WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.200 --> 00:00:02.960 Do you know what real power is? It's knowing you're 2 00:00:03.000 --> 00:00:05.719 on the same rate for energy all day, every day. 3 00:00:05.759 --> 00:00:08.640 With a smart all day plan from Board Gosh Energy, 4 00:00:08.839 --> 00:00:11.039 save up to eight hundred and eighty euro on dual 5 00:00:11.119 --> 00:00:13.519 fuel plus get a two hundred and thirty five euro 6 00:00:13.679 --> 00:00:17.120 welcome bonus switch today at Boardgosh Energy Dot I E 7 00:00:17.559 --> 00:00:20.480 Board Gosh Energy Know your Power. 8 00:00:20.440 --> 00:00:22.600 Estimation annuel bill of twenty six hundred and twenty nine 9 00:00:22.600 --> 00:00:24.920 euro new customers only. Thirst of percentis kent off smart 10 00:00:24.920 --> 00:00:26.960 all day electricity unit rates in twenty nine percent of 11 00:00:27.000 --> 00:00:30.839 GASSI unitrates. 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Every little helps available in most stories, Prices 21 00:00:58.359 --> 00:00:59.039 vary in express. 22 00:01:00.280 --> 00:01:03.200 Oh hey, so it's your partner who insisted on buying 23 00:01:03.240 --> 00:01:05.879 respirators during COVID, who isn't clothing at all. They're just 24 00:01:05.920 --> 00:01:07.959 glad that we have them when we need them. Ali 25 00:01:08.000 --> 00:01:11.879 Ward here with a rather smoky encore. It's a mega 26 00:01:11.920 --> 00:01:15.239 episode because the time has never been right to explain 27 00:01:15.280 --> 00:01:20.400 what is happening over North America? Is it the apocalypse? Maybe? 28 00:01:20.760 --> 00:01:23.359 Stay tuned. So we have a really good episode about 29 00:01:23.359 --> 00:01:25.400 scallops in the Pike coming for you that we have 30 00:01:25.480 --> 00:01:27.840 been working so hard. You're gonna have to wait a 31 00:01:27.840 --> 00:01:30.319 coup more days for it. But with the current situation, 32 00:01:30.640 --> 00:01:33.799 we thought we'd bring back these super hot fire ecology 33 00:01:33.799 --> 00:01:35.920 episodes to your attention. If you're like, what's going on 34 00:01:35.959 --> 00:01:38.599 over there? Let me tell you a quick rundown. What 35 00:01:38.719 --> 00:01:41.239 is happening currently on the continent of North America. So 36 00:01:41.400 --> 00:01:45.159 the Canadian Emergency Preparedness Minister Bill Blair said, as of 37 00:01:45.200 --> 00:01:50.400 Wednesday this week, four hundred and fourteen wildfires we're burning 38 00:01:50.439 --> 00:01:53.159 in Canada, with two hundred and thirty nine of them 39 00:01:53.200 --> 00:01:57.120 out of control. As of today Wednesday, Tune seventh, Toronto 40 00:01:57.480 --> 00:02:00.239 has the third worst air quality in the world and 41 00:02:00.400 --> 00:02:03.040 New York City has the second worst. Dealing with the 42 00:02:03.079 --> 00:02:07.359 same smoke from all these Canadian fires, Delhi, India, I 43 00:02:07.439 --> 00:02:09.240 regret to inform you that you are the winner of 44 00:02:09.280 --> 00:02:12.479 this terrible contest. But right now, North America isn't just 45 00:02:12.960 --> 00:02:18.560 sporting bizarre hellish landscapes with smoky orange glowing skies that 46 00:02:18.599 --> 00:02:20.520 you may have been seeing posted all over social media. 47 00:02:20.599 --> 00:02:23.560 It's also a real health hazard, especially after a three 48 00:02:23.639 --> 00:02:27.439 years of a pandemic that involves respiratory infections. So if 49 00:02:27.439 --> 00:02:29.879 you are being affected by the smoke at all, pay 50 00:02:29.919 --> 00:02:33.199 attention to your local authorities for upstate health alerts, as 51 00:02:33.199 --> 00:02:35.439 have been issued from New York to the Carolinas and 52 00:02:35.479 --> 00:02:38.560 as far west as Minnesota, according to The New York Times, 53 00:02:38.639 --> 00:02:42.560 where health officials are recommending that residents with health risks 54 00:02:42.879 --> 00:02:46.520 stay indoors and keep the windows closed. The CDC has 55 00:02:46.520 --> 00:02:48.879 a bunch of recommendations about dealing with the smoke, which 56 00:02:48.879 --> 00:02:51.000 will link in the show notes for this episode. But 57 00:02:51.039 --> 00:02:53.599 in case you can't stay indoors hopefully with an air 58 00:02:53.759 --> 00:02:56.919 filter running, we thought we'd highlight what the CDC has 59 00:02:56.960 --> 00:03:00.759 to say about masks. Quote, don't rely on dustus masks 60 00:03:00.840 --> 00:03:04.719 for protection. Paper comfort or dust masks commonly found in 61 00:03:04.800 --> 00:03:08.159 hardware stores trap large particles such as sawdust. But these 62 00:03:08.199 --> 00:03:10.759 masks will not protect you or your lungs from smoke. 63 00:03:11.039 --> 00:03:14.199 So an N ninety five mask properly worn will offer 64 00:03:14.240 --> 00:03:17.639 some protection, So bust out those N ninety five's if 65 00:03:17.680 --> 00:03:20.599 you are somewhere with smoke right now. Also, speaking of health, 66 00:03:20.680 --> 00:03:23.800 another reason why I'm running this mega episode is I've 67 00:03:23.800 --> 00:03:27.879 been dealing with some health stuff and I will talk 68 00:03:27.879 --> 00:03:29.960 about it in this mega secret at the end of 69 00:03:30.000 --> 00:03:31.960 this mega episode. If you care, if you make it 70 00:03:32.000 --> 00:03:34.240 all the way there, but take care of yourselves and 71 00:03:34.280 --> 00:03:38.080 please enjoy this mega encore double feature of fire ecology 72 00:03:38.560 --> 00:03:44.319 and indigenous fire ecology. Hem oh hey, it's the pair 73 00:03:44.319 --> 00:03:46.960 of sunglasses that you leave in the car. It's scratched. 74 00:03:47.039 --> 00:03:48.840 It's not your favorite, but it's better than nothing. In 75 00:03:48.840 --> 00:03:52.680 a pinch, Ali ward back with a piping hot episode 76 00:03:52.680 --> 00:03:55.840 of ologies. It's top of mind for a lot of 77 00:03:55.919 --> 00:03:59.599 us out here up here in the Northern Hemisphere, especially 78 00:03:59.639 --> 00:04:05.280 towards the west of the continent. Wildfires, fire ecology, blazing infernos, 79 00:04:05.639 --> 00:04:10.840 apocalyptic nightmares, this ologist so special. Got his bachelor's in zoology, 80 00:04:10.879 --> 00:04:13.800 a master's in wildlife ecology, and a PhD in Wildlife 81 00:04:13.800 --> 00:04:17.879 ecology Statistics, all from the University of Wisconsin and Madison. 82 00:04:18.240 --> 00:04:22.800 He is currently a Wildlife and Terrestrial Ecosystems research ecologist. 83 00:04:23.439 --> 00:04:26.240 Such a mouthful. He's a research scientist at the US 84 00:04:26.319 --> 00:04:30.399 Department of Agriculture's Forest Service, also an adjunct professor at 85 00:04:30.399 --> 00:04:32.800 the University of New Mexico. He has been published on 86 00:04:32.839 --> 00:04:38.959 papers about fire refuges for wildlife where they hide out megafires, 87 00:04:39.319 --> 00:04:43.120 habitat loss. He's also just casually the editor at the 88 00:04:43.199 --> 00:04:46.800 Association of Fire Ecology, so I have been following him 89 00:04:46.839 --> 00:04:49.160 online for a while. I reached out to casually ask 90 00:04:49.240 --> 00:04:54.240 him about pyrology versus fire ecology, and before I knew it, 91 00:04:54.319 --> 00:04:56.079 I was begging him to talk to me. So we 92 00:04:56.120 --> 00:04:59.680 hopped onto chat while fires were raging in the West 93 00:04:59.759 --> 00:05:02.800 this week and I was in a muggy Florida hotel 94 00:05:02.879 --> 00:05:05.240 room for work and it smelled like a turtle tank. 95 00:05:05.600 --> 00:05:08.120 But before we dive into the conversation, I want to 96 00:05:08.120 --> 00:05:11.319 thank everyone at patreon dot com slash ologies. It costs 97 00:05:11.319 --> 00:05:13.160 a dollar a month to join, and then you can 98 00:05:13.240 --> 00:05:16.879 submit questions to Theologists. Thank you to everyone listening and 99 00:05:16.920 --> 00:05:21.079 making us the number one podcast in the science category 100 00:05:21.120 --> 00:05:24.120 on Spotify, and thank you for leaving reviews on Apple 101 00:05:24.120 --> 00:05:26.800 Podcasts to get us seen by other people. I truly 102 00:05:26.839 --> 00:05:28.959 read them all because I desperately want to make a 103 00:05:28.959 --> 00:05:30.879 show that does not suck, and to prove it, I'm 104 00:05:30.879 --> 00:05:33.839 going to read you a still glowing coal of assessment 105 00:05:34.160 --> 00:05:38.519 from Bert Lancaster, who wrote Ologies is your cynicism antidote. 106 00:05:38.639 --> 00:05:42.079 I simultaneously feel beautifully tiny and so expansive that I 107 00:05:42.079 --> 00:05:45.000 could burst after listening. Sometimes I just have to stand 108 00:05:45.000 --> 00:05:47.439 there and laugh to myself for a while. Sometimes I cry. 109 00:05:47.600 --> 00:05:51.160 Emotions are weird. Love you dad, word, Bert Lancaster, get 110 00:05:51.160 --> 00:05:54.560 a hanky because your internet dad right here loves you 111 00:05:54.720 --> 00:05:57.399 right back. Okay, everyone who left to review, I read it. 112 00:05:57.600 --> 00:06:00.240 I love you also. Okay, all right, let's fine. Fire 113 00:06:00.279 --> 00:06:04.399 off some questions, Yeah, okay, open your ears for info 114 00:06:04.439 --> 00:06:08.800 on what fire is, how hot it burns, fire trends, 115 00:06:09.199 --> 00:06:13.720 tinder boxes, lots and lots of forest fire, flim flam, 116 00:06:13.759 --> 00:06:19.759 tolerant wombats, Angelina Joe Lee, movies, cunning pine cones, thick bark, 117 00:06:20.079 --> 00:06:26.000 tragic Koala's indigenous fire stewardship and more with researcher, scientists 118 00:06:26.040 --> 00:06:30.680 of the woods, desert dweller, awl cuddler, forest service employee, 119 00:06:31.079 --> 00:06:35.720 optimist and fire ecologist doctor Gavin Jones. 120 00:06:54.720 --> 00:06:58.240 Yes, Gavin Jones, and my pronouns are. 121 00:06:58.160 --> 00:06:59.560 He him, got it? 122 00:07:00.120 --> 00:07:03.279 And you are currently in New Mexico. 123 00:07:03.720 --> 00:07:06.439 That's right in the great city of Albuquerque. 124 00:07:06.959 --> 00:07:08.519 Do you guys have trees there? 125 00:07:09.120 --> 00:07:11.959 You know we do? Yes, Okay, it's pretty much desert 126 00:07:12.000 --> 00:07:14.680 out here, so when the trees grow, they don't grow 127 00:07:14.759 --> 00:07:15.240 very tall. 128 00:07:16.199 --> 00:07:21.319 And now tell me how a fire ecologist from Wisconsin 129 00:07:21.600 --> 00:07:26.079 and Florida and now New Mexico. Yes, how did your 130 00:07:26.240 --> 00:07:29.120 life path lead to fire ecology? 131 00:07:29.600 --> 00:07:32.439 Oh my goodness, it was really an accident. I do 132 00:07:32.519 --> 00:07:35.240 consider myself a fire ecologist, but I was really trained, 133 00:07:35.240 --> 00:07:37.639 and I did my graduate work and all my studies 134 00:07:37.720 --> 00:07:40.759 in wildlife ecology. And when I was in grad school, 135 00:07:40.920 --> 00:07:44.279 I was doing some research out in the Sierra Nevada 136 00:07:44.319 --> 00:07:48.680 and California on the cutest cuddliest creature there is the 137 00:07:48.879 --> 00:08:00.639 California spot at owl. And yeah, like pretty much anybody 138 00:08:00.720 --> 00:08:06.439 who spends enough time doing science out in fire prone 139 00:08:06.560 --> 00:08:09.680 lands like the Sierra Nevada. You eventually become a fire 140 00:08:09.680 --> 00:08:12.160 ecologist because a fire happens and then you have to 141 00:08:12.279 --> 00:08:15.199 try to figure out what to do with it. So 142 00:08:15.279 --> 00:08:18.079 that's exactly what happened. I was doing my master's degree. 143 00:08:18.319 --> 00:08:21.600 I was at the University of Wisconsin with my supervisor, 144 00:08:21.720 --> 00:08:24.639 Zach Peery, and we were doing a study out in 145 00:08:24.680 --> 00:08:27.480 California on spotted owls, trying to figure out what kind 146 00:08:27.519 --> 00:08:30.839 of forests they used, how they would respond to climate change. 