As part of our 60^th anniversary celebrations last year, we launched our Words of the Wild podcast series. The series explores stories from the Trust’s past, present and future. In this blog we catch up with hosts, Ed and Rachel, about the highlights and challenges of capturing 60 years’ worth of stories.

The Words of the Wild series covers so many different aspects of the Trusts’ work; where did you start?

Ed – The first thing to do was to pick which stories we wanted to include. The podcast series was planned alongside the storytelling events so we knew we had a great place to start with the material we’d capture at them. From there, we were able to pick broad themes and group stories and features together to get the rough shapes of each episode.

What were your highlights from recording the series?

Ed – For me the recording process was a great opportunity to be nosey about what some of my colleagues are up to! I really enjoyed the storytelling event at Shewalton Wood as I hadn’t visited before and Gill’s knowledge of the reserve was fascinating. The storytelling event at Loch of the Lowes was also very special. A lot of the people that came along had deep personal connections to the Loch and it was touching to hear more about them. I also have to mention recording with Jess and Elouise from our Living Seas team. We got to sit on a beach and have a chat and call it work!

Rachel – For me, it was just simply hearing people share their stories. The podcast covered so many topics, but at the heart of every story was a person’s love and passion for nature. Sitting down to record the podcast with Ed and have our ‘weekly chats’ was also a highlight (promise he didn’t pay me to say this!).

What were some of the biggest challenges when you were creating Words of the Wild?

Rachel – In typical Scottish fashion, we couldn’t always count on the weather for outdoor recording! When visiting the Isle of Eigg to chat to the volunteers and look for otters, we were met with very heavy rain! No otters were spotted but we managed to take cover and sit down to chat in the community hall instead – I was very thankful for my waterproofs! It was also incredibly hard to cut down recordings into bite-sized segments, especially when there is so much amazing content. Ed had the hard job of cutting down the audio and piecing it together to create a story for our listeners – and he smashed it!

Ed – For me one of the biggest challenges was also one of the most exciting! The storytelling event that features in episode 2 was focused on the Coigach and Assynt Living Landscape and it was a real adventure to travel up to the rugged and remote West Highlands. The challenge was at the event itself; we had an amazing group of people join us who all had fascinating stories and connections to the local landscape. Capturing all of them was technically quite tricky and I did a lot of running around with a microphone to try and record everything!

Do you have any favourite segments or stories in the series?

Ed – All of them!

Rachel – Don’t make me pick! I absolutely loved Laura’s story about the Flying Flock in episode 4. I also loved episode 5 and being transported to the coast – Montrose Basin is one of my favourite spots.

Ed – If I really had to choose, I really enjoyed talking to Tracy from our Cumbernauld Living Landscape as part of episode 6. We chatted for ages about being connected to nature and how important it is for our wellbeing. It really struck a chord with me and it was a lovely segment as well as a good reminder for us all to get outside more.

You can listen to the full series here or search “Words of the Wild” on your podcast streaming platform of choice.