In Your Nature

In Your Nature—a reflective, nature-focused memoir in the tradition of Aldo Leopold, E.O. Wilson, and Annie Dillard

You’re five years old, barefoot in the shade of a white cedar, staring into a cornfield that might as well be the Amazon. You’re holding a worm in one hand and a question in the other. You step forward.

That’s how it begins.

This is not just a memoir. It’s a field guide to a life lived in close conversation with the natural world. A trout stream in Iowa. A frozen lake in Ontario. A duck blind in Iowa. A classroom filled with students who think lichens are just moss with a PR problem.

Colbert, a biologist by trade and a storyteller by compulsion, doesn’t just recount his life—he catalogs it like a naturalist with a butterfly net and a notebook full of wonder. He traps muskrats as a teenager, teaches his grandchildren to fish, and leads a flotilla of students down a river to remove a bathtub. He names things. He remembers things. He makes you care about things you didn’t know existed.

You’ll laugh. You’ll learn. You’ll want to go outside.

Bound in softcover, but best read with dirt under your fingernails and a thermos of coffee nearby.

Warning: May cause spontaneous identification of fungi, birdsong, and your own place in the ecosystem.