Audio guide transcript for the Nature Discovery Garden

NARRATOR

You’re about to start your tour of our Nature Discovery Garden, an active area for scientific research here at the Natural History Museum.

The garden is fantastically rich in habitats for you to explore: there are grasslands, wetlands, woodlands, and many different surfaces. Across the tour, you’ll hear about the enormous number of wildlife species these habitats support – plants of all colours and textures, and a huge variety of animals. Many of which our scientists are monitoring and studying!

While there are different paths you can take through the garden, our tour follows a prescribed route. If you listen to the tracks in order, navigation tracks will lead you to each stop, where you’ll hear from scientists and other experts about what’s going on in the garden, as well as poems written by young people. Following all the tracks in order will take around 60 minutes. Feel free to pause the tracks at any point if you need more time.

The Nature Discovery Garden stretches across two acres in a letter L shape around the western corner of the museum site. You can exit the Garden into the Museum at the Darwin Centre or into the Central Hall, where you can find toilets and cafes inside. You can also exit onto Queen’s Gate, a busy public road.

In the next track, some of our team will properly introduce you to the Nature Discovery Garden. 

NARRATOR

Welcome to the Nature Discovery Garden! John Tweddle, our Head of Centre for UK Nature, tells us more about this space.

JOHN TWEDDLE

So, here in the Nature Discovery Garden, we're trying to create an oasis for urban wildlife. There'll be different examples of the kinds of grassland habitat: flower-rich grassland habitats we can create in an urban setting. There's a beautiful pond network, which you can get really close to and explore the different insects and the newts. Along with areas of woodland and more scrubby vegetation, you'll often get in urban parks. So hopefully you'll have quite a familiar feel as you walk around here. Beneath that familiarity there are quite literally thousands of different species of wildlife in this tiny little space here at the museum.

NARRATOR

Fadumo, who's part of the Learning team here, shares a little more about why it's important to know what kinds of wildlife are present in any one space.

FADUMO

Everything in the natural world is connected. Everything depends on other things. A good example of this is the food chain. In the food chain, herbivores are dependent on plants to get their food and their energy. And if there aren't as many plants as there used to be, then there might not be enough food for all of the herbivores to eat. And that will have an impact on the number of herbivores in the environment. And if there are fewer herbivores in the environment, then there will also be less food for the carnivores to eat in that environment. And so then there will be fewer carnivores. And so, even though the carnivores and the plants don't interact, they do, because they're all interconnected in the same ecosystem. And so when one thing is impacted by a change in the climate, everything else in that ecosystem will also be impacted because of the way that they're connected

NARRATOR

Here's John again.

JOHN TWEDDLE

It's never been more important for us to understand the wildlife that's around us and how and why it's changing. We know that we're in a planetary emergency where climate change and biodiversity loss, so the loss of the plants and animals that we rely on, are impacting us as humans. And we know that most of the negative changes in wildlife are because of our actions. So it's really important for us as a science based research institute to look at how we can best assess the nature that's around us, why it's changing, so we can start to put in practical actions to support the recovery of this nature going forward.

And that's what this space is here. It's a playground for us as scientists in many ways, where we can develop new methods to understand the wildlife around us. We can develop new practical approaches to create new habitats for wildlife or better manage our green spaces and rigorously test those to see which works best for nature and also which works best for us as people.

NARRATOR

For directions to the next stop, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

If you are following the whole Guide in order, you’ve just crossed the courtyard from the Evolution Garden. Our next stop is the large stone sculpture that’s down a level to your right.

To reach it, turn to your right. Ahead of you are a set of wide stone steps down to the lower ground level. There are twelve in total, and the final step to ground level is a little shallower than the rest. Once you’re down, the sculpture is a short distance ahead of you behind some railings. In front of it is a tall, metallic viewing piece that looks a bit like a standing lamp, with an information panel lower down to the right.

If you’d rather not take the steps, from your starting point you can continue forward down the long ramp that stretches out before you. It has a slight decline, and you could follow the lip of the pathway on the righthand side. Once at the bottom, take a hard right and continue along the path. There are lots of benches along the right. At the end of the path there is a closed gate. Our stop is to your left.

NARRATOR

In front of us here are three objects. Nearest to us on the right is an information panel. To its left is a tall metal pole, in a golden colour, about as tall as an average height person standing up. On top of this pole is a large metallic cube that’s angled towards a high point on the museum building behind. If a sighted person looks through the cube, which is open at both ends, their focus is directed to a row of large stone animal sculptures which run along the high exterior wall of the museum.

A few steps behind this metallic viewing box, and behind some low metal railings, is one of these very stone sculptures at ground level. It’s a stylised wolf, sitting tall on its haunches, head angled up and towards the right, teeth slightly bared. If you’re able to, do feel free to move forwards and reach through or over the railings to feel some of its features.

The museum’s architect, Alfred Waterhouse, decorated this part of the building with carvings of living plants and animals. Since 1875, when these sculptures were made, many top predators like the wolves, lions, and panthers featured here have become increasingly vulnerable as environmental changes and human activities reduce their habitats.

