Nature, noticed week by week.
Nature Notes tracks the small changes that mark outdoor life, from hummingbird arrivals to lake ice-out dates. Jim Gilbert brings the pace of a careful morning walk, while Denny Long frames the reports with weather, listener notes, and radio warmth.
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Nature Notes is a local naturalist program with the feel of an early morning window cracked open. Jim Gilbert reports what is moving, singing, blooming, thawing, nesting, feeding, and returning. The show’s center of gravity is ordinary outdoor change. That is its strength. A week can turn on the first ruby-throated hummingbirds at a feeder, Baltimore Orioles taking grape jelly, or Canada goose goslings appearing at a pond. Another week might track lake ice-out dates, common loons landing, ospreys returning, or the exact daylight gained since winter. The details are practical and precise. Hummingbird sugar water gets a recommended ratio, lake ice-out gets a definition, and backyard reports arrive with dates, towns, counties, and species names. The rhythm is conversational rather than polished-naturalist grandstanding. Denny Long brings a familiar radio presence, greeting Jim Gilbert, checking the temperature, reading listener reactions, and keeping the segment moving through weather and breaks. Jim’s register is warm, observational, and exacting in a modest way. He notices red-winged blackbirds trilling, morning doves cooing, house finches singing, robins hunting lawns, and deer flies following him outside. He also makes room for surprises, such as a red admiral butterfly warmed indoors after being found in snow. The program often sounds like a shared notebook kept by people who pay attention. Listeners send in sightings from yards, lakes, nature centers, and rural roads, and those observations become part of the week’s natural calendar. Birds dominate, but the scope is wider than birding. Frogs, butterflies, snakes, sap runs, rhubarb, asparagus, lake temperatures, sunrise, sunset, and spring storms all enter the frame. The show has nostalgia built into it, especially in the return and farewell episodes that reference decades on WCCO. Still, it is not only a memory piece. Its appeal comes from the steady habit of noticing common things before they pass. Nature Notes is best for listeners who like seasonal specificity, backyard ecology, and the quiet satisfaction of knowing what changed outside this week.
Made for: For listeners who enjoy backyard birds, seasonal markers, lake country weather, and practical nature observations. It especially suits people who like calm radio conversation grounded in local sightings.
What sets it apart: The show’s strength is its field-notebook specificity: exact birds, dates, towns, temperatures, feeder advice, and lake conditions. It feels less like a lecture and more like a living seasonal record shared between a naturalist, a radio voice, and observant listeners.
WCCO's Naturalist Jim Gilbert and Denny Long bring you Nature Notes!
A first-of-year hummingbird reaches someone else's feeder, and Jim Gilbert has you checking yours.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
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A naturalist discusses local bird sightings and nature observations, with sponsor messages about bird feeders.
A naturalist shares observations of birds and nature from his yard in Minnesota.
A naturalist shares observations of birds and nature from his yard in Minnesota, with sponsor messages about bird feeders.
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