbacca made from walrus and bear sounds. TIE Fighters screaming like baby elephants. Donkeys, camels, sea lions, lions—woven into galactic mythology. Turns out even a...

Ever heard a bird that sounded like a broken modem or a laser beam? I have—and I recorded them. This week on The Listening Planet , I explore the incredible syrinx , the dual-voiced organ birds use to create their songs. Some species take this instrument to mind-blowing extremes—like the Brown-headed Cowbird , whose song bubbles and squeaks like a glitching robot, and the Montezuma Oropendola , wh...

When I moved to Washington State nearly 30 years ago, I was drawn to the voices hidden in the forest. Frogs, insects, birds—they all had stories to tell. One voice stood out: the Winter Wren (now called the Pacific Wren). A tiny, brown blur with a tail cocked skyward—and a song that could shatter silence. Over 70 unique songs in a single breath. Armed with my trusted Telinga parabolic dish, I capt...

There are places on this Earth where time slows and the silence says more than words ever could. The Kalahari is one of them. This image was taken during one of my visits to that vast, golden savanna—a place that’s often called a desert, yet teems with life if you know where and how to listen. As the first light of dawn touched the sand, a lone jackal appeared in the distance—quiet, watchful, belo...

I’m excited to share something a little magical—and a little ridiculous—with you this week. In 2011, I was deep in the dunes of coastal Namibia when I recorded one of the most peculiar sounds nature has ever thrown my way. Meet the Desert Rain Frog ( Breviceps macrops ) . It doesn’t croak. It doesn’t chirp. It squeaks. Like a rubber toy defying extinction, hidden beneath the fog-soaked sand. I lay...

Covered in tarpaulin, hidden away. Inside, a dog sat shaking, refusing to meet my gaze. His neck was scarred, his ear torn. He looked broken. I knelt beside him for hours. Whispered. Left a GoPro in his cage to study his movements. He wouldn't move much. I named him **Pocket**. And he changed my life. Day after day, I returned to sit beside him. Then one morning — the miracle — he wagged his tail....