147 00:08:31.279 --> 00:08:35.399 And just as I was finishing my master's degree, like 148 00:08:35.960 --> 00:08:38.919 just a month or two before I had defended my degree, 149 00:08:39.120 --> 00:08:43.120 a big fire burned through our study area. 150 00:08:41.840 --> 00:08:44.120 Yeh yeah. 151 00:08:44.159 --> 00:08:46.039 And at the time, to be honest with you, I 152 00:08:46.200 --> 00:08:49.639 was I was pretty devastated. I was like, man, what 153 00:08:49.679 --> 00:08:52.200 does this mean for the work that I've been doing? 154 00:08:52.240 --> 00:08:55.320 Like does this even mean anything anymore? It, you know, 155 00:08:55.480 --> 00:08:59.919 changed the game a little bit, but it provided an 156 00:09:00.120 --> 00:09:04.840 incredible opportunity to learn about how these animals, this owl 157 00:09:04.960 --> 00:09:07.919 that I was studying, responded to fire. It was basically 158 00:09:08.000 --> 00:09:11.600 a natural experiment. This fire burned through our study area 159 00:09:11.600 --> 00:09:14.159 in twenty fourteen, and it burned through about half of it. 160 00:09:14.879 --> 00:09:18.759 And so you know, in ecology, when we're doing these 161 00:09:18.840 --> 00:09:23.120 field studies, we rarely get the chance to do experiments. 162 00:09:23.879 --> 00:09:27.240 Like almost everything we do is observational. We go out 163 00:09:27.279 --> 00:09:29.120 and we see what we see, and we record it 164 00:09:29.120 --> 00:09:31.519 and we try to make sense of it. We rarely 165 00:09:31.559 --> 00:09:34.200 get to do experiments like you know other folks get 166 00:09:34.240 --> 00:09:35.919 to do in the lab who are doing chemistry or 167 00:09:36.000 --> 00:09:39.879 their molecular things. But this was really a natural experiment 168 00:09:40.480 --> 00:09:43.679 to see how this species of owl responded to fire. 169 00:09:43.720 --> 00:09:46.279 And that's what launched me into, i guess, being a 170 00:09:46.639 --> 00:09:49.200 real sucker for fire and for learning about how it 171 00:09:49.960 --> 00:09:52.360 works in some of these systems, why it happens, how 172 00:09:52.360 --> 00:09:56.240 it happens, what its consequences are, and I'm totally hooked. 173 00:09:56.279 --> 00:10:01.399 Now how many of your owls were later, how many 174 00:10:01.480 --> 00:10:05.159 of the owls survived that, like what percentage of the 175 00:10:05.240 --> 00:10:07.759 impacted area half of your study area. 176 00:10:07.840 --> 00:10:10.159 So some of them didn't make it, some of them dispersed, 177 00:10:10.759 --> 00:10:12.240 some of them left the fire they were able to 178 00:10:12.240 --> 00:10:14.840 get out of the way. And then there's large parts 179 00:10:14.879 --> 00:10:18.200 of the fire that didn't burn so severely, that burned 180 00:10:18.200 --> 00:10:21.759 at lower severity where basically a lot of the trees 181 00:10:22.200 --> 00:10:25.000 that the big trees in the canopy, they kind of 182 00:10:25.039 --> 00:10:27.360 you know, they survived, and some of the understory burned 183 00:10:27.840 --> 00:10:30.360 a little bit more of what we call quote unquote 184 00:10:30.399 --> 00:10:33.279 good fire in some of these areas, which I'd love 185 00:10:33.320 --> 00:10:35.159 to talk more about. But you know, a lot of 186 00:10:35.200 --> 00:10:37.519 those birds did great and are still persisting in some 187 00:10:37.559 --> 00:10:41.360 of those areas that experienced lower severity fire, those lower 188 00:10:41.399 --> 00:10:42.799 severity effects. 189 00:10:42.320 --> 00:10:47.600 To the forest, but predictably many bit the proverbial dust 190 00:10:47.799 --> 00:10:50.960 and returned to the earth. As Ash Gavin told me 191 00:10:51.000 --> 00:10:54.120 that one of his colleagues was surveying the charred land 192 00:10:54.519 --> 00:10:57.639 and found a little aluminum owl leg band that they 193 00:10:57.720 --> 00:11:01.120 used for tagging and it in case a little crispy 194 00:11:01.200 --> 00:11:03.399 owl leg did not go well for that one. 195 00:11:03.960 --> 00:11:07.120 And how did that wildfire start? 196 00:11:07.519 --> 00:11:11.039 Well, so that particular wildfire that was a human started fire, 197 00:11:11.080 --> 00:11:13.080 and it's actually a kind of a sad story. Is 198 00:11:13.639 --> 00:11:17.720 some guy, I'm trying to remember the details. You should 199 00:11:17.759 --> 00:11:21.000 look this up ally, but some guy was I think 200 00:11:21.159 --> 00:11:23.960 taking a video for his ex girlfriend or something and 201 00:11:24.039 --> 00:11:26.639 like lit some house on fire and then that started 202 00:11:26.639 --> 00:11:29.759 this gigantic It was like, at the time, one of 203 00:11:29.799 --> 00:11:33.240 the largest fires that had burned in the state of California. 204 00:11:34.080 --> 00:11:37.279 Okay, buckle up, here's a story. So this was twenty 205 00:11:37.440 --> 00:11:41.080 fourteen's King Fire, and it started in Pollock Pines and 206 00:11:41.120 --> 00:11:44.320 the Sierra Nevadas. And I already knew of this fire 207 00:11:44.639 --> 00:11:48.759 because my parents lived in Pollock Pines in twenty fourteen, 208 00:11:49.080 --> 00:11:51.320 and my sisters and I had to plead with them 209 00:11:51.679 --> 00:11:56.879 to heed the emergency evacuation orders as pyrocumulus clouds billowed 210 00:11:56.919 --> 00:11:59.720 over their hill. We're like, please get to safety. I'm 211 00:11:59.759 --> 00:12:02.240 sweat a lot. Don't make me come up there. I can't. 212 00:12:02.360 --> 00:12:04.600 The roads are closed. So I booked my mom and 213 00:12:04.679 --> 00:12:08.080 dad a hotel in Reno, out of harm's way. And 214 00:12:08.559 --> 00:12:12.039 the hotel turned out to have a mirrored ceiling and 215 00:12:12.320 --> 00:12:16.360 a very thrifty but sensual vibe. They tell me. I 216 00:12:16.399 --> 00:12:19.600 get the feeling that there were also hourly rates available 217 00:12:19.720 --> 00:12:23.039 at this hotel. I got them. I didn't read the reviews. Okay, 218 00:12:23.120 --> 00:12:27.000 it was an emergency anyway. The Kingfire that reduced homes 219 00:12:27.000 --> 00:12:32.519 to ashes and dashed people's dreams at Flambayed Gavin's Owls. 220 00:12:33.159 --> 00:12:35.279 It was all started by a guy named Wayne Huntsman, 221 00:12:35.399 --> 00:12:38.759 who was not a Huntsman but an arsonist, a formerly 222 00:12:38.840 --> 00:12:44.679 incarcerated firefighter actually, who that sweltering September day had set 223 00:12:44.919 --> 00:12:49.679 several fires to impress a paramore. He took video for 224 00:12:49.759 --> 00:12:54.200 her standing between two small, smoldering blazes that were just 225 00:12:54.240 --> 00:13:01.639 starting to take off. I'm not sure how their relationship 226 00:13:01.679 --> 00:13:04.000 turned out, but as proof that we're living in a 227 00:13:04.039 --> 00:13:09.840 simulation the burn area, the burn scar is absolutely shaped 228 00:13:10.240 --> 00:13:13.879 like a perfect ninety seven thousand acre dick and balls 229 00:13:14.480 --> 00:13:18.799 all ablaze in one of the state's most infamous literal 230 00:13:18.840 --> 00:13:23.600 thirst traps. Okay, so how much is our horny, greedy 231 00:13:23.759 --> 00:13:25.080 species to blame? 232 00:13:25.600 --> 00:13:28.000 Oh man? And that's another thing, is a lot of 233 00:13:28.039 --> 00:13:32.960 the ignitions are human ignitions, you know, people accidentally starting fires, 234 00:13:33.519 --> 00:13:37.480 machinery getting too hot, people driving over dry grass, and 235 00:13:37.519 --> 00:13:38.200 things like that. 236 00:13:38.720 --> 00:13:41.320 So Gavin says that eighty to ninety percent of all 237 00:13:41.480 --> 00:13:47.399 wildfires are human caused ignitions. Half of California's largest fires 238 00:13:47.440 --> 00:13:50.600 in the last century happened in the past five years. 239 00:13:51.080 --> 00:13:54.039 By the way, a complex fire means a cluster of 240 00:13:54.399 --> 00:13:57.559 related fires in one area. But what's the difference between 241 00:13:57.919 --> 00:13:59.960 a wildfire and a forest fire? 242 00:14:00.360 --> 00:14:05.000 We talk about wildfires. Typically, when we're talking about wildfires, 243 00:14:05.000 --> 00:14:08.639 those are unplanned, so fires that we as people don't 244 00:14:08.679 --> 00:14:11.080 plan so you can kind of juxtapose that with a 245 00:14:11.159 --> 00:14:15.159 prescribed fire or a cultural fire. So prescribe fire is 246 00:14:15.200 --> 00:14:20.000 often fire that is purposely set and then managed by 247 00:14:20.440 --> 00:14:23.960 teams to achieve some type of objective. Maybe they're trying 248 00:14:24.000 --> 00:14:27.759 to restore some area, restore fire. You know, you probably 249 00:14:27.759 --> 00:14:30.080 hear a lot about you know, people burning prairies and 250 00:14:30.120 --> 00:14:32.279 things like that. It's the same thing in forests, they 251 00:14:32.360 --> 00:14:35.559 go in and do prescribed burns. And then there's also 252 00:14:35.679 --> 00:14:39.799 a really important component of cultural burning, So indigenous communities 253 00:14:40.000 --> 00:14:44.399 using wildfire for their purposes, which until you know, about 254 00:14:44.399 --> 00:14:48.919 one hundred two hundred years ago, made up the overwhelming 255 00:14:49.000 --> 00:14:52.720 majority of the fire activity that was happening in a 256 00:14:52.720 --> 00:14:54.879 lot of these areas. For you know, the last ten 257 00:14:55.039 --> 00:14:59.600 thousand years or so, indigenous peoples have been using fire 258 00:14:59.720 --> 00:15:04.399 in o really important cultural way, and that has really 259 00:15:04.480 --> 00:15:07.440 changed in the past couple of centuries with colonization, but 260 00:15:08.519 --> 00:15:11.639 that is an increasingly important part of the solution to 261 00:15:11.679 --> 00:15:13.720 sort of this modern wildfire problem. 262 00:15:13.759 --> 00:15:19.399 And obviously indigenous cultures and just the planet at large 263 00:15:19.759 --> 00:15:24.200 saw the benefit of prescribed burns. So what good do 264 00:15:24.279 --> 00:15:28.519 fires do, either in prescribed burns or just in nature. 265 00:15:29.039 --> 00:15:32.279 Yeah, that's such a good question. I mean, fires are 266 00:15:33.000 --> 00:15:38.000 a critical piece of ecosystems around the world. Every square 267 00:15:38.039 --> 00:15:40.960 inch of land that has vegetation has some type of 268 00:15:41.320 --> 00:15:44.840 fire regime, It has some sort of natural fire cycle, 269 00:15:44.919 --> 00:15:48.600 and fire is kind of a restorative process. There's many 270 00:15:48.639 --> 00:15:51.200 benefits of fire from we can think about it from 271 00:15:51.240 --> 00:15:53.480 a human perspective, we can think about it from a 272 00:15:53.600 --> 00:15:56.759 sort of an ecosystem perspective, you know, from the human perspective. 273 00:15:57.440 --> 00:16:01.440 You know, fires create more resilient forest when they burn 274 00:16:01.519 --> 00:16:03.919 the right way. When we have sort of a natural 275 00:16:04.000 --> 00:16:07.120 kind of lower intensity fire in some systems, like in 276 00:16:07.159 --> 00:16:09.120 the Sierra Nevada, where I've spent a lot of my time, 277 00:16:09.240 --> 00:16:14.120 that reinforces healthy water supplies. It reduces erosion. 278 00:16:14.720 --> 00:16:19.559 Side note, A fire regime sounds like Satan's cabinet members 279 00:16:19.840 --> 00:16:23.320 farting flames in a hades boardroom, but it's actually just 280 00:16:23.360 --> 00:16:26.879 a gentle term. A fire regime describes a pattern of fire, 281 00:16:27.159 --> 00:16:29.960 how frequent, how intense, what kind of fuel of gobbles 282 00:16:30.320 --> 00:16:34.279 And maybe me just calling it Satan's cabinet members farting 283 00:16:34.279 --> 00:16:37.799 in hades. Maybe that's part of the root of Europeans 284 00:16:37.879 --> 00:16:42.879 fear of fire and thus this historical fire suppression by colonists. 