Tree Amble
After 30 years working to restore nature in forests and on farms, Pete Leeson takes time out to revisit the people he’s met along the way. Throughout the series, Pete discovers how land managers are adapting and responding to the nature crisis we all face, while navigating the economic challenges within farming today. People are at the heart of this podcast, holding the potential to do some incredible things. We meet farmers, ecologists, rewilders and more to find out how communities are building a future together which respects and supports nature.

For 30 years, Pete has been at the Woodland Trust, working with partners and landowners to plant trees.
While his work has focussed on sites across Cumbria, he has built partnerships and supported projects across the UK with a focus on restoring nature.
In this podcast, Pete has in-depth conversations with land managers, ecologists and rewilders to hear how they support nature on farmland and beyond.
For more about Pete, here's a 2 minute film about his work and motivations:
Episodes

Monday Mar 17, 2025
Series 5 Episode 1 Neil Heseltine
Monday Mar 17, 2025
Monday Mar 17, 2025
Neil and Leigh Heseltine farm in the North Yorkshire village of Malham - famous for its amazing geology and beautiful setting. Neil's journey into farming with nature, in fact farming nature, is fascinating. He has moved from farming sheep to farming cattle. He loves the landscape he has farmed all his life and it comes across in this episode.

Tuesday Feb 25, 2025
Series 4 Episode 10 Glen Finglas Woodland Restoration
Tuesday Feb 25, 2025
Tuesday Feb 25, 2025
In this episode of Tree Amble we head up to Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park in Central Scotland to meet Hamish Thompson the Estate Manager of the Woodland Trust's largest single site Glen Finglas. Hamish and his team are responsible for managing over 4000 ha / 10,000 acres of ancient woodland, wood pasture, peat bog and mountain. This is tree management on an epic scale and a day's walk around the tracks or up one of the Glen's hills is hardly enough to take in the scale of this landscape. Hamish's work crosses many disciplines but we meet him in a stand of ancient hazel talking about the importance of this species to ecology today and people in the past.

Monday Feb 10, 2025
Series 4 Episode 9 Caring about our Cows with Lindsay Whistance
Monday Feb 10, 2025
Monday Feb 10, 2025
Have you ever thought about beef or dairy from the cow's perspective? In this episode of Tree Amble we meet Dr Lindsay Whistance who has a life long passion for cows and is deeply concerned about our relationship with them. She works as the senior livestock researcher at the Organic Research Centre and has 4 themes to her work:
* Farm animal behaviour
* Participatory research and facilitation
* Health and welfare planning and assessments
* Role of trees and shrubs in landscapes and food systems for farmed animals
I hope you enjoy this conversation!

Thursday Jan 23, 2025
Series 4 Episode 8 Kate Hanley - Peat Restoration
Thursday Jan 23, 2025
Thursday Jan 23, 2025
We met Kate Hanley down at Dovestones just east of Oldham on a very wet day in 2024. Kate works for the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) and manages a brilliant project on land above Dovestones which is owned by water company United Utilities but leased to the RSPB for nature recovery. Kates work here is really drilling down into how we restore very degraded peat bogs - essential for carbon storage, water management [keeping water back for both flood prevention and droughts] and for nature. Our upland peat bogs have been hammered by pollution, extraction and drainage. But Kate's work is truly inspirational even if it is turning a few heads - birds are flooding back, insects galore but also trees are seeding into her project and this challenges the peat / tree dogma. This is one site visit which is well worth the walk!

Wednesday Jan 08, 2025
Tree Amble Special - Specialist Cheesemakers Association Gathering
Wednesday Jan 08, 2025
Wednesday Jan 08, 2025
In this Tree Amble Special we went back to Torpenhow [pronounced Tre'pen'ah] - Mark and Jenny's Farm - and joined the Specialist Cheesemakers Association at their annual gathering. We had a ball with these amazing cheese makers eating and talking about the best of the best cheeses in the UK. These folks are brilliant food producers and all concerned with nature on land they manage or where their milk comes from and what it can do for good food taste and production.

Monday Dec 16, 2024
Series 4 Episode 7 Wild Boar with Chantal Lyons
Monday Dec 16, 2024
Monday Dec 16, 2024
In this episode we talk to the brilliant Chantal Lyons about her book "Groundbreakers" which is all about Wild Boar. For us in the UK this is a challenging species which we hunted from our shores many years ago but for which there is an ecological argument for restoration. It is challenging this one though, they make a huge mess and are difficult to control at any level. But we should have a discussion about all and any species that were once here and see whether they may fit into our landscape again at some point. Chantal's book does the two side of this equation very well. I hope our interview brings out some of the best point on both sides.

Friday Nov 29, 2024
Series 4 Episode 6 Crofting On Lismore Claire and Mike
Friday Nov 29, 2024
Friday Nov 29, 2024
We took some time out last spring to head out to Lismore - a wee island a short ferry ride from Oban - to meet Claire and Mike on their beautiful productive and, as it turned out, biodiverse croft. Crofting is a very old tradition in Scotland with small areas of land managed for food production in often remote communities. Claire and Mike have created an oasis of life within their which produces lots of vegetables and fruits - but they also grow tea! The spring birds were a joy when we visited feasting off innumerable insects.

Thursday Nov 14, 2024
Series 4 Episode 5 Farming at Matson Ground Windermere
Thursday Nov 14, 2024
Thursday Nov 14, 2024
Matson Ground is a traditional Lake District Estate with house, gardens and cottages (some available as holiday accommodation) a few small offices and about 500 ha of organic farmland situated just south and East of Windermere in the Lake District. In this Tree Amble episode we meet Madelaine who is the current owner of the estate which came into her family 100 years ago. We also meet Pete Webster - farm manager - and Luke Steer - woodland adviser. We talk about managing the estate and the new wood pasture project emerging under Luke's guidance.