At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, when being outside was limited to one walk a day, it was remarkable how many of us found solace and enjoyment in returning to nature. Walks in forests and parks and seeing plants and flowers growing in urban streets brought us a reconnection with nature.

Join authors Mo Wilde and Ruth Allen for a discussion about how we can benefit from this connection with nature. Wilde’s new book, The Wilderness Cure, tells of how she lived exclusively off foraged food for a year, while Allen’s Grounded explains how being closer with nature can improve our mental and physical wellbeing.

About The Authors

Shot of Ruth Allen

Ruth Allen

Ruth is a movement and nature-based psychotherapist, workshop facilitator and writer based on the edge of the Peak District, where she runs her private therapeutic practice. Grounded is her first book

Headshot of author Mo Wilde, guest at Bradford Literature Festival, stood outside in front of some trees.

Mo Wilde

Mo Wilde is a forager, research herbalist, author and ethnobotanist. She lives in West Lothian in a self-built house on 4 organic acres, where she encourages medicinal and foraging species to thrive in a wild, teaching garden. She has been teaching foraging formally since 2005 and was a founding member of the Association of Foragers. Mo spent a wild childhood in Kenya, where she was introduced to herbal medicine by a local herbalist at the age of six, and went on to live and teach in four different continents. She loves foraging and would happily never visit a supermarket again.

After spending many years traveling and running Scotland’s oldest and most trusted herbal medicine company, Napiers, Mo achieved a Masters degree in Herbal Medicine at the age of 50. She is a Fellow of the Linnean Society, a Member of the British Mycological Society and a Member of the International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society (ILADS). She practices at Napiers Lyme Clinic specialising in integrative medicine in the treatment of Lyme disease, lectures in herbal medicine and teaches foraging courses.