285 00:16:43.120 --> 00:16:45.120 I wondered this, and I begged myself not to google 286 00:16:45.120 --> 00:16:47.240 it because this aside would be like forty five minutes long. 287 00:16:47.279 --> 00:16:49.720 But snap, I found a twenty fifteen paper from the 288 00:16:49.799 --> 00:16:54.679 journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society be title Fire 289 00:16:54.799 --> 00:16:59.440 in the Mind, Changing Understandings of Fire in Western Civilization, 290 00:17:01.200 --> 00:17:04.160 in which author Stephen J. Pron writes you ready for 291 00:17:04.200 --> 00:17:06.960 this quote? The Old Testament is in fact a cauldron 292 00:17:07.000 --> 00:17:10.359 of stories, rights, and beliefs simmering over a mix of 293 00:17:10.400 --> 00:17:13.599 religious fires. He goes on to say the heartland of 294 00:17:13.720 --> 00:17:18.319 European forestry new fire only as a human artifact, not 295 00:17:18.559 --> 00:17:23.079 a natural process. Most new and colonized lands were burned 296 00:17:23.160 --> 00:17:28.559 lands naturally, but the agencies found themselves in a continuous firefight, 297 00:17:28.839 --> 00:17:32.759 so fire became a political as well as practical challenge. 298 00:17:32.839 --> 00:17:38.119 He continues, the upshot has generally been disastrous. Okay, So 299 00:17:38.599 --> 00:17:42.240 what does the land miss out on when natural fire 300 00:17:42.400 --> 00:17:47.480 is suppressed and indigenous populations are fined, imprisoned, or even, 301 00:17:47.559 --> 00:17:50.319 up until the nineteen thirties in the US shot for 302 00:17:50.519 --> 00:17:55.480 fire stewardship. Well, from an ecology standpoint, those fires can 303 00:17:55.519 --> 00:18:00.000 help the water supply by eliminating excess vegetation and thus 304 00:18:00.039 --> 00:18:04.839 increasing runoff into streams, and by preventing huge fires with 305 00:18:04.960 --> 00:18:09.039 more frequent smaller ones. Also, erosion doesn't get out of 306 00:18:09.039 --> 00:18:12.119 control when there are regular fires, like you see with 307 00:18:12.279 --> 00:18:16.799 post megafire mud slides. Also, the charcoal after a burn 308 00:18:17.240 --> 00:18:21.640 could trap carbon for millennia, and the recovery of vegetation 309 00:18:21.799 --> 00:18:24.880 takes more excess carbon from the atmosphere. According to the 310 00:18:24.960 --> 00:18:30.039 twenty nineteen paper how wildfires trap carbon for centuries to millennia. Okay, 311 00:18:30.160 --> 00:18:35.359 but wildfires burn at eight hundred degrees celsius. That's fourteen 312 00:18:35.599 --> 00:18:40.880 seventy two fahrenheit America. So the animals hate natural and 313 00:18:41.039 --> 00:18:44.279 cultural burns too, right, No animal wants to be trapped 314 00:18:44.279 --> 00:18:47.039 in a blaze. But I'm just going to stop myself 315 00:18:47.079 --> 00:18:49.440 from singing about the circle of life in your ears. 316 00:18:50.119 --> 00:18:52.799 And then from an ecosystem perspective, and from what I 317 00:18:52.880 --> 00:18:55.839 like to think about a lot is the biodiversity perspective, 318 00:18:56.000 --> 00:18:59.039 So you know what kinds of animals there are and 319 00:18:59.079 --> 00:19:02.720 the richness of of animal life and plant life. Fires 320 00:19:03.279 --> 00:19:09.119 create this template for wildlife and plants to thrive. And 321 00:19:09.240 --> 00:19:13.519 also this that creates this natural dynamic where you have 322 00:19:14.279 --> 00:19:16.880 places that burn in one year and then don't burn 323 00:19:16.920 --> 00:19:19.400 for a while, and places that burn frequently, in places 324 00:19:19.440 --> 00:19:21.759 that burn at high severity and low severity. You can 325 00:19:21.839 --> 00:19:24.839 kind of think about it as this patchwork, this mosaic 326 00:19:25.640 --> 00:19:28.960 of different ages of forests that burned at different times, 327 00:19:29.640 --> 00:19:34.519 and that creates a really diverse landscape that generates the 328 00:19:34.559 --> 00:19:37.920 habitat for lots of critters. It can be a really 329 00:19:37.960 --> 00:19:41.119 regenerative and restorative process to the land, both from a 330 00:19:41.759 --> 00:19:44.519 ecosystem perspective and also really you know, fire is a 331 00:19:44.559 --> 00:19:47.400 necessary part of these systems, and so when we can 332 00:19:47.920 --> 00:19:49.799 put the right kind of fire on the landscape, it 333 00:19:49.839 --> 00:19:53.160 really benefits us to as people as society. 334 00:19:53.759 --> 00:19:57.759 So fire mosaic paints a beautiful picture of land in 335 00:19:57.799 --> 00:20:01.440 different states of recovery and and if you're looking to 336 00:20:01.759 --> 00:20:05.440 learn more about it, don't google fire mosaic unless you 337 00:20:05.480 --> 00:20:08.359 want to see a lot of tiling crafts that seem 338 00:20:08.440 --> 00:20:11.079 to be an homage to burning Man. But look up 339 00:20:11.119 --> 00:20:15.599 the official term. It's patch mosaic burning. So let's talk 340 00:20:15.799 --> 00:20:18.839 different flavors of fire, because it does matter. 341 00:20:19.119 --> 00:20:23.440 So you can think this is a really overly simplistic 342 00:20:23.559 --> 00:20:27.720 way to think about fire, because fire is a really 343 00:20:28.039 --> 00:20:32.279 complicated process. But the way that we often sort of 344 00:20:32.319 --> 00:20:35.440 describe it and think about it within fire ecology world 345 00:20:36.279 --> 00:20:42.759 is we think about natural low severity fire regimes. You know, 346 00:20:43.039 --> 00:20:45.799 in a given area, you might expect fires to sort 347 00:20:45.839 --> 00:20:48.720 of burn a lower severity, not too hot, not too 348 00:20:49.039 --> 00:20:52.079 all consuming. They burn along in the understory, nice and happy, 349 00:20:52.240 --> 00:20:55.440 crawl along and burn some logs here, burn some trees there, 350 00:20:55.480 --> 00:20:59.400 but generally don't destroy or consume the big trees in 351 00:20:59.480 --> 00:21:01.799 the overstore of the canopy. So that first end of 352 00:21:01.839 --> 00:21:06.160 the system, that's kind of frequent low severity fires. And 353 00:21:06.200 --> 00:21:08.359 then on the other end of the whole spectrum you 354 00:21:08.400 --> 00:21:13.559 can think about infrequent high severity fires or fire regimes rather, 355 00:21:13.640 --> 00:21:16.799 so these are places in that area is for fires 356 00:21:17.119 --> 00:21:20.119 when they do burn, to burn pretty big and pretty hot, 357 00:21:20.400 --> 00:21:23.920 and those are both natural, but they're natural in those 358 00:21:23.960 --> 00:21:27.000 different places. And so why is it that you have 359 00:21:27.359 --> 00:21:31.920 some places that naturally burn low severity and generally I'm 360 00:21:31.920 --> 00:21:35.000 talking about forest fires here and then other places of 361 00:21:35.039 --> 00:21:37.799 the forests that naturally burn it really high severity and 362 00:21:37.839 --> 00:21:40.599 really large. We can think about those two ends of 363 00:21:40.640 --> 00:21:44.160 the spectrum also in terms of what's limiting the system. 364 00:21:44.279 --> 00:21:48.880 So in these low severity fire systems, those are generally 365 00:21:49.160 --> 00:21:53.279 systems that are limited by fuel. And so what I 366 00:21:53.319 --> 00:21:56.720 mean by that is the climate is such that on 367 00:21:56.839 --> 00:22:01.119 any given year, the conditions are right for fire, Like 368 00:22:01.160 --> 00:22:03.960 if there's a lightning strike or another ignition, fire is 369 00:22:04.000 --> 00:22:06.960 going to burn and the fuel is dry, and the 370 00:22:07.000 --> 00:22:09.960 only thing that's keeping that fire. One of the primary 371 00:22:09.960 --> 00:22:12.359 things it's controlling that fire and where it burns is 372 00:22:12.599 --> 00:22:16.160 where the fuel is, where the trees are, where the 373 00:22:16.240 --> 00:22:20.279 kindling so to speak is. And because those fires those 374 00:22:20.319 --> 00:22:23.680 places they ignite every year, there's ignitions all the time, 375 00:22:23.960 --> 00:22:26.640 and the conditions are right for fire, they burn really frequently. 376 00:22:27.039 --> 00:22:28.960 And so you can think about places where the fires 377 00:22:28.960 --> 00:22:32.200 burn every couple of years, and when they do burn, 378 00:22:32.279 --> 00:22:36.920 they kind of clean out or you know, burn in 379 00:22:36.960 --> 00:22:41.160 that understory, so sort of below the forest canopy. It's 380 00:22:41.200 --> 00:22:44.720 burning the smaller trees, it's burning some of the medium trees, 381 00:22:44.759 --> 00:22:47.079 and it's burning some of the big trees. But mostly 382 00:22:47.240 --> 00:22:49.160 it just every time a fire burns, it burns all 383 00:22:49.200 --> 00:22:52.559 that fine fuel or a lot of it, right, And 384 00:22:52.640 --> 00:22:57.920 so that's the primary sort of control on how fire 385 00:22:58.079 --> 00:23:01.799 burns in some of these dry fuel limited systems. 386 00:23:02.519 --> 00:23:05.240 So in these areas, the way it's supposed to be 387 00:23:05.359 --> 00:23:09.000 is that fires don't get mega because blazes are more frequent, 388 00:23:09.279 --> 00:23:13.000 so burning all of the fallen wood and the understory, 389 00:23:13.079 --> 00:23:16.000 so an excess of fuel doesn't build up. So that's 390 00:23:16.079 --> 00:23:20.160 one way that these giant, devastating fires can be avoided. 391 00:23:20.599 --> 00:23:23.599 And then on the other end of the spectrum, you 392 00:23:23.720 --> 00:23:27.640 have these climate limited systems, so rather than the system 393 00:23:27.680 --> 00:23:31.240 being limited by fuel, it's limited by climate. And so 394 00:23:31.440 --> 00:23:35.079 this is a place like the Pacific Northwest, where it's 395 00:23:35.119 --> 00:23:38.319 really wet, right, it's generally wet most of the time, 396 00:23:38.359 --> 00:23:42.240 it's cool. There's maybe quite a few ignitions, but when 397 00:23:42.720 --> 00:23:45.880 those ignitions occur, the fuel is not really ready to burn. 398 00:23:46.720 --> 00:23:49.680 It's too wet, and maybe it burns a small fire 399 00:23:49.759 --> 00:23:52.160 or something like that, but it just kind of extinguishes itself. 400 00:23:53.119 --> 00:23:57.200 And you think about that system, those kind of areas, 401 00:23:57.400 --> 00:24:01.559 and when you end up getting those really big, infrequent, 402 00:24:01.720 --> 00:24:05.079 severe fires that occur there, it's because there's been a 403 00:24:05.240 --> 00:24:09.839 some sort of climate activity, like a drought that's caused 404 00:24:09.920 --> 00:24:12.400 all that fuel that hasn't burned in a really long 405 00:24:12.480 --> 00:24:15.960 time to dry out and then it burns, and when 406 00:24:15.960 --> 00:24:17.680 it does burn, it burns really big because there's tons 407 00:24:17.720 --> 00:24:20.400 of fuel available, right, And so those are that's kind 408 00:24:20.440 --> 00:24:22.119 of the two ends of the spectrum. And you know, 409 00:24:22.960 --> 00:24:24.599 I was trying to think about this today. How do 410 00:24:24.640 --> 00:24:29.039 I describe that that like spectrum in a way that's 411 00:24:29.079 --> 00:24:35.000 not so dry and academic. And I was thinking about, like, Okay, 412 00:24:35.359 --> 00:24:37.920 like the haircut that I get is like a frequent 413 00:24:37.960 --> 00:24:41.400 fire system. Okay. You know, I go to Great Clips 414 00:24:41.480 --> 00:24:43.799 or Sport Clips or whatever just down the street from me, 415 00:24:44.279 --> 00:24:46.839 and I get my haircut every few weeks, maybe every month. 