For directions to the next stop, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

As you face the funnel, information panel, and stone sculpture, there is a closed metal gate to your right. Turn so that your back is to the gate, and our next stop is a medium distance ahead of you along the pathway. The path is very wide and there is a continuous row of bench seating along the left-hand side as you move forward.

As you proceed, to your right are our two grassland habitats. The first is the grassy verge directly next to the path you’re on. Visitors are welcome to head onto this grass, perhaps sitting down or enjoying a picnic. Beyond this verge is a raised piece of grassland, separated by a low concrete wall that’s topped with a black metal fence. Our gardens team maintain this area more closely, as you’ll hear soon.

You’ll soon arrive at two bright, metallic funnels sticking out of the grass on your right. The first starts narrow at the ground, but then opens out into a wide 12-sided shape at the top. If you put your ear to this, you’ll be able to hear a recording of yellow meadow ants at work underground. The funnel to the left of this has a much smaller, square opening. Sighted visitors can look through this to see a representation of the ant’s world.

While we’re here, you can listen to the next track to hear our Head of Gardens tell you more about the nearby grassland habitats. There are still plenty of benches on the other side of the path, or if it’s nice weather, why not take a seat on the grass!

NARRATOR

Tom McCarter, Head of Gardens here at the Natural History Museum, tells us about the grassland habitat.

TOM MCCARTER

So, the one area which is behind a fence is more of a habitat and we manage that as like a hay meadow, essentially. So, we do a cut in July and then later in the year in the autumn, so between kind of October to December time, we aftermath graze with some sheep. And that form of management helps to create a really diverse, floristically diverse flowering plant community.

And the other area is the publicly accessible part, it’s a small mound of mainly turf grass, but we're trying to make it as diverse as possible. So, we manage that by cutting less frequently than you would if you're, say, managing your lawn at home, by cutting it every kind of four to six weeks at a slightly higher height to about five to six centimetres. And that allows smaller plants to grow and flower, things like clovers or common daisy. Things like that will kind of survive that cutting regime and should make it better for biodiversity.

So, it's a kind of a multifunctional space. It's one for visitors to relax and enjoy and sit down and picnic and be outside. But it's also a space that we're hoping to demonstrate that even at home, you know, your lawns can have value for biodiversity.

NARRATOR

For directions to the next stop, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

Next up, we’re going to keep following the path further into the garden. Standing with the two funnels on your right, our next stop is a medium distance ahead. As you move forward, the path will curve towards the right – if it’s helpful you can use the edge where the path meets the grass to help guide you.

The path will curve to the right. Our next stop is here – if you can, head onto the grass to your right and move towards the wall. Attached to the top rung of the fence here is a rectangular black information panel that shows four species - a ladybird, a grasshopper, a beetle, and a spider.

On the low wall below this panel there are small, bronze models of each of these. They’re a reflective bright colour, and they catch the sunlight beautifully. They’re very tactile, so see if you can figure out which species is which!

It’s species like these that our scientists are monitoring in the gardens. While you’re here, you can listen to the next track to learn more about urban biodiversity in spaces like this. 

BECKY CLOVER

My name's Becky Clover, I'm the Urban Biodiversity Officer for the Urban Nature Project. So, at the museum I'm working on creating lots of resources to get people involved in recording the wildlife in their urban areas, kind of on their doorstep, in their gardens, parks, and setting up a network to support these people so they can ask questions, access new resources, new research findings, that kind of thing!

NARRATOR

So, how much nature is really out there in an urban space like this?

BECKY CLOVER

Just to put it in a bit of perspective, in the wildlife garden at the Natural History Museum, we have recorded over 3,200 species, in such a tiny area in the centre of London that's just surrounded by concrete basically. Which just goes to show that if you kind of manage a space and provide that habitat, things will arrive!

And all these kinds of pockets of green space provide so many opportunities for different species. So, they can support birds, countless insects and other invertebrates, pond life like amphibians, dragonflies, reptiles, mammals, including bats, which are really cool. And of course there are plants, trees, fungi, and all the species that rely on them in turn.

You've got such a variety in cities. And I think, almost in such a small space in London, you can have almost more variety of habitats than you would have in the countryside, because you could have gardens, which can be massively varied depending on what people do with them. You have allotments, railway sidings, cemeteries, canals, rivers, everything. And if you kind of add that all up and see it as a network through the city, it's really important for wildlife, not only to live in it, but also to move through it as well.

NARRATOR

If you've been inspired to help monitor the wildlife in your local area, Becky has some great tips.

BECKY CLOVER

So, there's loads of ways you can investigate the habitats and the wildlife in your local area, depending on how involved you want to get. But you can get involved with community and citizen science projects, which is a really great way to start. And there's loads of schemes, national schemes, also local ones that provide free resources and some even provide training if you want to get a bit more involved in how to identify different groups of wildlife.

And the records you make for these not only help you learn what species are present in your local area, but they contribute to national schemes to kind of look at the big picture of wildlife in the UK and help steer those decisions on how best to restore nature.

