He took an interest in geology from an early age, collecting fossils at Dorset and Wiltshire with his uncle, Reverend George Cookson. He studied at Eton under John Keate, then under his uncle Reverend W. Fisher in Poulshot, Wiltshire and then with his grandfather, Rev. Philip Fisher, Master of the Charterhouse. Fisher also attended King's College London, where he listened to the lectures of Charles Lyell and John Frederic Daniell.