Environment & Nature audiobooks

Walden

By: Henry David Thoreau

Narrated by: Mel Foster

Length: 11 hours 42 minutes

Abridged: No

Walden is the classic account of two years spent by Henry David Thoreau living at Walden Pond near Concord, Massachusetts. The story is detailed in its accounts of Thoreau's day-to-day activities, observations, and undertakings to survive out in the wilderness for two years. Thoreau's journal is an exquisite account of a man seeking a more... Read more

To Speak for the Trees

By: Diana Beresford-Kroeger

Narrated by: Diana Beresford-Kroeger

Length: 8 hours 34 minutes

Abridged: No

Canadian botanist, biochemist and visionary Diana Beresford-Kroeger's startling insights into the hidden life of trees have already sparked a quiet revolution in how we understand our relationship to forests. Now, in a captivating account of how her life led her to these illuminating and crucial ideas, she shows us how forests can not only heal... Read more

All Creatures Great and Small

By: James Herriot

Narrated by: Christopher Timothy

Length: 15 hours 39 minutes

Abridged: No

The classic multimillion copy bestseller

Delve into the magical, unforgettable world of James Herriot, the world's most beloved veterinarian, and his menagerie of heartwarming, funny, and tragic animal patients.

When this book was first published, it was merely a simple volume of memoirs by an unknown Scottish veterinarian. But within a year,... Read more

The Botany of Desire

By: Michael Pollan

Narrated by: Michael Pollan

Length: 8 hours 32 minutes

Abridged: No

The book that helped make Michael Pollan, the New York Times bestselling author of Cooked and The Omnivore’s Dilemma, one of the most trusted food experts in America

In 1637, one Dutchman paid as much for a single tulip bulb as the going price of a town house in Amsterdam. Three and a half centuries later, Amsterdam is once again the mecca for... Read more

How to Love a Forest

By: Ethan Tapper

Narrated by: Evan Sibley

Length: 7 hours 49 minutes

Abridged: No

A tender, fearless debut by a forester writing in the tradition of Suzanne Simard, Robin Wall Kimmerer, and Robert MacfarlaneOnly those who love trees should cut them, writes forester Ethan Tapper. In How to Love a Forest, he asks what it means to live in a time in which ecosystems are in retreat and extinctions rattle the bones of the earth.... Read more

Pests

By: Bethany Brookshire

Narrated by: Courtney Patterson

Length: 10 hours 50 minutes

Abridged: No

An engrossing and revealing study of why we deem certain animals “pests” and others not—from cats to rats, elephants to pigeons—and what this tells us about our own perceptions, beliefs, and actions, as well as our place in the natural worldA squirrel in the garden. A rat in the wall. A pigeon on the street. Humans have spent so much of our... Read more

Silent Spring Revolution

By: Douglas Brinkley

Narrated by: Stephen Graybill

Length: 29 hours 24 minutes

Abridged: No

New York Times bestselling author and acclaimed presidential historian Douglas Brinkley chronicles the rise of environmental activism during the Long Sixties (1960-1973), telling the story of an indomitable generation that saved the natural world under the leadership of John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon.With the detonation of... Read more

Our Oaken Bones

By: Merlin Hanbury-Tenison

Narrated by: Merlin Hanbury-Tenison

Length: 8 hours 29 minutes

Abridged: No

Brought to you by Penguin

I lie on the rock to let my limbs dry after my immersion in the river. My bones warm. I have no towel but the moss is grateful for the additional moisture that I bring as the water runs off me and into its spongy web of roots and branches. I look up through the canopy and time freezes as the oak leaves drift gently... Read more

Sentient

By: Jackie Higgins

Narrated by: Joan Walker

Length: 10 hours 43 minutes

Abridged: No

Perfect for fans of The Soul of an Octopus and The Genius of Birds, this “revelatory book” (Sy Montgomery, New York Times bestselling author) explores how we process the world around us through the lens of the incredible sensory capabilities of thirteen animals, revealing that we are not limited to merely five senses.

There is a scientific... Read more

Turning to Stone

By: Marcia Bjornerud

Narrated by: Rebecca Stern

Length: 9 hours 41 minutes

Abridged: No

Earth is vibrantly alive and full of wisdom for those who learn to listen.

Earth has been reinventing itself for more than four billion years, keeping a record of its experiments in the form of rocks. Yet most of us live our lives on the planet with no idea of its extraordinary history, unable to interpret the language of the rocks that surround... Read more

Dirt to Soil

By: Gabe Brown

Narrated by: Gabe Brown

Length: 7 hours 44 minutes

Abridged: No

Gabe Brown didn’t set out to change the world when he first started working alongside his father-in-law on the family farm in North Dakota. But as a series of weather-related crop disasters put Brown and his wife, Shelly, in desperate financial straits, they started making bold changes to their farm. Brown—in an effort to simply survive—began... Read more

What the Chicken Knows

By: Sy Montgomery

Narrated by: Sy Montgomery

Length: 2 hours 9 minutes

Abridged: No

INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER

A charming and eye-opening exploration of the special relationship between humans and chickens from Sy Montgomery, “one of our finest chroniclers of the natural world” (The New York Times).