NARRATOR

In the next track, you can listen to one of the poems written by a group of young people, inspired by our Gardens. It’s called ‘Insects’, and is read by Noor, one of the young people.

For directions to the next stop on the tour, listen to the following track.

You are surrounded.

You are surrounded by millions of us,

different methods of hunting and different brain sizes. 

all working together for biological control. 

You are surrounded by a variety of survivors

Living among the leaves, flowers and trees,

Living in genetic continuity

To discover a new genus

doesn’t happen every day. – 

But think...

Without variety. 

Without our families

Our number one priority, we die.

If we die, we die for the greater good of our species.

Not all of us are blessed with the ability to inflict pain amongst those who try to hurt us,

But 

we can work in harmony with humans, for without us

half of the food you eat will disappear.

Who will fight those who bring disease and destroy your crops?

Without us, in hot deserts, in tropical rainforests, in bustling cities -

Nothing.

You are surrounded.

For directions to the next stop on the tour, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

The next stop on our tour is nearby. Turn back towards the path with the bronze tactiles behind you. We’re going to cross the path in front of you towards another wall, this one about double the height of the one with the tactiles. Being mindful of other visitors on the path, head across it diagonally and to the right.

When you reach the other side, you should come to the wall – it’s flush with the pathway. If you feel the path turn to softer grass, just move slightly to the right and you should feel the beginning of the wall. Feel free to stop here for a moment. Beyond the wall is our wetland habitat. Large ponds are sunk into the ground surrounded by wetland plants. There’s a bridge to the right, and a jetty jutting out over the pond to the left – which we’ll be visiting later.

For now though, select the next track to hear more about these wetland habitats. 

FADUMO

Hello, my name is Fadumo, and I am a Learning Facilitator here at the Natural History Museum.

Ponds are really cool because, when I first started, I thought ponds were just kind of mucky water, I didn't really think there was much going on in them! And then I did some pond dipping and I was like, ‘ponds are really important!’ There's lots of things that live in ponds that you wouldn't assume were there.

We've got freshwater hog louse, they're really cool. They're like woodlice, they're like cousins of woodlice, but they live in the water rather than in dead wood. You can get leeches in a pond; not leeches that feed on humans, but leeches that feed on the things that live in the pond. You get pond snails, you get beetles that live in the pond. Beetles are really cool! They live everywhere in the world, they're the most specious group of insects in the world and we've got some in our pond. And we do get amphibians as well, newtlets, and then newts when they get older and they're really cool. When newts are newtlets, they have kind of an external gills or breathing apparatus that makes them look a little bit like an axolotl! But yeah, lots of different things from all sorts of different animal groups.

When we're doing activities, people will ask, like, ‘this is really fabulous, how can I have this at home? How can I create this at home?’ And you definitely can. You can have, like, an old bathtub in your backyard. If you've got a small balcony and you’re living in flats, you can always have a small bucket. Or you can build a small area out of like some wood and some tarp, it doesn't really take a lot, because it's just water! It's just water that needs to be still for a while. So, you can build that just about anywhere. It can be as small or as big as you want it to be!

NARRATOR

There were ponds here before the Nature Discovery Garden was constructed. To hear how the wildlife in them was temporarily translocated during the building works, select the next track. Otherwise, the following track has your directions to our next stop.

NARRATOR

The Nature Discovery Garden we’re in today, that opened in 2024, is the result of an extensive redevelopment of our old Wildlife Garden.

LOUISE SIMMONS

My name is Louise Simmons and I am a Senior Project Manager at the museum.

NARRATOR

When the Gardens were redeveloped, Louise oversaw the translocation of the historic ponds here in the Nature Discovery Garden.

LOUISE SIMMONS

We already had existing habitats and a series of existing ponds on the site, but we wanted to improve accessibility to that pond so we could better provide our education activities and pond dipping. Our designers designed a sunken pathway through the pond to bring up the pond level so people could access it better. But that meant we had to take everything out of the pond, including all of the plants and the water and the sediment, and store them in temporary storage tanks elsewhere on the site.

So, we had to move out all of the frogs and newts and all of the invertebrates out of the pond, put those in temporary storage, in a temporary pond in a different part of the site. So, because we were translocating those things out of the active construction site, we put up the fencing to keep everything out and prevent it from homing back in on the pond when it all woke up. Because who knew, frogs and newts have some sort of homing mechanism going on! So, they will try and relocate back to where they were originally living. So, everything was trying to get back to the original pond while we were working on it!

NARRATOR

For directions to the next stop, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

From our spot here by the wall, the path continues on to both the left and the right. To the right, it leads to a sunken area between the ponds, which is great for getting right up close to the water level. This area is sometimes shut to accommodate school groups though, so we’re going to follow the path to the left.

Turning to your left, follow the path again – there’s a slight lip where it meets the planted edge. This might be helpful for you to follow. The path turns to the right, and we’re going to follow it round. Our next stop is up ahead, a longer distance away on the left-hand side of the path.

