Island life

Bernard Mandeville’s defence of private vices with public benefits

Keepers at the Chimfunshi Wildlife Orphanage in Zambia have noticed a fashion trend spreading among groups of chimpanzees living there – sticking strands of grass in their ears or rectums, and just le

Wildlife gardening is hugely beneficial, both for biodiversity and for gardeners. By providing food, shelter and nest sites for a wide range of species, you get the opportunity to engage with the natu

There is a van in John Little’s garden. That information may not seem so surprising perhaps, until you learn that the van in question isn’t simply parked. It is semi-submerged, with greenery growing o

Whether winter-faded ferns, the spindly harvestman or the tyrannical stare of an irate chicken, through-lines from the prehistoric to our modern age are all around us in November, says John Lewis-Stempel

Within just a few weeks, I had nearly been wee’d on by a naked mole-rat, waited for five hours for a few horses to poo and smelt the sulphurous pong of some seafloor sludge collected from the depths o