416 00:24:47.319 --> 00:24:49.759 It's it kind of maintains the general structure. It never 417 00:24:50.000 --> 00:24:53.400 kind of goes super long, and I never buzz it 418 00:24:53.640 --> 00:24:56.720 super short either. I just kind of keep it, you know, tamed, 419 00:24:57.319 --> 00:24:59.920 so to speak. You know, I go in there frequently. 420 00:25:00.440 --> 00:25:03.559 I clean out sort of the growth, right that's happened 421 00:25:03.599 --> 00:25:07.000 in between each cut. And on the other end of 422 00:25:07.039 --> 00:25:09.119 the spectrum, you could have somebody and I did this 423 00:25:09.160 --> 00:25:11.359 once when I was in college. I think you're right 424 00:25:11.400 --> 00:25:14.880 after college, you know, grow out your hair super duper long. 425 00:25:14.960 --> 00:25:17.759 Like I didn't cut it for I don't remember exactly 426 00:25:17.799 --> 00:25:19.640 how long it was, but let's say so you grow 427 00:25:19.680 --> 00:25:21.759 your hair for a year, five years or something. You know, 428 00:25:22.200 --> 00:25:26.799 you get some pretty floppy, pretty pretty crazy hair, at 429 00:25:26.880 --> 00:25:28.759 least if you've got hair like me, and then you 430 00:25:28.799 --> 00:25:30.480 say I'm gonna buzz it, and so then you buzz 431 00:25:30.519 --> 00:25:32.519 it right off. That's kind of the I don't know, 432 00:25:32.640 --> 00:25:34.200 you can kind of kind of think about that as 433 00:25:34.200 --> 00:25:36.680 the two ends of the spectrum. Right, You've got like 434 00:25:36.720 --> 00:25:41.160 your frequent haircut system, and you've got your infrequent, high 435 00:25:41.160 --> 00:25:44.000 severity haircut system, where you know, you just let it 436 00:25:44.039 --> 00:25:45.480 grow and then you cut it all off. 437 00:25:45.559 --> 00:25:49.440 Okay, So in this analogy, the regular maintenance cuts are 438 00:25:49.480 --> 00:25:53.160 the low intensity fires, the ones that burn the undergrowth, 439 00:25:53.400 --> 00:25:57.240 that don't spread too far or that extinguish themselves because 440 00:25:57.279 --> 00:26:00.720 there's enough moisture to keep things from being stray bone, 441 00:26:00.799 --> 00:26:05.200 dry powder, keg, kindling. But if those small fires don't happen, 442 00:26:05.440 --> 00:26:09.680 or if the fire resistant older trees are logged out, 443 00:26:10.000 --> 00:26:13.519 or if the climate is just super hot, then you 444 00:26:13.559 --> 00:26:17.519 get a situation that's much more dramatic. I've had got 445 00:26:17.720 --> 00:26:21.759 and is that like long main to buzz cut. 446 00:26:21.799 --> 00:26:23.480 Is that what a mega fire is? 447 00:26:23.839 --> 00:26:24.039 Then? 448 00:26:24.519 --> 00:26:27.640 Yeah, so that term I would say, that's a good 449 00:26:27.680 --> 00:26:29.400 way to think about it. Yeah, from the long man 450 00:26:29.480 --> 00:26:32.200 to the buzz cut. The term megafire is a really 451 00:26:32.359 --> 00:26:36.200 interesting term, and it really doesn't have a great definition. 452 00:26:36.480 --> 00:26:39.680 A lot of people when they talk about megafires, they're 453 00:26:39.720 --> 00:26:43.920 thinking about these basically really big fires, just fires that 454 00:26:43.960 --> 00:26:46.799 are giant in size. But you can have a really 455 00:26:46.920 --> 00:26:53.519 really large fire that doesn't necessarily create that forest buzz cut, right, 456 00:26:53.519 --> 00:26:56.960 It doesn't necessarily kill all the trees within its path. 457 00:26:57.599 --> 00:27:00.640 It may kill some trees in some parts, but not 458 00:27:00.880 --> 00:27:01.880 throughout the whole fire. 459 00:27:02.680 --> 00:27:06.240 So a forest mullet maybe, but not the cool kind 460 00:27:06.400 --> 00:27:09.720 that gen Z has. The warning my cousin will probably 461 00:27:09.839 --> 00:27:12.240 hit on your wife kind of mullet not ideal. 462 00:27:12.440 --> 00:27:14.920 You can have really large fires that are not necessarily 463 00:27:15.119 --> 00:27:19.000 super damaging. You can have smaller fires that are pretty 464 00:27:19.119 --> 00:27:21.400 severe and intense and destroy a lot of what's there 465 00:27:21.480 --> 00:27:24.079 in terms of the forests. There isn't really a single 466 00:27:24.119 --> 00:27:25.799 definition of mega fires. A lot of people like to 467 00:27:25.839 --> 00:27:28.720 think about them in terms of their impact to society too, 468 00:27:29.200 --> 00:27:31.680 So it's not just like how big or severe they 469 00:27:31.720 --> 00:27:34.119 are in terms of how many trees they kill, but 470 00:27:34.359 --> 00:27:40.880 it's you know, how much that fire influences people, and 471 00:27:41.119 --> 00:27:45.079 you know how much of the infrastructure it destroys. And 472 00:27:45.599 --> 00:27:50.640 there's a growing problem within the US, and particularly the 473 00:27:50.720 --> 00:27:53.680 western US, which right now, as you know, is experiencing 474 00:27:53.799 --> 00:27:57.279 quite a bit of fire activity. There's a lot more 475 00:27:57.279 --> 00:28:00.799 people living in that interface, what we call the wildland 476 00:28:00.960 --> 00:28:05.799 urban interface or the WOUI yeah wooey, So yes. 477 00:28:05.880 --> 00:28:10.559 The US Forest Service defines the wildland urban interface as quote, 478 00:28:10.720 --> 00:28:13.799 a group of home and other structures with basic infrastructure 479 00:28:13.799 --> 00:28:17.559 and services within or adjacent to federal land that is 480 00:28:17.599 --> 00:28:22.079 an at risk community. Aka all the cute cabins that 481 00:28:22.119 --> 00:28:23.880 you save on pinorest when you should be working on 482 00:28:23.920 --> 00:28:25.759 a spreadsheet for your boss because you just want to 483 00:28:25.759 --> 00:28:28.039 get away for the weekend, but go to someplace that 484 00:28:28.119 --> 00:28:31.839 still has coffee shops. So more and more folks ditched 485 00:28:31.880 --> 00:28:34.480 the cities in the pandemic for these type of living 486 00:28:34.519 --> 00:28:39.440 situations and might be getting their very first tastes of PSPs, 487 00:28:39.640 --> 00:28:43.960 which are public safety power shutoffs when utility companies straight 488 00:28:44.039 --> 00:28:47.480 up cut power for a day, maybe a few weeks 489 00:28:47.559 --> 00:28:51.519 when winds are high in case otherwise live downed wires 490 00:28:51.920 --> 00:28:55.160 ignite the forest. Realators might not tell you about that 491 00:28:55.279 --> 00:28:58.359 until after you're done with escrow, So Wowie. 492 00:28:58.359 --> 00:29:02.000 Indeed, the wildland urban interface is kind of this intermingling 493 00:29:02.039 --> 00:29:04.759 of people and the forest right where they kind of 494 00:29:05.240 --> 00:29:07.279 overlap a little bit. And there's a lot more people 495 00:29:07.279 --> 00:29:09.400 living there now than there was ten twenty years ago, 496 00:29:09.640 --> 00:29:13.119 and so you can think about fires as generally having 497 00:29:13.160 --> 00:29:16.000 more of a mega impact on people now because we're 498 00:29:16.039 --> 00:29:19.319 just more vulnerable in some ways to those fire effects 499 00:29:19.319 --> 00:29:20.720 when those fires do burn through. 500 00:29:22.000 --> 00:29:26.240 And now, as we're speaking, the Dixie Fire is the 501 00:29:27.119 --> 00:29:31.039 one of the largest fires California has ever seen. There's 502 00:29:31.119 --> 00:29:33.759 the is it the Bootleg fire up in Oregon? 503 00:29:33.839 --> 00:29:33.920 Ye? 504 00:29:34.039 --> 00:29:35.400 Up in southern Oregon, that's right. 505 00:29:35.880 --> 00:29:39.000 So I'm surprised you were able to even talk to 506 00:29:39.039 --> 00:29:41.519 me right now. Can you tell me a little bit 507 00:29:41.519 --> 00:29:45.519 about what your job entails. Do you have is the 508 00:29:45.559 --> 00:29:49.000 busy season all year round because you're analyzing data that 509 00:29:49.079 --> 00:29:51.000 comes in or do you have to go to the 510 00:29:51.000 --> 00:29:53.920 field a lot? Are you getting reports from people who 511 00:29:53.960 --> 00:29:56.440 are closer to each of the fires? Do you have 512 00:29:56.480 --> 00:29:58.839 to count all the fires all of that? 513 00:29:59.279 --> 00:29:59.559 Yeah? 514 00:29:59.680 --> 00:30:03.839 Yeah, So I am not one of the incredible people 515 00:30:03.880 --> 00:30:06.000 who are out on the front lines doing this work 516 00:30:06.119 --> 00:30:09.119 on the fires, right, My work is really more focused 517 00:30:09.119 --> 00:30:12.440 on after fire burns, what can we learn from it. 518 00:30:12.599 --> 00:30:14.640 And there are also a ton of people, of course, 519 00:30:14.640 --> 00:30:17.279 who are out there responding to these fires like the 520 00:30:17.319 --> 00:30:20.960 Dixie Fire and the Bootleg Fire and many others when 521 00:30:21.160 --> 00:30:23.799 those are burning, and those are the people who really 522 00:30:23.799 --> 00:30:26.680 deserve the applause and the praise, right who are out 523 00:30:26.680 --> 00:30:30.160 there doing this really dangerous work. And I'm relatively speaking, 524 00:30:30.200 --> 00:30:33.079 I'm a desk jockey compared to those people. So I 525 00:30:33.119 --> 00:30:35.559 spend a lot of my time here at the computer 526 00:30:35.640 --> 00:30:39.480 trying to take that data and learn from the fires 527 00:30:39.839 --> 00:30:45.119 and trying to understand how wildlife respond to those fires. 528 00:30:45.559 --> 00:30:47.480 That's what I do most of the time. This last year, 529 00:30:47.680 --> 00:30:51.440 COVID year, has definitely made things even more so away 530 00:30:51.480 --> 00:30:53.839 from the field. But boy, I love field work. I've 531 00:30:53.880 --> 00:30:56.160 done quite a bit of it. I love getting out 532 00:30:56.240 --> 00:30:59.319 into those burned landscapes and trying to figure out what's 533 00:30:59.319 --> 00:30:59.640 going on. 534 00:31:00.200 --> 00:31:03.079 What is it like when you are doing field work, 535 00:31:03.079 --> 00:31:05.480 What kind of samples do you have to collect, and 536 00:31:05.519 --> 00:31:07.400 what kinds of observations are you making. 537 00:31:08.039 --> 00:31:10.240 Yeah, so a lot of the work that I've done 538 00:31:10.440 --> 00:31:14.079 has focused on how this one little critter, that spotted 539 00:31:14.160 --> 00:31:18.680 owl responds to these burned areas, these fires that have 540 00:31:18.759 --> 00:31:21.079 come through. And so myself and some of my really 541 00:31:21.160 --> 00:31:24.440 outstanding colleagues, both back from when I was in grad 542 00:31:24.480 --> 00:31:27.440 school that I established during my PhD program, some of 543 00:31:27.440 --> 00:31:31.119 those collaborators back at University of Wisconsin, as well as 544 00:31:31.160 --> 00:31:34.519 some of my fantastic teammates here at the Rocky Mountain 545 00:31:34.559 --> 00:31:38.000 Research Station with the US Forest Service, we've done quite 546 00:31:38.000 --> 00:31:39.960 a bit of work trying to understand how this bird, 547 00:31:40.279 --> 00:31:44.480 this spotted owl responds to fires. We've gone out and 548 00:31:45.039 --> 00:31:47.240 spent quite a bit of time in these burned areas, 549 00:31:47.799 --> 00:31:52.079 capturing owls and putting GPS tags on them to see 550 00:31:52.079 --> 00:31:54.480 where they move in these burned areas, to see if 551 00:31:54.519 --> 00:31:57.680 they like them or if they're using them. We literally 552 00:31:57.680 --> 00:32:01.359 go out into the woods and hood at the alley dear, Really, 553 00:32:01.759 --> 00:32:05.960 we really do it. You walk into the woods where 554 00:32:06.000 --> 00:32:07.359 you think there's going to be an owl and you 555 00:32:07.720 --> 00:32:12.200 just start hooting with your mouth. You just do it, 556 00:32:12.599 --> 00:32:14.880 and they hoot back because they're like, Hey, who the 557 00:32:14.920 --> 00:32:15.519 heck is that? 558 00:32:16.160 --> 00:32:17.559 Oh my gosh. 559 00:32:17.599 --> 00:32:19.640 And then are you able to count them based on 560 00:32:20.319 --> 00:32:22.599 who hoots? 