As you move along the path, you might notice a change in atmosphere. We’ve now moved from the open air of the garden to a more enclosed space; the path is flanked by tall trees, which form a canopy above our heads. You might feel it become a little cooler in the shade of their leaves, and the noises around you – including the road to your left – may sound a little dampened. Please be aware that there may be branches hanging overhead into the path.

Once you’ve moved along the path under the trees, there should be an information panel just off the path on the left-hand side. Next to it is another bright, metallic listening funnel like we found earlier. If you can’t locate the funnel, keep moving up the path.

This time, if you listen through the large opening at the top of the funnel, you can hear a recording of the sounds of beetle larvae eating in a decaying wood stack. Listen to the next track to find out more about bioacoustics monitoring in the gardens. 

NARRATOR

You’re now in part of our woodland habitat, which we’re monitoring in potentially surprising ways – by listening!

ED BAKER

I'm Ed Baker and I'm an acoustic biology researcher. So, I look at how animals communicate with sound and things that affect their ability to communicate such as noise, noise pollution, cars, traffic, aeroplanes, tube trains in the soil, all kinds of stuff.

NARRATOR

So, just how did Ed come to be the museum's 'acoustic biology researcher'?

ED BAKER

I opened a cupboard by mistake! So, I have predecessors, who work on grasshoppers and crickets, which is one of the groups I work on mainly. And from the mid 1950s onwards, a guy, David Wagg, was recording cricket song, because he thought it could be useful for delimiting species and working out how those species related to each other across Europe. So, he built this library of like 900 reel to reel tapes, mainly of crickets, but all kinds of other things. Yeah, I found that in the cupboard, and thought, ‘yep, someone should do something with that’!

NARRATOR

Once Ed had taken on the role of bioacoustic researcher, he began setting up his tech in the gardens. One example is in front of us here - he's monitoring the decaying wood stack, using microphones to detect the different animals moving through it and helping its decay. But what else does he monitor in the gardens?

ED BAKER

I'm using a few acoustic techniques. One is, just, put a microphone out, and you can record, and you get an idea of what's there. That's the most kind of basic kind of thing we're doing. We're also doing some spatial audio, where you have lots of microphones closely placed together, so you can work out what direction sounds are coming from. So it's like, you can tell where a bird is roughly in the garden. So how are they using the space, do they, like in times when gardens are open, do they avoid people? And when the people have gone, do they move back into those spaces?

And then we're also doing sound in ponds. So, there's a lot of work done on whales mainly and how they're impacted by noise and how fish are impacted by noise; a lot less done on freshwater environments. So, it's a great opportunity to study that.

NARRATOR

In the next track, you can listen to one of the poems written by a group of young people, inspired by our Gardens. It’s called ‘The Soil Turns’, and is read by Testament, the poet who worked with the young people.

For directions to the next stop on the tour, listen to the following track.

The mystery of soil

Malleable, squish me like playdough

loosening the knots in your shoulders

slow every panting breath,

heart rate flowing in a regular rhythm

like waves in shallow water

you are buried inside me

like diamonds or moisture

little pockets of air

where you can get a glimpse of light

sink into me,

nerves calm

the smell of old ships

and pleasant conversations

plants, twigs, ancestors,

it’s like a community

feeding you, teaching you,

full and fed.

when you are away in your own head,

wretched like a mangled car

your machine cranks along severing us

chemicals stain me, stains that don’t wash away

The soil turns

For directions to the next stop on the tour, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

For our next stop, we’re going to leave this enclosed woodland area and head back toward the ponds. To get there, we’re going to continue following this path. With the panel and listening funnel to your left, continue along the path.  

You’ll come to a crossroads junction. There’s an open wooden gate to the right, and to the left is a new, softer path that heads back into a different area of the woodland habitat. For now, we’re going through the open wooden gate to the right.

Once through the wooden gate, take a sharp right. Please be aware that the ponds are nearby. There is one small area that has no fence or wall around the pond, but soft soil and planting acts as a barrier between you and the water.  

Move forward along this path, and you’ll likely notice the ground beneath you change from smooth stone to wooden planks. You’re now on the jetty overlooking the ponds we mentioned earlier – don’t worry, there are tall railings all around the edge.

At the end of the jetty, there are two more of the bright metallic funnels we’ve encountered before. Once again, one has a large opening to listen (this one is a recording of underwater sounds), while the other with the smaller top is for sighted visitors.

Here, jutting out over the ponds, is a good time to hear all about one of our most popular activities – pond dipping. That’s your next track. 

NARRATOR

Victor Heng, one of our learning team, tells us more about the pond dipping which takes place in the water below the jetty you’re currently on, and what younger children in particular can learn from it.

VICTOR HENG

A lot of kids, unless they've already been pond dipping somewhere, will have no idea what it is, what those pond animals are like. ‘Cause you, you can't really see them very easily in your everyday life. Whereas you can see terrestrial invertebrates in your everyday life, you can see slugs, snails, worms, wood lice.

