Using the concept of ‘socio-nature’, this talk examines how green spaces and urban publics are mutually constituted in Delhi.  It shows how social change shapes a re-imagination of the cultural meanings of urban nature, bringing about new modes of ecological management.  Ecological change, in turn, creates new social relations around the use and protection of green spaces.  Analysing two instances of urban nature: Mangarbani, a sacred grove on the periphery of the metropolis, and the Delhi Ridge, a ‘wilderness’ that has been domesticated for recreational use, I argue that the move to create and preserve certain forms of urban nature is related to the rise of the middle classes, with a section acting as a self-appointed vanguard of environmental causes.  This ‘bourgeois environmentalism’ has had far-reaching ecological and social effects.  I argue that the urban order that bourgeois environmentalists seek to impose does not go unchallenged but is undermined by other users of public green areas, including poor migrant workers foraging for firewood and young lovers seeking privacy.  I end by showing that, although the meanings and practices around urban natures are contested, they also give rise to new alliances and understandings that promote ecology and justice.