Chris Baines
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Professor Chris Baines, is an English gardener, naturalist, television presenter and author.
Baines grew up in Sheffield. He worked in the local parks department when he left school, and then studied horticulture and landscape architecture at university.
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[edit] Career
After an early career in landscape contracting, which included several years of greening the deserts of the Middle East and creating community landscapes in some of the UK's most hostile inner-city housing estates, Chris taught landscape architecture at post-graduate level until 1986, when he was awarded an honorary personal professorship at the University of Central England, in Birmingham.
Baines now works as a self-employed freelancer, and advises government ministers, local councils and senior executives in major water, minerals, finance, construction and housing companies, on environmental practice.
In 1980 he was one of a group of local environmentalists who co-founded Urban Wildlife Group (now the Wildlife Trust for Birmingham and the Black Country), the first of a series of such urban conservation organisations to appear in the UK that year. This was the beginning of a burgeoning urban wildlife movement with which he has always had a close association.
Through most of the late 1980s and early 1990s, Baines focused on television broadcasting, and presented The Big E, Countryfile, Saturday Starship, Pebble Mill at One and several other networked series.
Baines built the first wildlife garden ever allowed at Chelsea Flower Show in 1985, and in the same year his television programme Bluetits and Bumblebees, and his book, How to Make a Wildlife Garden, inspired many people to begin gardening with wildlife.
The Wild Side of Town, which accompanied a five-part television series of the same name. It won the UK Conservation Book Prize in 1987. His other books include four story books for young children. His investigative environmental series for children, The Ark, won the International Wildscreen Award in 1987.
Also in 1987, Chris recorded an album, The Wild Side of Town, with the folk-rock Albion Band and then toured the UK, raising money for the British Wildlife Appeal.
In 2000, he presented Charlie's Wildlife Gardens with Charlie Dimmock.
Baines is one of the UK's leading environmental campaigners, and in recent years he has particularly championed the cause of trees. He led the fight to prevent cable television and other utility companies chopping through the roots of urban street trees, has promoted the concept of urban forestry in the UK. He is a member of the steering committee of CABE Space, the UK Government's urban greenspace adviser
He was principal adviser to Trees of Time and Place, a campaign for the millennium which encouraged as many people as possible to gather seeds from a favourite tree, grow a seedling and plant it for the future. He is now a member of the steering board for the BBC's Breathing Places campaign.
Baines is committed to urban wildlife and wildlife gardening. He works from home in Wolverhampton, is president of the Urban Wildlife Partnership and vice-president of The Royal Society of Wildlife Trusts , and in 1998 he was appointed by the Prime Minister as a trustee of the Heritage Lottery Fund, to serve until July 2004. He continues as a member of the HLF Expert Panel and the assement panel of the BIG Lottery's Living Landmarks programme. He is currently a trustee of the Waterways Trust, President of the Association for Environment-Conscious Building and a patron of the Landscape Design Trust. In 2004 he was presented with the RSPB's annual medal for his contribution to nature conservation and sustainable water management.
Baines writes frequently in BBC Gardeners' World, BBC Wildlife and Country Living magazines.
[edit] Television programmes
- BBC Gardeners' World 1981 and 1999
- Your Country Needs You 1988
- Grass Roots 1993 - 1996
- Bluetits and Bumblebees 1985
- The Big E 1988
- Countryfile 1989 - 1992
- Saturday Starship 1986
- Pebblemill at One 1981 - 1984
- The Ark 1987
- The Wild Side of Town 1987
- Millennium Meadows (Under the Axe) 1998
- Charlie's Wildlife Gardens 2000
[edit] Bibliography
(incomplete)
- New Pollution Handbook 1992
- A guide to habitat creation (with Jane Smart) ISBN 1-85341-031-4
- Wildlife Garden Handbook
- How to Make a Wildlife Garden
- The Wild Side of Town
[edit] Children's books
- The Old Boot
- The Picnic
- The Flower
- The Nest
[edit] Awards
- International Wildscreen Awards, winner of children's TV prize for The Ark, 1987
- Sir Peter Kent Conservation book prize for The Wild Side of Town, 1987
- Honorary Fellow, the Institute of Leisure and Amenity Management
- Honorary Fellow, the Chartered Institute of Water and Environmental Management
- Honorary personal chair, University of Central England
- Honorary Doctorate, Sheffield Hallam University
- RSPB annual medal for contribution to conservation