561 00:32:23.319 --> 00:32:26.559 Pretty much? Yeah, So we call them callback surveys. So 562 00:32:26.599 --> 00:32:30.519 we're calling, they call back, and that's how we locate them. 563 00:32:31.000 --> 00:32:34.200 And oftentimes we're just interested in detecting them. So okay, 564 00:32:34.200 --> 00:32:36.680 there's an owl here, there's an owl there, sort of 565 00:32:36.759 --> 00:32:39.480 establishing where they are across the landscape. 566 00:32:39.880 --> 00:32:42.519 Did I look this up? Of course? And please enjoy 567 00:32:42.920 --> 00:32:47.119 the absolute maestro of this art see O Pacific Industries 568 00:32:47.240 --> 00:32:49.839 wildlife biologist Kevin roberts Well. 569 00:32:49.839 --> 00:32:52.079 I like to do when I'm surveying for spotted owls 570 00:32:52.160 --> 00:32:53.960 and using my voice is kind of mix them all 571 00:32:54.079 --> 00:32:56.240 up and do something to the fact of. 572 00:32:58.160 --> 00:33:10.440 Whoa who who? 573 00:33:13.359 --> 00:33:16.720 Thank you, Kevin. We beg you to make a ring tone? 574 00:33:16.799 --> 00:33:18.759 Is it too much to ask? You can only answer 575 00:33:18.759 --> 00:33:21.839 that in owl hoots? But anyway, that is how you 576 00:33:22.200 --> 00:33:25.720 do a Jim Carrey level impersonation of spotted owls. 577 00:33:25.839 --> 00:33:27.519 But a lot of the work I've done is focused 578 00:33:27.559 --> 00:33:31.440 on capturing those owls once we find them, and putting 579 00:33:31.440 --> 00:33:33.680 little GPS tags on them and seeing where they go. 580 00:33:34.079 --> 00:33:35.880 And then we get that, we get that data and 581 00:33:35.920 --> 00:33:38.160 we see where they went and we try to figure out, Okay, 582 00:33:38.160 --> 00:33:40.480 how are they interacting with some of those burned areas. 583 00:33:40.640 --> 00:33:43.400 What can we learn from that about what type of 584 00:33:43.400 --> 00:33:45.240 fire they like, what kind of forests they like, and 585 00:33:45.279 --> 00:33:48.359 how we might be able to manage the forests in 586 00:33:48.440 --> 00:33:49.680 a way that supports them. 587 00:33:50.000 --> 00:33:55.279 And how is a fire ecology changing with the climate 588 00:33:55.599 --> 00:33:59.319 with droughts? Why do droughts even happen? Is the water 589 00:33:59.359 --> 00:34:03.440 that would normally rain here raining somewhere else where? 590 00:34:03.519 --> 00:34:06.079 Is the water so okay? 591 00:34:06.160 --> 00:34:09.599 So again, this is something that much smarter people would 592 00:34:09.639 --> 00:34:11.960 have a much better answer for. But I will say 593 00:34:11.960 --> 00:34:15.480 that something that is for certain is that we are 594 00:34:15.880 --> 00:34:21.760 entering into uncharted territory with fire and fire ecology and 595 00:34:21.800 --> 00:34:25.519 fire behavior. And one of my good colleagues at University 596 00:34:25.519 --> 00:34:29.320 of California mer said, Leroy Westerling has you know, said 597 00:34:29.360 --> 00:34:31.679 many many times to me, and I've seen him write 598 00:34:31.679 --> 00:34:35.239 about this too. You know, there is no more normal 599 00:34:36.039 --> 00:34:38.199 in terms of fire. There's not even a new normal. 600 00:34:38.840 --> 00:34:41.719 It's a new abnormal, you know, we because we just 601 00:34:41.840 --> 00:34:45.159 it's really it's becoming really difficult to predict what's going 602 00:34:45.239 --> 00:34:47.079 to happen in the future because we don't have a 603 00:34:47.119 --> 00:34:51.559 reference point anymore. We're sort of just going into uncharted territory. 604 00:34:52.239 --> 00:34:55.039 And so you know, when it comes to drought and 605 00:34:55.159 --> 00:34:58.880 climate change and things like that, look those are definitely 606 00:34:59.000 --> 00:35:02.280 a part of the equation in terms of what's going 607 00:35:02.280 --> 00:35:04.760 on with wildfire and what's going to happen, and particularly 608 00:35:05.039 --> 00:35:08.639 climate change and you know how that interacts with forests 609 00:35:08.639 --> 00:35:12.239 and drives out fuels and things like that. Sometimes it's 610 00:35:12.239 --> 00:35:15.719 hard to just talk about drought and climate change for 611 00:35:15.800 --> 00:35:19.880 many reasons because it's hard as like a scientist who's 612 00:35:19.920 --> 00:35:22.679 interested in conservation, like, what can I do about that? 613 00:35:23.639 --> 00:35:25.119 I mean, you know, I don't. I don't mean to 614 00:35:25.159 --> 00:35:27.719 sound like nihilistic, like, oh, we can't do anything about it, 615 00:35:27.760 --> 00:35:31.079 because we can. We absolutely can. It's never too late 616 00:35:31.239 --> 00:35:34.559 to make actions on those big problems like climate change, right, 617 00:35:35.000 --> 00:35:41.559 But you know, I have the the honor to work 618 00:35:41.599 --> 00:35:45.360 for this agency, the US for a service that is 619 00:35:45.360 --> 00:35:48.840 in charge of managing a ton of land, and so 620 00:35:49.000 --> 00:35:52.360 what can we do on the ground to make a 621 00:35:52.360 --> 00:35:54.880 difference in terms of how these fires burn? 622 00:35:55.119 --> 00:35:55.360 Right? 623 00:35:56.519 --> 00:35:59.119 And you know, considering climate change like that plays a role. 624 00:35:59.119 --> 00:36:02.079 It plays a really role, and so does drought in 625 00:36:02.159 --> 00:36:05.480 terms of driving some of these wildfire patterns that we've seen. 626 00:36:06.159 --> 00:36:09.639 But there's also something to be said for how forests 627 00:36:09.679 --> 00:36:14.480 are managed and how flammable forests are and how we 628 00:36:14.559 --> 00:36:18.199 can potentially manage them in a way that tries to 629 00:36:18.280 --> 00:36:21.800 mitigate those worst effects of fire when they do come through. 630 00:36:21.840 --> 00:36:26.599 So it's really like you are going to hear people say, oh, 631 00:36:26.719 --> 00:36:28.960 you know, these fires are just because of climate change, 632 00:36:29.199 --> 00:36:31.719 there's nothing we can do about it. And then you're 633 00:36:31.719 --> 00:36:34.679 going to hear people say, oh, climate change has nothing 634 00:36:34.719 --> 00:36:37.840 to do with it. It's we just need to manage forests differently. 635 00:36:38.880 --> 00:36:42.800 And the reality is it's neither of those. It's kind 636 00:36:42.800 --> 00:36:46.320 of both, right, It's both climate change and you know, 637 00:36:46.559 --> 00:36:49.440 the forest and the patterns of fuels across the landscape 638 00:36:49.440 --> 00:36:53.199 are affecting how fires burn. As a research scientist with 639 00:36:53.280 --> 00:36:55.639 the Forest Service, I'm thinking about how can I do 640 00:36:55.840 --> 00:37:01.199 science that informs how we manage for it. And that's 641 00:37:01.239 --> 00:37:04.239 one of the coolest parts about my job is that 642 00:37:05.079 --> 00:37:08.760 I work for an agency that has a really strong 643 00:37:08.800 --> 00:37:11.159 management component, you know, a huge part of the agency 644 00:37:11.199 --> 00:37:14.239 as people out there doing this work, you know, managing forests, 645 00:37:14.719 --> 00:37:17.800 coming up with forest plans and management plans and fire plans, 646 00:37:18.639 --> 00:37:21.880 and I get to do science that helps them figure 647 00:37:21.880 --> 00:37:24.400 out how to do that, and we work together, you know, 648 00:37:24.440 --> 00:37:26.920 in a collaborative way to figure that out. And that 649 00:37:27.400 --> 00:37:29.719 is where I think I like focusing on those solutions, right, 650 00:37:29.719 --> 00:37:33.159 How can we press the levers and make a difference 651 00:37:33.199 --> 00:37:34.119 from the ground. 652 00:37:34.840 --> 00:37:38.719 Is the leading theory on that is just more and 653 00:37:38.800 --> 00:37:42.960 better prescribed burns, or is it humans stop living in 654 00:37:43.000 --> 00:37:46.559 the woods for a while, Like what is the best 655 00:37:46.599 --> 00:37:47.199 tool you have? 656 00:37:47.559 --> 00:37:51.000 Yes, so that is a great question. And I think 657 00:37:51.039 --> 00:37:54.599 this is a misconception that if humans just got out 658 00:37:54.599 --> 00:37:55.760 of the picture, it would all be better. 659 00:37:56.519 --> 00:37:56.920 Mm hmm. 660 00:37:57.079 --> 00:37:59.360 You know, I think it's easy to think that way, like, oh, 661 00:37:59.360 --> 00:38:02.119 we're just the problem and humans suck and we just 662 00:38:02.159 --> 00:38:04.000 need to get out of the picture and nature will 663 00:38:04.000 --> 00:38:06.840 do its own thing and blah blah blah. And look, 664 00:38:07.000 --> 00:38:09.559 you know I understand that perspective. I'm sensitive to it. 665 00:38:10.119 --> 00:38:14.119 But we have to remember indigenous people's have been burning 666 00:38:14.639 --> 00:38:19.440 for ten thousand years, and you know, we need more 667 00:38:19.519 --> 00:38:22.599 fire on the landscape, not less. It's just what kind 668 00:38:22.639 --> 00:38:26.320 of fire burns. This is kind of crazy to think about, 669 00:38:26.480 --> 00:38:29.559 but especially given you're looking at these maps. I've got 670 00:38:29.599 --> 00:38:32.599 the New York Times wildfire tracker open here, I got 671 00:38:32.639 --> 00:38:36.159 another tracker on my desktop open as well. Like with 672 00:38:36.199 --> 00:38:38.679 all these big fires burning, you're thinking, like, man, there's 673 00:38:38.719 --> 00:38:40.519 just got to be so much more fire now than 674 00:38:40.519 --> 00:38:41.079 there ever was. 675 00:38:41.519 --> 00:38:42.559 Yeah, that's what I would think. 676 00:38:42.760 --> 00:38:45.519 Yeah, that's totally what you'd think, But it's actually not 677 00:38:45.719 --> 00:38:50.880 the case. There's still less fire in the West, in 678 00:38:50.920 --> 00:38:54.760 western North America. Then there was many many years ago, 679 00:38:54.760 --> 00:38:57.679 one hundred, two hundred, three hundred, five hundred thousand years ago. 680 00:38:57.559 --> 00:38:59.280 But they were smaller back then. 681 00:38:59.559 --> 00:39:03.000 Is that so they just burned differently. I'll bring you 682 00:39:03.039 --> 00:39:06.079 through a little bit of a time warp. So we 683 00:39:06.719 --> 00:39:10.880 often in Western science delineate sort of this pre colonial 684 00:39:11.119 --> 00:39:15.039 era and in the pre European or pre colonial era, 685 00:39:15.920 --> 00:39:18.639 there was a lot of fire in the West. I mean, 686 00:39:18.679 --> 00:39:22.639 these are flammable landscapes, and they never really got put out, right, 687 00:39:22.960 --> 00:39:27.320 All these ignitions would just burn, and vast areas of 688 00:39:27.360 --> 00:39:30.159 the landscape would burn all the time, depending again on 689 00:39:30.199 --> 00:39:32.519 what kind of system you're in, right, So these frequent 690 00:39:32.559 --> 00:39:36.360 fire systems would burn very frequently. You know, every couple 691 00:39:36.360 --> 00:39:39.079 of years you'd have fires kind of returning to the 692 00:39:39.079 --> 00:39:44.760 same areas. Then when you know settlers, white settlers colonized 693 00:39:45.880 --> 00:39:53.559 and pretty much disrupted indigenous burning and began actively suppressing wildfires. 