But there are only so many ways that you can go pond dipping. It's just putting a net in the pond and then scooping out stuff and putting it in some kind of a container! So that bit was like, ‘well, the kids, have to do that bit’. So, what I put most effort in was looking at what do the kids do with those animals afterwards. And what that looks like in most other locations is just looking at the animals in trays, maybe in a small specimen container so you can kind of see the animal up close. But that reduces the three-dimensional habitat of a pond to essentially a two-dimensional habitat because the trays are very wide and shallow.

So, I was thinking, is there a way that we can put those animals back into a pond habitat, but one that they can see the animals with their actual behaviour? So, in our sessions, the animals go from a tray and into small fish tanks, which brings back the three-dimensional element. And we've got a little plant that's in there, there's a little shelter that animals can go in, in there. So, kids can hopefully see a bit more of the natural behaviour of those animals.

NARRATOR

Scientists do their own version of pond-dipping, too. By monitoring the variety and health of different species in a pond habitat, they can determine how ecologically 'clean' that water is. Victor Heng again.

VICTOR HENG

That is not an angle that a lot of kids really care about, and it's also a really confusing angle because, if you think of ‘what does clean water mean’, for most people and for most kids it means that you can drink it. But you can have really high-quality pond habitats, like really undisturbed habitats where you've got lots of biodiversity, animals that are really sensitive to pollution, can live and thrive in this water, but you still wouldn't want to drink it because it's full of microbes and stuff that'll give you, you know, gut infections and what not!

NARRATOR

For directions to the next stop, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

To reach our next stop, we’re going to double back on ourselves to the crossroads. Turn away from the end of the jetty, so that the funnels are behind you. Now head forwards. You may notice the wood floor change back to the smooth solid surface. Stick to the left-hand side of the path, away from the water.

You will reach some low boulders in front of you. You might like to pause here, as on the low boulder to your right, there are some more of the small bronze tactiles we found earlier. This time there is a springtail, velvet mite, a moss, and a lichen for you to find.

When you’re done, just ahead you’ll have a choice of path. The path to the right leads to the sunken pond area which is sometimes closed for school groups, so we’re going to head left, back to the 4-way crossroads.

Keep moving directly forward, past the wooden gate and across the crossroads. After a short distance you’ll probably notice the ground change to a more gravelly texture. We’re heading back into the woodland habitat. Follow this path as it curves slightly to the right and you’ll reach a little wooden seating area to the left of the path.

There are more bronze tactiles to discover here across a chunky, light-wooden bench and the log stump next to it. The tactiles are a stag beetle, a snail, a centipede, a woodlouse, a spider and a collared earthstar fungus. 

To the right of this area is an information panel about what our scientists can find in soil below the ground. You can find out more in the next track.

SAM THOMAS

I'm Sam Thomas. I'm the UK Biodiversity Officer for the Urban Nature Project.

NARRATOR

One of Sam's key roles here at the museum is monitoring the wildlife that moves through our urban nature spaces. To do this, he's using a relatively new technique known as environmental, or e, DNA. Sam tells us more.

SAM THOMAS

Traditionally the way we've recorded nature or what we call biodiversity monitoring has very much relied on visual methods. So, I go out, I look at something, I look at its features, its characteristics, I match them up against a book or a key or some other thing to decide what that species that I've visually observed is, and I record that in various ways.

So, that's been the backbone of all the knowledge we have of where nature lives, where species occur. But that has broadly overlooked a large percentage of our biodiversity because it's too small, too obscure, too difficult to visually observe. So, what we're doing with DNA-based monitoring and within that environmental DNA is we're using the traces of genetic code.

So, every species has a unique genetic code. And as they move around through their environments - that could be a worm wiggling through the soil, it could be a beetle in the pond, it could be a moth flapping through the meadow - they leave behind traces, so a scale or a little piece of their skin or equivalent material. And within that tiny trace that they leave behind will be contained DNA. And so, what we can do with that is, we can then, through a process called barcoding, we can look at a little tiny bit of the DNA that's in that fragment that's left behind in the soil or the water or wherever it might be.

And we can sequence, amplify that. We can read it in the lab. And we can then compare that against all previously known sequences. And in doing that, we can link up the two things and say, ‘well, the unknown piece that we found is very, very similar to this known piece that someone else previously found somewhere else in the world’. And so therefore the two came from the same organism.

NARRATOR

In tracking nature in this way, Sam can work out all kinds of things - including how organisms that are far too small for anyone to see are moving through an environment.

SAM THOMAS

That could be a species that has just arrived, be that introduced with something that's been brought into the country, potentially invasive, we could use this to track its spread through the UK. And that would work whether it's something like a grey squirrel, which we might already know where they are, but it would also work if it was a plant pathogen, a plant disease, or a bacteria that we otherwise wouldn't be able to track effectively.

NARRATOR

For directions to the next stop, listen to the next track. 

NARRATOR

Our next stop is a longer distance away.

Continue to follow the path onwards as it turns right. Please be aware of overhanging branches in this narrow area. You’ll probably feel there’s a slight incline here and soon you’ll reach another four-way crossroads, where the texture of the path will change to a more solid surface.  

