Great Big Green Week

As part of the national Great Big Green Week the Festival is holding two environmental talks

Tom Moorhouse - Elegy for a River

Richmond Town Hall Saturday 15th June 7:30 pm. Tickets £10

Tom Moorhouse is an ecologist and author, who for over twenty two years worked for the Wildlife Conservation Research Unit, Oxford University. His authorial career comprised a number of children's books, including The River Singers, The Rising and Trickster, all of which drew on ecological knowledge of water voles and rats, and his adult non-fiction comprises Elegy for a River and Ghosts in the Hedgerow.

In this talk Tom will introduce you to the wonderful world of water voles, and the conservation challenges they face in Britain. Through his own work he will explain what conservation research actually does, why it hasn't yet achieved the outcomes we all want and need - but why he still has hope for wildlife and our collective future.

Roger Morgan Grenville - Across a Waking Land

Richmond Town Hall Sunday 16th June 7:30 pm. Tickets £10

In the spring of 2022, nature writer, Roger Morgan-Grenville, walked alone for 1,000 miles through Britain northwards from Lymington at the pace of the advancing season. He wanted to see for himself at slow pace the state of nature in his country, and the efforts that were being made to regenerate it. 57 days later, and 11 kilos lighter, he arrived at Cape Wrath Lighthouse after a challenging but enthralling adventure. His account of the walk in Across a Waking Land manages simultaneously to be angry, hopeful, philosophical and very funny, and the lessons he learned from the people he met are life-changingly positive. The book has been short-listed for the Richard Jeffreys 2023 Nature Writing Prize.