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We are used to applying ideas from ecology and evolution to other species, and perhaps to people in exotic parts of the world, but rarely do we look at modern Britain through this lens. When we do, however, we see fascinating ecological patterns. For example, in some urban neighbourhoods, women begin reproduction a whole decade earlier than in other neighbourhoods that are only a couple of miles away. You can see completely different patterns of risk-taking, social interaction and family structure clustered together simply by walking around our cities. We are all familiar with these patterns, but we don’t ask ourselves often enough why they exist. I take an ecological approach. Each neighbourhood is a distinct micro-habitat, with its own distribution of resources and its own set of dangers. People’s behaviour is exquisitely sensitive to the ecological context in which they live, thus producing a remarkable diversity of behaviour even within the small and historically homogenous areas that our cities comprise.