My earliest memories all relate to animals: tadpoles, ladybirds, lizards, my pet mouse. I can remember being about four, growing up in suburban Southampton, and being fascinated by the difference between me and them. I saw perfection in all of those individual organisms. Much later I realised that the greater beauty was the way that they live together in an interconnected ecosystem – the fact that it was functional, dynamic and sustainable.

My relationship with dogs – I’m not afraid to say it – borders on a dependency. They are my autism-assistant animals. Their unconditional love, dynamism and exuberance has brought me so much joy. I’ve always had black miniature poodles. I called the previous two, Itchy and Scratchy. Now I’ve got Sid and Nancy. My joy grenades. Every time I took them out, I’d pull out the pin by releasing their lead. And sometimes I could just laugh or cry with happiness watching them run. Itchy, Scratchy and I were a very powerful triangular relationship.

My partner Charlotte understands my canine devotion because she has a similar relationship with her tigers. She inherited a zoo from her father, so we’re reluctant zoo owners, although it’s more of a rescue sanctuary. Charlotte lives on the Isle of Wight, where the zoo is based, and I live in the New Forest, so we never cohabit. We spend as much time together as we can.

When I die, my ashes will be scattered in the New Forest with Itchy and Scratchy’s. I see it as a romantic ambition and not a morbid or unusual one. Whoever’s responsible will have to mix my ashes with theirs and scatter them in the woods where we shared so much love. I’m not somebody who entertains any aspects of the spiritual, but I just like the idea of our carbon molecules being mixed together, growing into a tree that gets eaten by a caterpillar that, in turn, is eaten by a blue tit, which is eaten by a sparrowhawk – my favourite bird.

By my mid-20s I came up with a management plan to deal with who I was. I’d been in very dark and depressed places, and when the Asperger’s diagnosis eventually came I realised there were aspects that were empowering and enabling.

I’m a very confrontational person. I don’t look for conflict, but I won’t shy away. And I don’t pick my fights to win them, because winning for me is not giving up. Asperger’s is undeniably a gift, because it makes me more robust.

As a conservationist, I’ve failed. Since I bought my first pair of binoculars, we’ve lost 90 million birds from the UK countryside and 45-50% of the world’s wildlife. I remember when I left university, the black rhino wasn’t a common animal, but it was still widespread in sub-Saharan Africa. On my watch, we’ve seen catastrophic declines of the things that I care passionately about.And so, given my shortening life, I feel that I have to up the ante, and put more energy into trying to sort these issues out.

The climate crisis sometimes overpowers our capacity to think that we can make a difference. There’s a misconception that to get to carbon-zero, we’re going to have to live in caves and eat cabbage. But we do have an enormous arsenal of abilities we could implement. Our job at the moment is triage, so there’s enough of the planet left that when we get it into the operating theatre we can nurse it back to life.

It’s not that I don’t care about death threats, or getting shit posted through my letter box… I’m just impervious. In my world there’s no grey – it’s black or it’s white. So if something is wrong – and there’s no ambiguity about illegally killing birds of prey, which is wrong for ethical, ecological and legal reasons – then I don’t have to hold back. My friend Billy Bragg said to me, “If you’re not getting flak, you’re not over the target,” so I’m reassured when the shit turns up in the post. It means I’m putting pressure on the right people at the right time. Frankly, if they’ve got no other arguments than to post shit, that’s a clear indication that I’m winning.

The first line of my obituary will be: “This old punk rocker never failed to shout above the noise.”

Chris Packham is raising awareness of the #missingpiece to promote energy efficiency and smart meters