Terry Nutkins was born in Marylebone, London, and spent most of his childhood there. He even skipped school to spend time with the elephants at London Zoo. At the age of 12 Terry moved to Scotland. At 15 he lost part of two fingers to an otter named Edal while working for the Scottish naturalist Gavin Maxwell.

In the 1980s Nutkins was co-presenter of the BBC children's television series Animal Magic with Johnny Morris, whom he describes as his second mentor after Maxwell. He is perhaps best-remembered on the show for segments with Gemini, the California sea lion he had hand-reared from infancy. Animal Magic's run ended in 1983 and a year later Nutkins was asked to put together a new animal series, which resulted in The Really Wild Show which he presented from 1986 to 1993. In 1999 he inherited a large portion of Johnny Morris's estate.

In 2004 he appeared on Living TV's reality television show I'm Famous and Frightened!, and he featured in the Comic Relief video 2007.In April 2009 Nutkins co-presented and narrated My Life as an Animal, a BBC Three programme where young professionals and media personalities literally lived life as animals for four days, sharing living areas, food and sleeping with several farm and zoo animals.Nutkins has eight children.