694 00:39:54.159 --> 00:39:58.000 The amount of fire in the landscape just dropped to 695 00:39:58.800 --> 00:40:02.679 you know, almost nothing very effective at suppressing fires for 696 00:40:02.679 --> 00:40:08.079 a long time in the Western US. And basically what's 697 00:40:08.119 --> 00:40:11.800 happened is only recently have we sort of lost our 698 00:40:11.840 --> 00:40:15.039 handle on our ability to put out fires. The level 699 00:40:15.119 --> 00:40:19.000 of activity that we're seeing now is still far less 700 00:40:19.280 --> 00:40:22.119 than the level of fire activity that used to burn. 701 00:40:22.159 --> 00:40:25.920 But the difference is that because in many of these forests, 702 00:40:25.960 --> 00:40:30.400 and particularly in these frequent fire forests or these dry 703 00:40:30.519 --> 00:40:34.039 forest systems that used to burn really frequently, they haven't 704 00:40:34.079 --> 00:40:37.639 burned in a century or more, and so when they 705 00:40:37.719 --> 00:40:40.559 do burn, they burn really hot and really big, and 706 00:40:40.599 --> 00:40:43.199 that's not a natural kind of fire for this system. 707 00:40:43.960 --> 00:40:46.480 And also, you know, along with that, we have a 708 00:40:46.480 --> 00:40:48.639 lot more people again kind of living in those fire 709 00:40:48.679 --> 00:40:52.519 prone areas, and so we feel the effects a lot 710 00:40:52.559 --> 00:40:55.800 more as well as the population has increased, and so 711 00:40:55.920 --> 00:40:59.400 we still have way way less fire activity on the 712 00:40:59.480 --> 00:41:03.039 landscape that these fires are typically burning in a way 713 00:41:03.119 --> 00:41:09.239 that is for those forests unnatural and for society really 714 00:41:09.400 --> 00:41:14.159 not acceptable. Right. The other crazy thing is that we 715 00:41:14.360 --> 00:41:18.119 actually have in some areas, particularly again these sort of 716 00:41:18.440 --> 00:41:22.199 historically frequent fire systems, we have a lot more trees 717 00:41:22.239 --> 00:41:27.000 too than we used to have, oh yeah, which like 718 00:41:27.320 --> 00:41:29.920 it goes right along with that fire suppression. So we 719 00:41:30.000 --> 00:41:33.880 put out fires for one hundred years or more, and 720 00:41:34.880 --> 00:41:37.840 all those little shrubs and saplings that would have burned 721 00:41:37.880 --> 00:41:40.519 and those regular fires grew up to be big, you know, 722 00:41:40.639 --> 00:41:41.719 medium sized trees. 723 00:41:42.199 --> 00:41:42.840 More trees. 724 00:41:43.239 --> 00:41:43.800 Is that good? 725 00:41:44.880 --> 00:41:46.960 Well, it's kind of like a garage that we have 726 00:41:47.039 --> 00:41:50.400 failed to Marie condo for a long time, which I'll 727 00:41:50.440 --> 00:41:53.360 be honest, is my garage. Got to clear some stuff out. 728 00:41:53.559 --> 00:41:54.559 I'm talking to myself. 729 00:41:54.679 --> 00:41:58.079 And so we have actually a lot more trees on 730 00:41:58.119 --> 00:42:00.760 the landscape now in a place like this Ieerra, Nevada, 731 00:42:00.800 --> 00:42:04.000 where I've spent a lot of my career doing this 732 00:42:04.079 --> 00:42:06.159 research than we used to. It's just like the kinds 733 00:42:06.159 --> 00:42:08.320 of fires are different, the kinds of trees are different. 734 00:42:08.360 --> 00:42:12.360 We have a lot more smaller trees and medium sized trees, 735 00:42:12.360 --> 00:42:15.079 and a lot fewer of those really giant old trees, 736 00:42:15.119 --> 00:42:17.880 which are really kind of an endangered species sort of 737 00:42:18.360 --> 00:42:21.360 in and of themselves. Because over the past one hundred 738 00:42:21.480 --> 00:42:25.280 years or so, particularly pre nineteen eighties, there was quite 739 00:42:25.280 --> 00:42:27.719 a bit of large tree logging going all the way 740 00:42:27.719 --> 00:42:30.440 back to the early nineteen hundreds and late eighteen hundreds, 741 00:42:30.840 --> 00:42:32.719 so a lot of those big old trees were removed, 742 00:42:32.840 --> 00:42:34.760 a lot of those smaller trees grew up with that 743 00:42:34.840 --> 00:42:37.760 fire suppression, and now we just have a ton of 744 00:42:38.239 --> 00:42:41.599 smaller trees on the landscape. And that again is kind 745 00:42:41.599 --> 00:42:44.119 of feeding back into why we have fires that are 746 00:42:44.119 --> 00:42:48.360 burning differently because these fires are burning through you know, 747 00:42:48.440 --> 00:42:54.880 these pretty thick, connected, like well connected forests that historically 748 00:42:54.960 --> 00:42:56.239 just didn't look like that at all. 749 00:42:56.480 --> 00:43:00.239 So forests look and behave much differently now, and they 750 00:43:00.280 --> 00:43:04.119 were for tens of thousands of years because of colonial 751 00:43:04.280 --> 00:43:07.880 human tinkering. Don't you want to know all about indigenous fires, 752 00:43:07.920 --> 00:43:11.679 stewardship now and cultural burns? So do I? And did 753 00:43:11.719 --> 00:43:15.400 I hours before this podcast episode on up decide to 754 00:43:15.519 --> 00:43:18.719 feverishly book an indigenous fire scientist to talk to me 755 00:43:18.760 --> 00:43:21.360 for next week. I did, so stay tuned. I just 756 00:43:21.400 --> 00:43:25.559 thought i'd plant that expectation for you. And what about 757 00:43:25.719 --> 00:43:30.639 the effect of fire on seeds opening and certain plants 758 00:43:30.639 --> 00:43:33.360 saying like sweet, there was just a fire, now's my 759 00:43:33.440 --> 00:43:36.199 time to shine like our ash is good for certain 760 00:43:36.280 --> 00:43:37.480 types of botany. 761 00:43:37.920 --> 00:43:41.159 So okay, One of my colleagues, Jens Stevens, he's with 762 00:43:41.159 --> 00:43:43.079 the Forest Service as well. Now he's done some really 763 00:43:43.159 --> 00:43:46.639 awesome work looking at tree adaptations to fire and fire regimes. 764 00:43:46.920 --> 00:43:50.360 But one of the most common examples of how trees 765 00:43:50.400 --> 00:43:54.079 are adapted to fire is, particularly when thinking about seeds, 766 00:43:54.159 --> 00:43:58.280 is seroteny as E R O T I N. Why so, 767 00:43:58.480 --> 00:44:03.480 seroteny is this trait that some trees have, not not 768 00:44:03.559 --> 00:44:06.960 all trees, but some trees have this basically waxy kind 769 00:44:07.000 --> 00:44:11.760 of resin that encompasses their cones and their seeds, and 770 00:44:12.280 --> 00:44:16.239 they only open when fires burn because the fire melts 771 00:44:16.280 --> 00:44:20.159 that wax off of their seeds and the seeds drop 772 00:44:20.280 --> 00:44:23.840 and then the trees able to regenerate and typically it 773 00:44:23.880 --> 00:44:27.039 releases in many cases. In some cases that I know of, 774 00:44:27.519 --> 00:44:30.840 those trees require a really severe fire to release its seed. 775 00:44:31.119 --> 00:44:35.039 Okay, So serotenus means later or following, and it is 776 00:44:35.079 --> 00:44:38.119 not to be confused with certolene, which is the generic 777 00:44:38.199 --> 00:44:41.840 form of zoloft, which I googled wrong. So according to 778 00:44:42.320 --> 00:44:47.719 Nationalforest dot Org, serotenous cones with full mature seeds can 779 00:44:47.840 --> 00:44:51.159 just chill out closed up on a pine tree like 780 00:44:51.199 --> 00:44:55.159 a jackpine or a table mountain pine for years until 781 00:44:55.199 --> 00:44:58.400 a fire sweeps through and the resin melts and then 782 00:44:58.440 --> 00:45:01.920 the seed confetti party time happens. So this is also 783 00:45:02.400 --> 00:45:06.920 side note how indoor fire sprinklers work. They're not reliant 784 00:45:06.960 --> 00:45:10.320 on smoke, but on heat of over one hundred and 785 00:45:10.360 --> 00:45:13.440 fifty degrees fahrenheit. So there's a little glass capsule in 786 00:45:13.480 --> 00:45:16.840 fire sprinklers and it's filled with glycerine, and that heats 787 00:45:16.960 --> 00:45:21.079 up and bursts and opens the sprinkler valve. And apparently 788 00:45:21.280 --> 00:45:25.159 they open individually wherever it's hottest, not all at once 789 00:45:25.199 --> 00:45:27.679 like in the movies. I'm looking at you, Lethal Weapon four, 790 00:45:28.280 --> 00:45:31.280 The Incredibles and Charlie's Angels and Mean Girls and Casino 791 00:45:31.360 --> 00:45:34.039 Royal and Kindergarten Cop and the Peanuts movie and all 792 00:45:34.079 --> 00:45:35.719 the other ones. And I'm going to link on my 793 00:45:35.760 --> 00:45:38.960 website because I found someone with a YouTube channel who 794 00:45:39.000 --> 00:45:43.199 is very pissed about the sprinkler myth. Anyway, heat seeds disperse, 795 00:45:43.480 --> 00:45:44.599 it's natural, and. 796 00:45:44.599 --> 00:45:48.800 So some trees have adapted that that trait, and in 797 00:45:49.840 --> 00:45:52.920 other cases trees have really thick bark. And this is 798 00:45:53.000 --> 00:45:55.639 the case for many of the trees and these frequent 799 00:45:55.679 --> 00:45:59.599 fire systems that experience fires all the time. On a 800 00:45:59.639 --> 00:46:03.679 five and your cycle or in that range, trees have 801 00:46:03.760 --> 00:46:07.679 really thick bark because they need to survive that frequent 802 00:46:07.880 --> 00:46:12.719 heat and disturbance from fire. And so there's really remarkable 803 00:46:12.920 --> 00:46:17.719 adaptations that plants have to fire. And also increasingly we're 804 00:46:17.800 --> 00:46:21.599 trying to learn about animal adaptations to fire. Typically we 805 00:46:21.599 --> 00:46:25.599 think about these in terms of behavioral adaptations. So how 806 00:46:25.599 --> 00:46:28.960 do animals interact with either fire itself or the post 807 00:46:29.000 --> 00:46:31.960 fire landscape in a way that tells us a little 808 00:46:32.000 --> 00:46:34.599 bit about it? Kind of opens the book on their evolution, 809 00:46:34.719 --> 00:46:35.519 how they evolved. 810 00:46:35.880 --> 00:46:38.440 So what are the spoty owls like? It turns out 811 00:46:38.679 --> 00:46:42.800 small patches of high intensity fires, which were more common 812 00:46:42.880 --> 00:46:46.800 in pre colonial times. Spoty owls are like me at 813 00:46:46.840 --> 00:46:49.920 a cocktail party, just waiting for a tray of egg 814 00:46:49.920 --> 00:46:53.079 girls to roll past. Now, in scientific terms, this is 815 00:46:53.079 --> 00:46:54.800 called a sit and wait predator. 816 00:46:55.199 --> 00:46:57.480 And the owls like to sit on the edge, on 817 00:46:57.559 --> 00:47:01.639 that green edge and hunt into that smaller patch of 818 00:47:02.039 --> 00:47:05.000 open forest where I can see little you know, critters 819 00:47:05.079 --> 00:47:07.800 run across, and it has a better flight path and 820 00:47:07.840 --> 00:47:11.119 that sort of thing, while also concealing itself from its predator, 821 00:47:11.199 --> 00:47:13.960 like the great horned owl. So that's just one example 822 00:47:14.000 --> 00:47:17.239 that I've been involved in. But we generally expect, you know, 823 00:47:17.360 --> 00:47:20.840 not only plants to have these adaptations, but also animals 824 00:47:20.920 --> 00:47:23.440 to potentially have these behavioral adaptations too. 825 00:47:23.760 --> 00:47:24.039 M h. 826 00:47:24.880 --> 00:47:25.719 That's so interesting. 827 00:47:25.760 --> 00:47:28.679 Also, I didn't realize that owls had drama between them. 828 00:47:28.920 --> 00:47:30.440 He would think they'd be like, I'm an l you're 829 00:47:30.480 --> 00:47:32.519 an owl. Let's make this happen, you know. 830 00:47:32.679 --> 00:47:35.360 No, it's it's so true. There is totally drama. And 831 00:47:35.639 --> 00:47:39.119 one of my mentors and colleagues's name is Rocky Gutierrez. 832 00:47:39.440 --> 00:47:42.039 He's done some work looking at owl communities and trying 833 00:47:42.079 --> 00:47:44.960 to figure out like how owls can coexist in space. 834 00:47:45.280 --> 00:47:47.840 There's a lot of drama out there in the in the. 835 00:47:47.519 --> 00:47:48.239 Hour so much. 836 00:47:49.440 --> 00:47:54.280 Speaking of drama, have you seen the acclaimed dramatic film 837 00:47:54.559 --> 00:47:58.039 Those Who Wished Me Dead starring Angelinisholei, who as a 838 00:47:58.079 --> 00:47:59.440 person who lives in a fire tower. 