Turning right here would take you back towards the pond jetty we visited earlier. To the left, is an exit from the gardens. If you want to end your visit here, it’s a short distance up a slight incline and brings you out onto the busy Queen’s Gate Road.

We’re going to head straight across. Continue onwards and the path will change back to the more gravelly texture. There’s a wooden gate open here which you will go through.

This woodland path has low wooden benches on either side which visitors can lie down on. If you can, we encourage you to try them out!

Here is a great space to rest and listen to our next stop, which introduces you properly to this woodland habitat. It’s the next track. 

NARRATOR

Tom McCarter, Head of Gardens here at the Museum, tells us a little more about the woodland habitat around us in the Nature Discovery Garden.

TOM MCCARTER

And the woodlands kind of surround the perimeter of the garden in a big L shape under the canopy of these giant London plane trees, and they were planted around the same time as the museum was built. They're really magnificent trees actually, they're really beautiful, structurally very impressive, and they have this lovely flaking bark that's quite amazing. So, they really dominate the canopy and the ecology of the woodland areas of the entire garden actually. And so underneath is this kind of sub canopy of smaller British native trees. And they were planted around 1995 when the Wildlife Garden was built. And they're representing different kind of woodlands that you might find in the south of the UK.

NARRATOR

We asked Tom to tell us a little bit more about the giant London plane trees that dominate our woodland habitat - and some of the surprising challenges they present!

TOM MCCARTER

London planes are amazing because they kind of shed their bark and also they have very waxy leaves which kind of are resistant to pollution, which is why they were so good and planted around London in the 1800s where they got the name London Plane Trees. So they're fantastic because they're quite resistant in urban areas.

Working directly underneath them, they drop all their leaves in autumn, which is a massive challenge for us to manage, both because there's lots of leaves to collect and also because they're quite difficult to break down. So, if you just leave them where they are, they tend to kind of accumulate in big drifts. They're an introduced tree, so there's not really any native kind of biodiversity that breaks them down. So, we do compost them, and we collect them and we put them in a big pile. And sometimes we'll shred them up using a shredder or a chipper to try and speed the process up. And then we put them back out at the gardens as mulch.

NARRATOR

If you continue up the path, keeping to the left, you will reach another listening funnel and will be able to reach out and touch one of the London planes next to it.

In the next track, you can listen to one of the poems written by a group of young people, inspired by our Gardens. It’s called ‘Leaves’, and is read by Anna, one of the young people.

For directions to the next stop on the tour, listen to the following track.

I want to touch the leaves again

Something from the past

Memories appearing in my palms

Some soft with muted colours

Small and thin longing

Some wide a spreading out

Catching raindrops like jewels

While others stay waxy and smooth for protection

Small buds peeps out

Looking up at those in the windows of the buildings

That surround them

Plants steal the light

We just get their leftovers

Slight scents of lemony calm

Like those herbs for healing

Inviting us to spend a moment

Tracing patterns across these rain catchers

A leaf is nature’s hand held out

Where there is life there’s green

To grow again

Hold hands

For directions to the next stop on the tour, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

For our next stop, we’re going to leave this shadowy, woodland area. The path forks in two different directions ahead of you. The left-hand route takes you to an outdoor classroom area, which will sometimes be closed for school activities. A tree listening funnel can also be found along that path.

We’re going to take the right-hand path. Bear right and follow the path for a short distance. Soon you’ll emerge into a different space.

The path here changes back to a smoother stone texture and is inlaid with lots of angular, shiny lines. They zig zag across the floor here, making up an uneven network of lines and shapes. On your right, just off the path, is an information panel that explains the underground network of threads they represent. To hear more, play the next track. 

NARRATOR

The information panel you’re next to tells us all about how under the ground an incredible network of fungal threads and plant roots is working to the mutual benefit of both.

Mycorrhizal fungi are often found above ground in the form of mushrooms. Most of their structure is actually hidden beneath the ground though. Here, their fungal threads shoot down in a sprawling network. These threads attach themselves to the roots of nearby plants or trees. Once attached, the fungal threads absorb nutrients like nitrogen from the soil and pass them into the plant. In return, the plant shares sugar with the fungi, which it needs to grow. This relationship is essential for the healthy growth of most plants.

The network of fungal threads is what’s being represented on the ground here by the inlaid bright metallic lines. They actually start off the pathway in the soil that surrounds it – you might be able to feel one jutting out towards the base of the information panel, for instance. Then, they crisscross the pathway in a complex web, showing above ground what’s going on below. There are also two connected funnels where two people can speak to one another from across the path.  

For directions to the next stop, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

For our next stop, we’ll be leaving this woodland habitat and moving back into the more open, unshaded area of the Garden. With the Underground Networks panel on your right, move forward until you arrive at a low wooden fence.

The path goes in both directions here. Following it to the right would take you down into the sunken area between the ponds, which is sometimes closed for activities, when it’s closed off with a rope. If it’s not closed, you’re welcome to explore down there, as it also leads to a bridge that overlooks the ponds. If you continued in that direction, you’d end up back towards the grasslands where we started.

