Abby McBride at the WildWonder Nature Journaling Conference 2019

Abby McBride is a self-described sketch biologist, meaning she explores the world with a sketchbook to look for insight into the past, present, and future of landscapes and living things. She writes and illustrates multimedia stories about biology, ecology, and conservation. At the 2019 Wild Wonder Nature Journaling Conference, she shared how she used sketching to tell

Megafauna: How to draw Elephants and Giraffe (video)

Learn how to draw really big critters. Here we focus on the giraffe and elephant, showing anatomical structure and side, front and 3/4 views. In the video, we draw over skeletal studies by the great biologist and conservationist Jonathan Kingdon. You can download your own worksheet here so you can follow along. Note: I shot

My drawing process and practice (video lecture)

On July 3, 2018, I was invited to speak at The Foster, an amazing gallery, dedicated to the work of Watercolorist Tony Foster. Here I describe my process of creating the Laws Field Guide to the Sierra Nevada and nature journaling.

Interview on BeProvided Conservation Radio (audio)

It was a delight to be interviewed by Marcia Sivek for the BeProvided Conservation Radio Podcast. Enjoy the broadcast. Sivek writes: It was a sunny April afternoon as I approached a tree-lined apartment complex located in San Mateo. I avoided any extra caffeine that morning because my mind was already racing. I was to meet and

Nature Connection through Deliberate Attention and Curiosity- (Tedx video)

The key to developing a deep nature connection is deliberately enhancing your powers of observation and wonder. Learn how the methods of a field naturalist help you notice more, remember what you discovered, and be actively curious. A world of infinite beauty and discovery waits just beyond the point where we usually stop paying attention. Tedx

A Curiosity Framework

While visiting Sunnybrae International Baccalaureate World School, I saw a set of questioning prompts on the wall of each classroom. These eight concepts are used throughout the International School system. I strive to be rigorous in my thinking and actively question of the world. I thought these were useful and wrote them down as they might provoke my own intentional

Your journal is not the place to conserve paper

We don’t want to waste paper. Some folks try to save trees in their sketchbooks and journals by drawing or writing less or making very small pictures. This is the wrong place to make a conservation impact. In fact I think that the most respectful thing you could do to a tree once it is

Falling in love with Nature

Love of nature is the spring from which stewardship flows. In contrast, disconnection from nature leads to apathy in the face of all environmental problems. A useful way to define love is sustained, compassionate attention. Paying sincere attention to, and developing a rich curiosity about others helps us to be kind. This attention takes work and

Remembering Rich Stallcup

Conservation hero Rich Stallcup was a rare bird magnet and helped many of us realize what you can discover if you pay attention. While I was working on my Sierra field guide. I visited Rich with a pile of illustrations. He patiently went through them with me pointing out the subtlest corrections and suggested changes.