839 00:48:00.119 --> 00:48:00.719 No, I have not. 840 00:48:03.639 --> 00:48:09.039 If you like fires and people being miscast, you will 841 00:48:09.079 --> 00:48:10.960 love Those Who Wish Me Dead. 842 00:48:11.400 --> 00:48:14.159 That's that's my main genre of movie that I like, 843 00:48:14.440 --> 00:48:16.480 wonderful miscasting. Yeah, that's great. 844 00:48:16.639 --> 00:48:18.559 If you like to watch a movie in the entire 845 00:48:18.639 --> 00:48:21.519 time picture someone else playing the lead role, you will 846 00:48:21.559 --> 00:48:25.320 love those who Wish Me Dead? She is absolutely gorgeous. 847 00:48:25.440 --> 00:48:27.719 She's a stunner. I love her acting. I don't know 848 00:48:27.800 --> 00:48:30.199 why they cast her this movie. It seemed so weird. 849 00:48:30.480 --> 00:48:31.920 Why they put you in a fire tower? 850 00:48:33.519 --> 00:48:35.159 Well I'm just lucky, I guess. 851 00:48:35.559 --> 00:48:38.320 Anyway, Those who Wish Me Dead just so much, so 852 00:48:38.440 --> 00:48:41.239 much forest fire and a lot of just breathing through 853 00:48:41.280 --> 00:48:43.000 smoke that seems like it should be thicker. 854 00:48:43.079 --> 00:48:46.039 But you can just you can smell this movie. 855 00:48:46.320 --> 00:48:49.079 Listen. There are a lot of actors that are suited 856 00:48:49.159 --> 00:48:52.840 for certain types of cinematic environments. Okay, Oh, but if 857 00:48:52.880 --> 00:48:55.280 you watch it, Medina Sanghor is so good in it 858 00:48:55.519 --> 00:48:57.199 that I just looked up her name and then I 859 00:48:57.239 --> 00:49:01.119 followed her on Instagram. So some beautiful creature are more 860 00:49:01.199 --> 00:49:04.760 well suited to some roles and environments. That's all. 861 00:49:05.199 --> 00:49:09.800 What about the term pyro diversity? Is that a really Oh? 862 00:49:09.840 --> 00:49:12.639 Ali, I'm so glad you asked that question. I am 863 00:49:12.679 --> 00:49:18.159 street smart and book smart. Yes, so pyrodiversity is something 864 00:49:18.199 --> 00:49:20.360 that I've been spending a lot of time thinking about 865 00:49:20.599 --> 00:49:23.000 in recent years. It's kind of a fun buzzword, you know, 866 00:49:23.199 --> 00:49:25.679 like pyro diversity, Like what does that even mean? Someone 867 00:49:25.679 --> 00:49:27.599 made that up, and it's probably because well, somebody did 868 00:49:27.599 --> 00:49:29.920 make it up. It basically is another way to think 869 00:49:29.960 --> 00:49:34.320 about this fire mosaic that we were talking about earlier. 870 00:49:34.440 --> 00:49:39.360 The term pyrodiversity sort of emerged alongside this idea that 871 00:49:39.599 --> 00:49:46.840 pyro diversity gives rise to biodiversity. So basically that the 872 00:49:46.960 --> 00:49:50.280 more different kinds of fire that we have on the landscape, 873 00:49:50.320 --> 00:49:55.360 the more different kinds of severities, the different fire ages. Basically, 874 00:49:55.360 --> 00:50:00.480 the greater mixture of different types of fire characteristics that 875 00:50:00.519 --> 00:50:05.920 are in a landscape is going to lead to greater biodiversity, 876 00:50:05.960 --> 00:50:09.480 which means more species basically, so you have more kinds 877 00:50:09.480 --> 00:50:12.559 of wildlife, more kinds of plants, et cetera, more kinds 878 00:50:12.559 --> 00:50:15.239 of bees, more kinds of bats, more kinds of birds, 879 00:50:15.280 --> 00:50:19.000 et cetera, because you have all sorts of different kinds 880 00:50:19.039 --> 00:50:21.559 of habitat for them that's been produced by fire. 881 00:50:21.960 --> 00:50:24.079 Ah Okay, that makes sense. 882 00:50:24.480 --> 00:50:28.760 Yeah, yeah, So it's it's an important idea because it 883 00:50:28.760 --> 00:50:32.320 it really kind of underlies this important role of fire 884 00:50:32.599 --> 00:50:34.840 in these cases with you know, the Dixie Fire and 885 00:50:34.880 --> 00:50:38.880 the Bootleg fire, these fires that are really like destructive 886 00:50:39.000 --> 00:50:42.679 to human infrastructure and also you know, to people's lives. 887 00:50:43.119 --> 00:50:46.599 I mean, this is really serious stuff that is sad 888 00:50:46.679 --> 00:50:49.440 and it's hard to watch. But on the other side 889 00:50:49.440 --> 00:50:52.159 of the coin, we do need fire on the landscape, 890 00:50:52.239 --> 00:50:54.519 right We just we need a different kind of fire. 891 00:50:54.599 --> 00:50:56.480 We don't want to see more, you know, of the 892 00:50:56.559 --> 00:50:59.320 destructive fires that are out there. We want to see 893 00:50:59.440 --> 00:51:01.519 good fire. And what I mean by good fire is 894 00:51:01.559 --> 00:51:04.840 really kind of like this pyro diversity idea, where we 895 00:51:04.920 --> 00:51:09.960 have a really nice mixture of fire that kind of restores, 896 00:51:10.119 --> 00:51:13.760 It cleans out the understory in some places, it kills 897 00:51:13.800 --> 00:51:16.480 some trees, It disrupts the system a little bit. You know, 898 00:51:16.559 --> 00:51:21.239 some disruption is good, and you create that really sort 899 00:51:21.280 --> 00:51:27.239 of wide ranging variety of habitats for different critters to live, 900 00:51:27.719 --> 00:51:30.559 and that also supports all sorts of other great things 901 00:51:30.639 --> 00:51:34.360 like water quantity and quality. It reduces a runoff, It 902 00:51:34.480 --> 00:51:39.639 reinforces the resilience of ecosystems and forests. So like, fire 903 00:51:39.760 --> 00:51:42.880 is so good, and it's like, we want that good 904 00:51:42.960 --> 00:51:45.840 kind of fire. It's really such a restorative thing. And 905 00:51:46.039 --> 00:51:50.280 it's just pyro diversity kind of encompasses this idea of 906 00:51:51.159 --> 00:51:55.280 like that beautiful mosaic on the landscape that is always changing. 907 00:51:55.320 --> 00:51:59.360 It's not just static. It's always changing, always being renewed. 908 00:51:59.519 --> 00:52:01.559 That's the idea of pyrodiversity. 909 00:52:02.280 --> 00:52:07.840 Huh can I blaze through a lightning round? 910 00:52:08.400 --> 00:52:08.719 Yes? 911 00:52:08.960 --> 00:52:14.559 Part in the pun, even though I'm not sorry, okay. 912 00:52:14.280 --> 00:52:17.280 And before your questions. We donate to a cause each episode, 913 00:52:17.400 --> 00:52:20.880 and as a forest Service employee, Gavin can't directly endorse 914 00:52:21.239 --> 00:52:24.440 anything in particular, so it was my pick this week 915 00:52:24.519 --> 00:52:26.760 and a donation will be going to the Common Good 916 00:52:26.800 --> 00:52:30.599 Community Foundation. They have established a matching fund to assist 917 00:52:30.719 --> 00:52:33.840 all local communities impacted by the Dixie Fire, and all 918 00:52:33.840 --> 00:52:37.519 donations will be distributed to Plumous County agencies involved in 919 00:52:38.079 --> 00:52:41.480 directly assisting communities and individuals most affected by the fire. 920 00:52:41.840 --> 00:52:44.960 More info is up at common Goood Plumas dot org 921 00:52:45.159 --> 00:52:48.280 and that donation was made possible by sponsors of the show. 922 00:52:49.400 --> 00:52:52.159 Do you know what real power is? 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Every 953 00:54:15.320 --> 00:54:18.360 little helps available in most stories, prices varying express. 954 00:54:20.239 --> 00:54:25.519 Okay, let's tend to your smoldering curiosities. Great question from 955 00:54:25.639 --> 00:54:30.039 Nicole d g Marie Charlotte Falcacard, Meghan McLean, Daniel Kim, 956 00:54:30.199 --> 00:54:35.159 Liz Gross, Eden, Sunshine, Talia Dunyak. Nicole Kleiman also asked, 957 00:54:36.360 --> 00:54:40.639 in Nicole's words, what happens to wildlife when there's a fire? 958 00:54:41.920 --> 00:54:44.000 Daniel Kim wants to know are there any animals that 959 00:54:44.039 --> 00:54:47.840 have adapted to survive forest fires? And Nicole asks do 960 00:54:47.960 --> 00:54:50.719 they all leave? Or are some able to hide or 961 00:54:50.760 --> 00:54:52.280 survive in a sneaky way? 962 00:54:54.360 --> 00:54:56.920 Oh that's so great. That's a great question. So I 963 00:54:56.960 --> 00:54:59.199 don't know if I can do a super quick answer 964 00:54:59.239 --> 00:55:04.559 to this because too excited about it. But yeah, so 965 00:55:04.599 --> 00:55:07.199 how do wildlife respond to wildfire? So here's the thing. 966 00:55:07.840 --> 00:55:11.119 It really depends and that's like the greatest you know, 967 00:55:11.320 --> 00:55:14.719 scientific smoke and mirrors. Like, hey, it depends, but it 968 00:55:14.719 --> 00:55:19.519 really does. Some species like fire, some don't, And it 969 00:55:19.559 --> 00:55:22.079 also depends on what kind of fire it is, you know, 970 00:55:22.119 --> 00:55:26.719 if it's really severe or mild. So, for example, there's 971 00:55:26.880 --> 00:55:30.719 one species that some of my awesome colleagues have worked on. 972 00:55:31.119 --> 00:55:33.800 It's called the black backed woodpecker. Many people think of 973 00:55:33.840 --> 00:55:37.079 it as a poster child of severely burned forest because 974 00:55:37.119 --> 00:55:42.079 it really needs these patches of totally killed trees. It 975 00:55:42.159 --> 00:55:47.239 depends on the insects that live in those recently killed trees. 976 00:55:47.800 --> 00:55:51.719 It needs those severely burned forests. Several years after those 977 00:55:52.199 --> 00:55:55.039 those fires burn and those trees are killed, it's no 978 00:55:55.079 --> 00:55:57.159 longer good habitat, Like it's really kind of this short 979 00:55:57.239 --> 00:56:01.000 term thing. They flock to these really severely burned places, 980 00:56:01.039 --> 00:56:03.159 they totally thrive, and then they are out of there 981 00:56:03.159 --> 00:56:06.800 and onto the next fire. So some critters love that, 982 00:56:07.159 --> 00:56:09.599 others not so much so. The spotted out all the 983 00:56:09.599 --> 00:56:11.559 species that I spent a lot of time studying, it 984 00:56:11.679 --> 00:56:14.039 is really kind of more of an old forest obligate. 985 00:56:14.039 --> 00:56:17.039 It doesn't love that severely burned stuff quite as much. 986 00:56:17.360 --> 00:56:20.039 So basically there are winners and losers, that's the answer. 987 00:56:20.159 --> 00:56:20.239 Is. 988 00:56:20.360 --> 00:56:22.840 It's never simple. It's never as simple as you make it. 989 00:56:22.840 --> 00:56:24.800 It's not just so all animals are going to die 990 00:56:24.880 --> 00:56:27.159 or leave when a fire burns. No, some of them 991 00:56:27.159 --> 00:56:29.639 are going to do great and some of them are not. 992 00:56:29.920 --> 00:56:32.360 That's like part of the beauty of studying this stuff 993 00:56:32.440 --> 00:56:34.400 is like trying to figure out why why do some 994 00:56:34.480 --> 00:56:36.920 animals love and some don't? The world is so complex 995 00:56:36.960 --> 00:56:39.639 and amazing it's like really fun to try to figure 996 00:56:39.679 --> 00:56:39.960 that out. 997 00:56:40.440 --> 00:56:40.559 Right. 998 00:56:41.639 --> 00:56:44.199 And then in terms of where animals go, some animals 999 00:56:44.199 --> 00:56:47.280 can escape fires, you know, fly out of the way, 1000 00:56:47.400 --> 00:56:49.360 run out of the way. I always think of like 1001 00:56:49.480 --> 00:56:53.400 Bamby movie Bad, Like all the animals are like parading 1002 00:56:53.440 --> 00:56:58.800 out of the forest. I don't want to ruin Bambi 1003 00:56:58.880 --> 00:57:02.760 for anybody's but you know, some animals can be a 1004 00:57:02.800 --> 00:57:07.199 fire even you know, flying critters cannot always fly away 1005 00:57:07.320 --> 00:57:10.440 from fast moving fires. Some animals will burrow under the 1006 00:57:10.480 --> 00:57:12.719 ground and wait for the fire to pass and then 1007 00:57:12.880 --> 00:57:15.239 go back out, which is totally crazy. You should, yeah, 1008 00:57:15.320 --> 00:57:16.719 it's it's nuts. 1009 00:57:17.400 --> 00:57:22.679 Oooh okay, burrowing critters hiding from fires? My heart burst 1010 00:57:22.960 --> 00:57:25.199 into flames. So which animals burrow? 