For our tour though, we’re going left. Follow this fence and then cross the path to the other side where you’ll find a similar wooden fence, with an information panel fixed to the top of one its vertical posts.  

The panel tells us how in autumn, sheep graze the land behind the fence. To hear more about how these gardens change across the seasons, listen to the next stop.

NARRATOR

As you might expect, the gardens here look very different as the seasons change, and near the ponds is a great spot to think about this. Learning Facilitator, Fadumo.

FADUMO

The really nice thing about the gardens in general is, if you visit the gardens at least four times in the year, once in each season, every time you come to the garden it will look completely different. And the pond is no different than that! So, around the springtime in the year, we’ll have frogs and toads coming in and laying their frogspawn and toadspawn in the ponds. So you’ll find a lot of that.

In the summertime all of the dragonflies will be coming out and about, especially towards the end of summer. But they live in the pond as nymphs when they are young. And then when the dragonflies are adults, um, they climb up the reeds, they come out of their casing and then spread their wings and fly off and zoom about. And the light reflects really beautifully off of all of the different colours that they have, like the blue and the green, all the demoiselles and damselflies, and the red, they look great!

So, in the autumn we have sheep that come to visit, and they help to graze on some of the greener parts of our garden and help keep them kind of low. And they also leave behind droppings which then increases the amount of insects that are visible and about, and then birds like to eat those. So, all of this is really great for some of the other wildlife that we’ve got!

And then in the wintertime, the trees have lost their leaves and the pond is really cold, but there’s still things living in the pond, which is great! So, at all times of the year, there’s always something different happening!

NARRATOR

In the next track, you can listen to one of the poems written by a group of young people, inspired by our Gardens. It’s called ‘Wasps’, and is read by Vicky, an Access Specialist.

For directions to the next stop on the tour, listen to the following track.

A message from us wasps!

There is a sound.

A hum of life, a tiny crash

We fly into your window and land on your flowers.

There is a sound.

The sound of bigger wings and a constant drone.

Scared? You shouldn’t be. We’re just passing by.

Just stand still 

We’ll leave you alone.

We work in the thousands, and that’s just one colony.

There is a sound

Of activity.

Yes, we will go after your food. What did you expect us to do?

We need to survive too you know.

And if you don’t share, there might be a sound of pain from you.

Unlike those bees who die like heroes,

We can actually defend ourselves for days on end.

We don’t separate from our stinger!

Yeah we get to keep it because we’re just cooler like that.

There is a sound of wings buzzing around your head.

Thought you were rid of us? Funny, we’re just behind your ear…

We can and will track you.

Can you hear us now?

Don’t worry, if you want to lounge in the sun,

Like we said,

Be small,

Stand still,

And we’ll leave.

We’re too busy to hang around for too long

There is a sound.

If you listen closely.

Two sets of membranous wings beat against the air at

227 times per second, going about their work.

It is the sound of life itself.

For directions to the next stop on the tour, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

From here, we’re going to continue following the path around to the right. Our next stop is the Nature Activity Centre which is actually the long building directly ahead of us here, beyond the fence and the grassy enclosure.

To reach it, we’re going to continue following this path to the right. As you move forward you may notice the floor beneath you change from stone to wooden timber. We’re now on the boardwalk, which is a much darker colour. 

Take care here, as just in front of you on the boardwalk, planted in the centre, is a fairly spiky tree! To avoid that, we’re going to follow the boardwalk around to the left.  On the boardwalk, you might like to follow the slightly raised edge that runs along the left side of the path.  

As you progress, you may notice the wooden timber floor change back to stone. The raised edge of the path also stops at this point, so take care, as there’s a slight dip off the path to the left. At this point you are near an entrance to the Museum, either by going up the ramp or up the stairs to your right.

To your left, you’ll come to the corner of our Nature Activity Centre. To learn more, play the next track.

NARRATOR

We’re now at the Nature Activity Centre. It might be open today, in which case there will be staff nearby who can tell you what’s going on and how you can get involved.

The building is long. The roof is like a stretched and inverted V, with one side considerably longer than the other. It’s made from timber. At the front it inclines upwards towards the highest point of the building, and then drops down more steeply at the back. The roof actually overhangs the exterior walls slightly. At ground level, below the edge of the roof on each side, is a narrow gulley formed from low stone walls. This is to collect any rainwater that runs off the sloping roof, which then gets fed back into the gardens.  

The walls are made from various types of stone, which each have a unique feel. To the left of where we stopped is a standalone column that holds up part of the roof, on which you can feel the different finishes: some are smooth, some are ridged, some are indented with tiny swirling shapes.

The entrance is just behind this column, and to the right of this is tall floor to ceiling window, in which is a digital screen. This displays a short video illustrating the data the scientists are collecting from the Gardens, as Sam explained in our previous eDNA track.

For directions to the next stop, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

With the Nature Activity Centre to your left, we’re going to move forward into our Urban Futures area.

The area has been planted with mediterranean plants, and is intended as a place to reflect on the future of our urban habitats. There are spaces for you to settle and relax, and we invite you to take some time here to listen to the next track on our tour. It’s a little longer than the others, so make yourself comfortable. 