For more than two decades, Sy Montgomery—whose The Soul of an Octopus was a National Book Award finalist—has kept a flock of... Read more

The Truth About Animals

By: Lucy Cooke

Narrated by: Lucy Cooke

Length: 10 hours 28 minutes

Abridged: No

Mary Roach meets Bill Bryson in this "surefire summer winner" (Janet Maslin, New York Times), an uproarious tour of the basest instincts and biggest mysteries of the animal world

Humans have gone to the Moon and discovered the Higgs boson, but when it comes to understanding animals, we've still got a long way to go. Whether we're seeing a viral... Read more

A Life on Our Planet

By: Sir David Attenborough

Narrated by: Sir David Attenborough

Length: 6 hours 20 minutes

Abridged: No

In this scientifically informed account of the changes occurring in the world over the last century, award-winning broadcaster and natural historian shares a lifetime of wisdom and a hopeful vision for the future.
See the world. Then make it better.

I am 93. I've had an extraordinary life. It's only now that I appreciate how extraordinary.

As a... Read more

Owls of the Eastern Ice

By: Jonathan C. Slaght

Narrated by: Jonathan C. Slaght

Length: 8 hours 43 minutes

Abridged: No

A field scientist and conservationist tracks the elusive Blakiston's Fish Owl in the forbidding reaches of eastern Russia



When he was just a fledgling birdwatcher, Jonathan C. Slaght had a chance encounter with one of the most mysterious birds on Earth. Bigger than any owl he knew, it looked like a small bear with decorative feathers. He snapped... Read more

Vesper Flights

By: Helen Macdonald

Narrated by: Helen Macdonald

Length: 10 hours 21 minutes

Abridged: No

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER

Animals don't exist to teach us things, but that is what they have always done, and most of what they teach us is what we think we know about ourselves.

From the bestselling author of H is for Hawk comes Vesper Flights, a transcendent collection of essays about the human relationship to the natural world.

Helen Macdonald... Read more

Our Green Heart

By: Diana Beresford-Kroeger

Narrated by: Diana Beresford-Kroeger

Length: 6 hours 4 minutes

Abridged: No

AN INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER

In this inspiring culmination of Diana Beresford-Kroeger’s life’s work as a botanist, biochemist, biologist and poet of the global forest, she delivers a challenge to us all to dig deeper into the science of forests and the ways they will save us from climate breakdown—and then do our part to plant and protect... Read more

The Hawk's Way

By: Sy Montgomery

Narrated by: Sy Montgomery

Length: 1 hour 58 minutes

Abridged: No

A splendid and luminous celebration of one of nature’s most perfect and mysterious creatures—the hawk—from the New York Times bestselling author of the “astoundingly beautiful” (NPR) The Soul of an Octopus.

When Sy Montgomery went to spend a day at falconer Nancy Cowan’s farm, home to a dozen magnificent birds of prey, it was the start of a deep... Read more

The Universe in Verse

By: Maria Popova

Narrated by: Maria Popova & Lili Taylor

Length: 1 hour 28 minutes

Abridged: No

In this audiobook Maria Popova, creator of The Marginalian, presents a celebration of the human search for truth and beauty through the lenses of science and poetry.

Poetry and science, as Popova writes in her introduction, "are instruments for knowing the world more intimately and loving it more deeply." In 15 short essays on subjects ranging... Read more

The Darkness Manifesto

By: Johan Eklöf

Narrated by: Owen Findlay

Length: 5 hours 31 minutes

Abridged: No

*Winner of the Penn Libraries Book Prize in Sustainability*
*Named a Best Book of the Year by Scientific American*

This timely and captivating look at the hidden impact of light pollution is “rich in revelation and insight…lyrical” (The Wall Street Journal) and urges us to cherish natural darkness for the sake of the environment, our own... Read more

Running with Sherman

By: Christopher McDougall

Narrated by: Christopher McDougall

Length: 12 hours 12 minutes

Abridged: No

"A delight, full of heart and hijinks and humor . . . McDougall is a gifted storyteller who gets to the heart of the human-animal connection." --John Grogan, author of Marley & Me: Life and Love with the World's Worst Dog

From the best-selling author of Born to Run, a heartwarming story about training a rescue donkey to run one of the most... Read more

The Quickening

By: Elizabeth Rush

Narrated by: Helen Laser

Length: 10 hours 36 minutes

Abridged: No

An astonishing, vital book about Antarctica, climate change, and motherhood from the author of Rising, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in General Nonfiction.In 2019, fifty-seven scientists and crew set out onboard the Nathaniel B. Palmer. Their destination: Thwaites Glacier. Their goal: to learn as much as possible about this mysterious place,... Read more

The Love Lives of Birds

By: Laura Erickson

Narrated by: Laura Erickson

Length: 3 hours 2 minutes

Abridged: No

From the lifelong devotion of the American crow to the dalliances of the eastern bluebird, from the bald eagle’s dazzling aerial display to the male ruby-throated hummingbird’s reputation as a “deadbeat dad” — courtship, mating, and parenting differ dramatically among birds. Ornithologist and author Laura Erickson takes readers on a... Read more

The Feather Thief

By: Kirk Wallace Johnson

Narrated by: MacLeod Andrews

Length: 8 hours 4 minutes

Abridged: No

As heard on NPR's This American Life

“Absorbing . . . Though it's non-fiction, The Feather Thief contains many of the elements of a classic thriller.” —Maureen Corrigan, NPR’s Fresh Air

“One of the most peculiar and memorable true-crime books ever.” —Christian Science Monitor

A rollicking true-crime adventure and a captivating journey into an... Read more