Hello, I’m Jay.

From the age of five I was a “wild child”, roaming the countryside and only coming home as it got dark. Back then nature was something I passed through or played in, or a place to catch a newt.

In my thirties I wanted to get outside more with my children. Ray Mears inspired me to take up open canoeing and bushcraft, and we had many adventures together. I also found time to head off alone and with friends to the wilder places I had dreamed about as a young adult.

From about forty I taught bushcraft and canoeing to children and adults, as a professional instructor and as a volunteer, and I began looking after a woodland. Yet despite all that time outside, I still felt separate from nature. I saw it as a place to find resources: plants to eat, firewood, species to identify.

The buzzard

One hot summer’s day a neighbour pointed out a buzzard he had been watching for months. I was in awe of this huge bird soaring above us. The next day I searched the sky and couldn’t find it. Where was it now? What had it been doing up there in the heat of the day? And why had I never noticed it before?

I had walked the same lanes and footpaths of the South Downs for years. I could find dry deadwood in lashing rain and nettles for tea, but I had never put the pieces of the jigsaw together. I could have told you where every light switch was in my house and when my dog needed to go out, but I didn’t know my natural home, who lived there with me, or how we were all part of one community.

Things are different now. I have a much deeper sense of place, I feel part of nature rather than apart from it, and I notice when the buzzard is soaring overhead, or have a good idea where it is when it isn’t.