NARRATOR

We asked everyone a pretty big question - how can we be advocates for our planet? Why not take a moment here in this section of the gardens, perhaps take a seat for a few minutes, and reflect on their thoughts.

FADUMO

So, one of the things we can advocate for is having more wild spaces. We have a lot of curated gardens, that's a very English thing, it's like the English tea garden! But actually having, just like we do here, having a variety of different types of living things in a nature space: so, tall trees, small hedges for nesting birds, fruity trees and nutty trees, and pond spaces, and grassy spaces - having all of these different variety of habitats is really important to increase the biodiversity of wildlife.

JOHN

One of the ways that I think we can all get involved, it's actually just slowing down a little, looking around us and starting to think about nature and what it means to us. It could mean your favourite bird. It could mean the space within your local park or your garden, or actually you feel relaxed and you feel safe at home. And just starting that process of thinking, ‘well, okay, why does nature matter to me?’ Leads naturally into thinking, ‘, what can I do? Are there other steps I can take to practically support this nature?’

LOUISE

I think we all have to be responsible, don't we? We all have to be responsible for what we do and how we look after things, because I think that's a big thing, right? We need to have respect for this amazing resource that we have. And the only way to do that is for the next generations that we have, it's giving them the knowledge and the ability to make the big changes that are required in order to keep this amazing planet kind of functioning.

VICTOR

I think an easy thing to do that can have a big long-term impact is talking about the things that you care about with regards to the environment. Talking about it with your friends, talking about it with your coworkers, I think is really important because it's a really big part of fighting back against climate anxiety, so they don't feel just like big overwhelming things that no one's doing anything about.

TOM

If you're lucky enough to have a garden, then you can do lots in your garden just by, you know, being a bit less tidy! Leaving things to get on with it basically, and they can still look good and be great for nature at the same time.

SAM

I think being an advocate for the planet, it can sound like such a huge thing. But I think it's also really important to understand that even small things, and in some ways particularly small things, can make a difference. And that could be things like changing the management of a piece of grassland you have, or putting a planter with some wildflowers in it. These sorts of small actions can have a disproportionate impact on increasing urban biodiversity.

BECKY

I think once you start noticing the small things like a bee or a little hoverfly on your flowers, or some pretty plants growing between the paving slabs on your walk to work, that kind of thing, you start to tune in a bit more to the nature around you and just notice it and kind of the beauty, especially in an urban setting. And I think it's really important that we value these seemingly really small contributions to the ecosystems, and having respect for nature and all the species that need each other to exist.

PAUL

I think it starts by valuing what you've got in front of you. So, it's about valuing nature and understanding nature and engaging with nature. So, I think that immediate engagement is really important. Once you start doing that, you appreciate it, and that helps you become an advocate for it and an advocate for the planet generally.

SUSANNAH

I think that when you work on palaeontology, you have a really deep time perspective of things like climate change, environmental change over time. But we can also see how fragile life is and how quickly things can change. So, I think having that perspective of deep time kind of makes you reflect on that deeply.  

PAUL

For me it's about the interconnectedness of everything we see. So for me, looking at things like gardens and actually going out and looking at wild landscapes, it's the idea of being able to leave things alone. And actually, not having a heavy presence in them, letting these kinds of environments regenerate themselves naturally, working as functioning ecosystems to all of those parts intact. We live on a planet that depends on those interconnections, and that scaling up from what we see in the garden to a planetary scale is what we should all be trying to do.

YOGI

Lots of us had experiences that we wouldn't initially have thought of as interactions with nature or the natural world that absolutely do count! Like going for a walk with my housemate and finding a slow worm under a tire was something that I had discounted from interacting with nature when actually that is exactly how you interact with nature in urban spaces!

NARRATOR

In the next track, you can listen to one of the poems written by a group of young people, inspired by our Gardens. It’s called ‘Soil’, and is read by Testament, the poet who worked with the young people.

Otherwise, this is the final stop on our tour. To hear how to head inside the Museum, listen to the following track.

I’m the beginning and the end.

I’m…

Hey!

Look down!

There’s probably something dead beneath.

But don’t worry,

I’ll grow something new for you.

Because that’s what I do best.

People love to bury things.

They call me dirt.

I get on your shirt, shoes

In your busy fingers.

What do I become in your hands?

I give life to you.

I feed the animals you love.

I also take them in.

Under your nails and on your skin.

The scent of new rainfall

You’ll decompose.

I’ll turn you into grass,

And animals will eat you.

But don’t worry, I’m home.

I’m the beginning and the end.

To hear how to head inside the Museum, listen to the next track.

NARRATOR

That brings us to the end of our tour. If you’ve followed it in full, you’ve now explored both the Evolution Garden and the Nature Discovery Garden.  

Your nearest entrance to the museum is nearby, at the top of the flight of steps or the ramp. There are toilets and a café close by inside.

Thank you for listening. If you would like to leave any feedback about this guide, please contact Feedback@nhm.ac.uk.