You may have read in last week’s Advertiser about the Wildlife Trusts’ 30 Days Wild campaign.

Author Erin McDaid of the Nottinghamshire Wildflife Trust said that the annual challenge, now in its fifth year, seemed to have captured the imagination of the nation.

Thousands of people sign up every year, pledging to reconnect with nature for the whole of June by doing something linked with wildlife every day.

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Inspired, I signed up there and then, and soon received my 30 Days Wild pack.

It included a wall chart for noting down my random acts of wildness, a packet of wildflower seeds, and a little booklet with 101 suggestions of how I might go about being a little wilder.

Now, I generally prefer to be outside than inside, love nothing more than a long walk in the country, and am known for having windows flung wide open day and night.

However, according to the 30 Days Wild booklet, I would have to be far wilder than this.

Suggestion 2 was that I might dance in a downpour. So, even though it rained for most of Sunday afternoon, my husband and I wrapped up in raincoats and walked to the next village.

I didn’t exactly dance ­— he would have thought I had gone completely mad ­— but I did notice how many snails had emerged to enjoy the rain, and tried to tip-toe round them.

Most had very pretty yellow and brown spiral-pattered shells. When I got back home, I looked them up, and discovered they are called grove snails. If I hadn’t been out walking in the rain, I would never have learned that.

Another suggestion in the booklet, number 72, was to photograph a wild diary, so I have been trying to take pictures of some of the other things I have seen but not been able to name, and identifying them later.

That pretty pink flower that looks a bit like a sweet pea turns out to be common vetch.

Suggestion 68, to cook outside, wasn’t difficult. Saturday’s weather was glorious so we had a garden barbecue.

But I did try, while eating, to listen to what birds I could hear. There’s a particularly chirpy blackbird that I now recognise because it has a whistle that sounds just like my father’s. It even confuses the dog.

On that subject, suggestion 46 was to listen to the dawn chorus. I didn’t plan to, but was woken on Monday at just before 5am by three raucous crows having an argument outside the window.

Suggestion 91 was to go wild swimming. No. Just no.

But I might well try suggestion 12 ­— to dip my feet in wild water, in the shallow river nearby.

Suggestion 96 suggested watching a wild webcam. We’re lucky enough to have one in our village church, trained on a peregrine falcon nest, and it’s fascinating to sit quietly watching the three chicks as the parent bird feeds them.

I don’t know how many of the 90-odd remaining suggestions I’ll manage this month, but I do know that taking more notice of our wildlife is a good first step in helping to protect it.

For me, there’s no reason why 30 Days Wild shouldn’t become 365 Days Wild. I don’t have to stick to the ideas in the booklet, so I may well come up with some wild ideas of my own.

But they definitely won’t include any wild swimming.