Nikki Paterson

Winter Well is on air BBC Radio 4 this week.

An audio guide to thriving in winter, with advice from medics, artists, poets and future-gazers on simple but effective ways to bring light into your life during the darkest part of the year.

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...

@hesterparr.bsky.social

Finally made it along to ‘More-than-human’ at the Design Museum with @riverreflections.bsky.social. A really vibrant & engaging exhibition about learning from and designing with other beings — it’s very cool & heartening to see this thinking reaching wider audiences 🦋

A big week continued with Fran Mahon’s brilliant ‘Flooded Memories’ exhibition, exploring river agency. In a space overlooking the River Ouse, he illuminated the ability of Rivers Ouse and Foss to effect change — reshaping local architectures, histories and memory @hgcresearchcentre.bsky.social

Loved roaming Yorkshire Arboretum & Bog Hall last week for the LCAB field trip. Mushroom season is in full swing! @anthropocenebio.bsky.social

What do we mean when we say that carnivores and other wildlife are "habituating" to people? Who actually habituates to whom? Is this bad or god? Who decides? All of this and more in our new paper, expertly led by @ethanddoney.bsky.social, out now in @peopleandnature.bsky.social.

Swimmers and river lovers of Yorkshire! Rave On for the Avon is coming to York THIS THURSDAY 🏊🏻‍♀️💦💙

Please share…

www.picturehouses.com/movie-detail...

@righttoroam.bsky.social @yorkswildlife.bsky.social

Southern Water applies for permission to draw water from rare chalk stream Environment secretary urged to stop drought order that could damage the ecology of River Test in Hampshire

And Yorkshire Water applies for drought orders, to extract water from Rivers Ouse & Wharfe. Yet 'the sector has been criticised for failing to build reservoirs and to fix leaking pipes, while attention has also focused on the large pay packets awarded to some water company bosses'

Lou & I are continuing our nature journaling practices to pay deep attention to local natures and shifting seasons — highly recommend for anyone who likes to scribble

Had a great week in Mons for the Society of Human Ecology conference — lots on relational thinking, rights of nature, emotions & affects. Cherry on top was winning the Richard J Borden award for my poster, ‘Experiences of outdoor swimming’

Grateful for the opportunity to share my ongoing PhD research at the end of May - as part of a panel on biodiversity & wellbeing @anthropocenebio.bsky.social 🌊

Pesticides, antibiotics, animal medicines: the chemical cocktail seeping into our rivers The list of everyday pollutants is a long one, and they could be as damaging to our water ecosystems as sewage spills

An important @theguardian.com article on @alistairboxall.bsky.social's research: "A study of #Yorkshire’s rivers is helping scientists understand the impact everyday pollutants are having on waterways – and the results are sobering" 👇🌍

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

#York #YorkResearch

📣 Time to get your panels and abstracts in @pollenetwork.bsky.social conf 2026 is open for submissions. @icta-uab.bsky.social is a great place to host it - and it promises to be a blast (as always!) @danbrockington.bsky.social

pollenpoliticalecology.network/pollen-2026/

Our new seminar series Anthropocene Biopolitics starts on 3 June with a session on microbes.

We’ll think about how microbial imaginaries necessitate a reimagining of how the human relates to the biodiversity that criss-crosses its boundaries.

Learn more & register: www.york.ac.uk/anthropocene...

Looking forward to contributing to the conversation tomorrow, on human-nonhuman relations and links to wellbeing. Please join us if you're free and in York

The Flow (2022), Amy-Jane Beer

Excerpt from Amy-Jane Beer's chapter in 'By the River' (2024)

To continue the watery theme, it was a real treat to have
@amyjanebeer.bsky.social visit @anthropocenebio.bsky.social last week to share her wisdom 🔮 on writing well and on engaging with audiences beyond the specialist. Unsurprisingly this was very well received by our research group!

Powerful evening with @robgmacfarlane.bsky.social & @amyjanebeer.bsky.social in Leeds, on the urgent need to remember that life is lived in relation, and to reimagine rivers as life sources rather than resources. 'Our fate flows with that of rivers and always has' 🌊

Agh you went!!! 🌊 can’t wait to hear what you thought

Great to meet you Barbara! 👋🏼

Also worth repeating another of his key insights, that ‘if it’s not profitable for capitalism to save the world, it won’t do it’, we need economic democracy

Degrowth is not about reducing all production, but reducing the ‘damaging and unnecessary forms that exist to service elite accumulation’ and needs to be accompanied by universal public services - @jasonhickel.bsky.social to a packed lecture hall in Sheffield last night

Huge thanks to @livingmaps.bsky.social for a great conference last week. Particularly inspired by the design-led projects and artworks, including Claire Reddleman’s #GinkgosoftheBritishIsles, and by trying my hand at my first more-than-human map

On my way to London for the More-than-human Mappings conference today & tomorrow. Hugely looking forward to making new connections and soaking in some great ideas 🧽

Sewage spilled into England's rivers and seas for record 3.6m hours last year - BBC News Sewage spilled into England's waterways for a record number of hours last year, the Environmental Agency says.

Just out: figures for sewage dumping in England for 2024.
* 3.61 million hrs of sewage released.
* That's c. 412 years of sewage.
* First yr all 15,000 CSOs were monitored.
£85bn paid out to shareholders since privatisation = underfunded, collapsing infrastructure.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Ridiculously pleased to have my fieldwork underway 🌊 will be swimming my way through Yorkshire until the summer

Happy spring equinox! 🌸 launched into the new season with a sunrise dip

River Sheaf opened up next to Sheffield Castle site - BBC News The River Sheaf has been exposed at Castlegate for the first time in over 100 years

"Daylighting" is the practice in urban design of restoring buried rivers to the surface.
The River Sheaf been unburied in Sheffield city centre, after 100 yrs in the dark.
Fabulous.
A small light in the great gloom.
“It is starting to make its own meandering path…”
www.bbc.com/news/article...

There's still time to apply for one of our fully funded (home fees) PhD studentships.

We're interested in supporting interdisciplinary PhD studentships that explore the ways in which human activity enhances as well as diminishes biological diversity.

Take a look: sites.google.com/york.ac.uk/l...

Lichen studies on campus. Really fascinating life forms

Hugely recommend this; a mind-expanding experience with some great food for thought 🪄

“Nature and culture intertwine indissolubly in the fenlands as in every person”