Supporting Nature cover

Live wilder · ebook & activity guide collection

Supporting Nature

Giving back to the wild

How can I give back to the place that gives to me?

Bug hotels, bee homes, hedgehog highways, nesting boxes, ponds and citizen science.

Make homes for wildlife, grow pollinator habitat, plant trees and hedges, and join citizen science surveys.

The ebook
57 Wilding activity guides as printable PDFs
Templates and charts the activity guides need

Coming soon. Jay is giving this book and its activity guides a final proofread before they go on sale as downloads. Ask to be told when they're ready.

Safety first. Outdoor activities carry real risks. Each activity guide has safety notes, but you are responsible for yourself and anyone in your care. Supervise children, get permission, never eat anything you cannot identify with certainty, and only light fires where it is allowed and safe.

Prefer to learn it outside? See course dates →

The activity guides in this collection

Everyday care

Leave it beSupport nature

DiversitySupport nature

Supporting invertebrates

Making a beetle bucketSupport nature

Making a leaf habitatSupport nature

Making a bug hotelSupport nature

Making a solitary bee homeSupport nature

Making a bumble bee boxSupport nature

Making a bee nestSupport nature

Making a bee scrapeSupport nature

Making a bee watering stationSupport nature

Creating and connecting habitats

Making compostSupport nature

Making a wormerySupport nature

Creating a deadwood habitatSupport nature

Making a log wallSupport nature

Making a hibernaculumSupport nature

Making a small wildlife pondSupport nature

Making a dead hedgeSupport nature

Growing plants for wildlife

Planning a butterfly & bee gardenSupport nature

Gathering seeds from plants & treesSupport nature

Welly magicSupport nature

Making & gifting a ‘seed gratitude ball’Support nature

Growing a pollinator habitat from seedsSupport nature

Growing a pollinator habitat with plant plugsSupport nature

Taking & growing cuttingsSupport nature

Splitting plantsSupport nature

Growing a small tree saplingSupport nature

Planting a sapling in the groundSupport nature

Planting & maintaining a wildlife hedgerowSupport nature

Supporting mammals

Making a hedgehog homeSupport nature

Making a bat homeSupport nature

Creating a garden watering holeSupport nature

Making a mammal tableSupport nature

Protecting established trees and local nature

Protect a treeSupport nature

ConserveSupport nature

Nature legacySupport nature

Supporting birds

Window warningsSupport nature

Sharing the garden with birdsSupport nature

Providing nesting materialsSupport nature

Making & maintaining a bird bathSupport nature

Providing food for birdsSupport nature

Maintaining a bird feederSupport nature

Building & positioning a blue tit nesting boxSupport nature

Building & positioning a robin nesting boxSupport nature

Building & positioning a swift homeSupport nature

Maintaining a bird nesting boxSupport nature

Wildlife surveys and recording

The big bug countSupport nature

The UK ladybird surveySupport nature

The big butterfly countSupport nature

Mammal map appSupport nature

BioblitzSupport nature

Become a citizen scientistSupport nature

Using iNaturalistSupport nature

How to do a dead wood surveySupport nature

BTO Bird TrackSupport nature

BTO Garden BirdWatchSupport nature

RSPB Big Garden BirdwatchSupport nature

Bird countSupport nature

← Back to the Wilding Rucksack

Safety, and where the activity guides come from

Look after yourself and others. Outdoor activities carry real risks: fire, tools, water, weather, heights, plants, fungi, animals and getting lost. Every activity guide includes safety notes, but you are responsible for your own safety and for anyone in your care. Supervise children closely, get the landowner's permission, follow the Countryside Code, never eat anything you cannot identify with complete certainty, and only light fires where it is allowed and safe. If in doubt, leave it out.

With gratitude to the lineage. The Wilding Practice Keys and many of the activities in the activity guides have been adapted from the core routines of nature connection in the 8 Shields approach (Coyote Mentoring), mapped by Jon Young and shared in Coyote's Guide to Connecting with Nature (Young, Haas & McGown).

These ways of noticing and belonging are far older than any book. They grow from the knowledge of Indigenous and land-based peoples around the world, who have lived in close relationship with the land for thousands of years and have kept that knowledge alive, often in the face of great loss. Jon Young describes 8 Shields as built on patterns of nature connection he found in Indigenous cultures around the world, and on what his mentors taught him, including the teachings passed down through Tom Brown Jr. from Grandfather Stalking Wolf. Our own ancestors in these islands once knew the land in this way too.

I offer Wilding with deep respect and thanks to all of them. It does not claim or copy any culture's ceremonies or sacred practices. It is a UK way of carrying forward simple, shared human ways of paying attention, giving thanks and belonging to a place. — Jay