1011 00:57:25.480 --> 00:57:25.599 All? 1012 00:57:25.639 --> 00:57:30.320 Right? Some Australian possums hide out in tree hollows, snakes 1013 00:57:30.679 --> 00:57:34.039 high tail it down a burrow, but wombats also hit 1014 00:57:34.079 --> 00:57:36.960 the basement during bush fires. And there were a bunch 1015 00:57:37.000 --> 00:57:39.960 of internet rumors going around last year that they invite 1016 00:57:40.000 --> 00:57:43.960 and usher other critters in. These rumors spread like wildfire, 1017 00:57:44.280 --> 00:57:47.800 but they are flim flam. They actually just tolerate other 1018 00:57:47.840 --> 00:57:51.880 animals hiding out in their wombat doomsday bunkers. But same 1019 00:57:51.920 --> 00:57:54.280 with gopher tortoises in the US. And to hear all 1020 00:57:54.320 --> 00:57:58.360 about that, you can amble slowly over to the Testudentology 1021 00:57:58.400 --> 00:58:03.360 episode with wonderful tortoise scientists Amanda Hips. Now what about 1022 00:58:03.599 --> 00:58:04.400 rebel birds. 1023 00:58:04.760 --> 00:58:07.679 There are other creatures. There's fire hawks and they're down 1024 00:58:07.679 --> 00:58:11.519 in Australia and they will actually like pick up burning 1025 00:58:11.559 --> 00:58:15.280 branches and drop them to burn other parts of their 1026 00:58:15.320 --> 00:58:17.199 habitat so that they can catch their prey. 1027 00:58:17.639 --> 00:58:23.559 I have heard of these and it sounds so devious. 1028 00:58:23.800 --> 00:58:26.920 But they even will get together and wait for rodents 1029 00:58:26.960 --> 00:58:27.760 to run out. 1030 00:58:28.000 --> 00:58:30.880 That's wild. That's just wild. Yeah, there's winners and losers, 1031 00:58:30.880 --> 00:58:34.440 Like there's such a variety of animals that respond in 1032 00:58:34.480 --> 00:58:37.400 different ways to fire, and that's just the coolest thing. 1033 00:58:37.440 --> 00:58:41.480 And that's that's one of the reasons why pyro diversity, 1034 00:58:41.519 --> 00:58:45.320 going back to pyrodiversity is thought to promote biodiversity because 1035 00:58:45.760 --> 00:58:48.079 the more kind of variety of fire you have, the 1036 00:58:48.119 --> 00:58:50.599 more different kinds of animals that are going to benefit 1037 00:58:50.639 --> 00:58:53.079 from that variety. Right. So, you know, if you have 1038 00:58:53.199 --> 00:58:55.400 sort of your forest that was killed by trees next 1039 00:58:55.400 --> 00:58:58.280 to a forest that is totally green and old and 1040 00:58:58.360 --> 00:59:02.039 you know, decaying almost, we have this big mosaic of 1041 00:59:02.039 --> 00:59:04.960 different kinds of forests that burn at different times. That's 1042 00:59:05.000 --> 00:59:08.119 going to support all kinds of different critters. So it's 1043 00:59:08.119 --> 00:59:08.599 a cool thing. 1044 00:59:08.760 --> 00:59:13.119 Now, that's a good thing. And several people, Rebecca wine Settle, 1045 00:59:13.679 --> 00:59:18.639 India Land, Nicole Kleinman, Jesse Hurlbert want to know, can 1046 00:59:18.760 --> 00:59:21.679 I really prevent forest fires? Rebecca asks, or is this 1047 00:59:21.800 --> 00:59:24.239 just another example of a giant corporation trying to foist 1048 00:59:24.280 --> 00:59:28.639 responsibility on to individuals. Nicole wants to know what smoking 1049 00:59:28.679 --> 00:59:31.320 the bear more helpful or harmful to forests? 1050 00:59:31.679 --> 00:59:34.679 What do you think about smoking the bear? Okay liberty 1051 00:59:34.719 --> 00:59:35.280 to say. 1052 00:59:37.360 --> 00:59:41.000 I think smoky the bear is super cute. I will 1053 00:59:41.039 --> 00:59:45.559 say that we absolutely can prevent forest fires, not all 1054 00:59:45.599 --> 00:59:48.239 of them, and we not necessarily should prevent all of 1055 00:59:48.239 --> 00:59:50.320 them over think about prescribed fires, right, Like, we do 1056 00:59:50.400 --> 00:59:54.000 want to put some fire in the landscape. But as 1057 00:59:54.000 --> 00:59:58.239 I mentioned before, a giant majority, like eighty seven percent, 1058 00:59:58.760 --> 01:00:01.559 between eighty ninety percent, humans cause eighty seven percent of 1059 01:00:01.599 --> 01:00:05.880 all wildfire occurrences annually within the western US. Like, that's crazy, 1060 01:00:06.079 --> 01:00:08.840 that's a big number. Yeah, and a lot of those 1061 01:00:09.159 --> 01:00:11.519 you can go look this up. There's this a couple 1062 01:00:11.559 --> 01:00:15.679 studies out there that have shown, you know, these gigantic 1063 01:00:15.760 --> 01:00:18.639 spikes of fire activity on the fourth of July every year. 1064 01:00:18.760 --> 01:00:20.519 Oh, Like, we. 1065 01:00:20.920 --> 01:00:25.920 Absolutely play a role in ignitions. A very small percentage 1066 01:00:25.960 --> 01:00:28.599 of all of the ignitions result in those really big, 1067 01:00:28.639 --> 01:00:31.559 big fires. Of course, many of the fires that ignite 1068 01:00:31.800 --> 01:00:35.760 don't burn everything up, but we absolutely as people can 1069 01:00:35.800 --> 01:00:38.719 be careful about how we burn. I think that Smoky 1070 01:00:38.760 --> 01:00:43.559 the bear is just misunderstood, Okay, you know, like because 1071 01:00:43.599 --> 01:00:45.920 it's true. You know, we we as people, like, we 1072 01:00:46.280 --> 01:00:50.639 absolutely do start fires. We start unintended, unplanned fires that 1073 01:00:50.679 --> 01:00:55.760 sometimes result in really devastating circumstances. There's sort of this 1074 01:00:55.840 --> 01:00:59.440 perception that all fire is bad among some people. And 1075 01:00:59.480 --> 01:01:01.039 maybe I don't know, I don't know if smoking the 1076 01:01:01.039 --> 01:01:04.039 bears associated with that or not. But you know, all 1077 01:01:04.079 --> 01:01:07.800 fire is not bad, Like fire is so important, and 1078 01:01:07.840 --> 01:01:10.159 the reason why some fire is really bad right now 1079 01:01:10.159 --> 01:01:12.400 and particularly is because we haven't had the kind of 1080 01:01:12.480 --> 01:01:15.039 fire on the landscape that is natural in a lot 1081 01:01:15.039 --> 01:01:15.760 of these systems. 1082 01:01:16.360 --> 01:01:18.920 So a lot of patrons looking at you, Michael Davis, 1083 01:01:19.000 --> 01:01:22.800 Peter Ashley, herbel Sebastian Pepino. First time question asker is 1084 01:01:22.880 --> 01:01:26.679 Karla Jerez and Ada Smith, Schandra Mason, Bennett Gerber. They 1085 01:01:26.719 --> 01:01:28.159 all essentially asked. 1086 01:01:27.960 --> 01:01:29.960 What do we do it? 1087 01:01:30.079 --> 01:01:35.079 Should firefighting teams approach it more strategically, like let it 1088 01:01:35.119 --> 01:01:37.800 burn twenty five miles over here, but let's stop it here, 1089 01:01:37.960 --> 01:01:40.840 or at this point, like what do we even do? 1090 01:01:42.480 --> 01:01:46.239 Yeah, So that is such a difficult and vexing question 1091 01:01:46.800 --> 01:01:49.960 that much smarter people than me are like thinking really 1092 01:01:49.960 --> 01:01:51.719 really hard about. So I don't want to make any 1093 01:01:51.800 --> 01:01:56.519 like really poorly informed statements about how firefighters should be 1094 01:01:56.519 --> 01:01:59.239 doing their job, because they're doing an incredible job. But 1095 01:01:59.559 --> 01:02:03.800 I'll say generally, there's there's many times when fires are 1096 01:02:03.800 --> 01:02:06.920 burning and there's a decision made to let the fire 1097 01:02:06.960 --> 01:02:08.599 burn on its own for a little while when it 1098 01:02:08.639 --> 01:02:12.119 is deemed to be safe. Right, So especially in areas 1099 01:02:12.159 --> 01:02:14.760 where there's not as many people and you know, like 1100 01:02:14.840 --> 01:02:19.559 kind of more wilderness type areas, because fires can do 1101 01:02:19.719 --> 01:02:23.320 some of that work for us, to restore the natural 1102 01:02:23.480 --> 01:02:27.079 structure of a system. So fires can be really restorative, 1103 01:02:27.159 --> 01:02:28.840 especially in those cases when we think it's going to 1104 01:02:28.880 --> 01:02:31.519 burn in a quote unquote healthy way or a natural 1105 01:02:31.559 --> 01:02:35.840 way and there aren't people who are in danger. So 1106 01:02:36.000 --> 01:02:38.360 that's kind of the idea of those managed wildfires. Just 1107 01:02:38.400 --> 01:02:40.079 you know, when wildfires burning, we're kind of trying to 1108 01:02:40.119 --> 01:02:42.480 manage them as opposed to to just put them out 1109 01:02:42.559 --> 01:02:44.320 or suppress them. 1110 01:02:44.320 --> 01:02:49.800 And from smoky the bear, let's move on to goats. 1111 01:02:50.239 --> 01:02:59.079 Ashley Nton and Leanne Schuster literally both started their questions goats, 1112 01:02:59.480 --> 01:03:02.079 both of them please tell us about how goats are 1113 01:03:02.199 --> 01:03:06.119 used to help produce fire risk in areas with excess vegetation, 1114 01:03:06.679 --> 01:03:09.239 And Ashley says, I mean a few hours and they 1115 01:03:09.400 --> 01:03:11.119 chewed down most of the pasture. 1116 01:03:11.719 --> 01:03:15.280 Can goats save us? Man? 1117 01:03:15.360 --> 01:03:17.599 I wish goats could just save us. That would be 1118 01:03:17.599 --> 01:03:20.480 so great. Just hand it all over to them. Yeah, 1119 01:03:20.559 --> 01:03:22.719 I'm sure they've they've got it figured out. No, but 1120 01:03:23.480 --> 01:03:27.960 I actually don't know about goats being used in wildfire management. 1121 01:03:28.079 --> 01:03:31.840 That could just be my naivity, so I'll pump that one. 1122 01:03:31.800 --> 01:03:33.199 Okay, all right? 1123 01:03:33.400 --> 01:03:36.880 Goats. I tried to rent some for my hillside about 1124 01:03:36.880 --> 01:03:39.679 two years ago, and it was a minimum, sadly of 1125 01:03:39.760 --> 01:03:42.440 five acres and I just moved in and it was 1126 01:03:42.480 --> 01:03:44.960 too soon to ask my neighbors if they wanted to 1127 01:03:45.000 --> 01:03:46.880 go in on a goat hert with me. I didn't 1128 01:03:46.880 --> 01:03:50.239 want to come on so strong. But there are businesses 1129 01:03:50.280 --> 01:03:54.079 like goatsarus dot com that'll rent them out. I thought 1130 01:03:54.079 --> 01:03:57.679 this was a pretty common practice, hiring goats to eat 1131 01:03:57.800 --> 01:04:00.400 your overgrown grass, because when I was in high school 1132 01:04:00.400 --> 01:04:03.480 in northern California, a lot of neighbors did that. And 1133 01:04:03.519 --> 01:04:07.159 then I read the faq on goats rs dot com 1134 01:04:07.239 --> 01:04:11.280 and what this business started in the tiny town I 1135 01:04:11.320 --> 01:04:13.719 went to high school in around the time I was 1136 01:04:13.719 --> 01:04:18.079 in high school. Holy literal smokes. As far as coincidences go, 1137 01:04:18.880 --> 01:04:21.599 it's the greatest of all time. Okay, So this next 1138 01:04:21.920 --> 01:04:25.320 smokey query was asked by plenty of folks, including patrons 1139 01:04:25.360 --> 01:04:30.760 Hannah Aussi, Alana wood firefighter supporter, Lousey Martinez, Charlie Cacamo. 1140 01:04:30.880 --> 01:04:34.920 First time question asker, Ashley Martinez, Nina eve Zeininger asthmetic 1141 01:04:35.039 --> 01:04:38.800 Ada Smith, Joseph and Katie Coast. 1142 01:04:39.480 --> 01:04:40.119 Let's see. 1143 01:04:41.159 --> 01:04:44.320 Dylan McGuire says, I live in eastern Washington where smoke 1144 01:04:44.519 --> 01:04:47.480 has become the fifth season. When will we have the 1145 01:04:47.559 --> 01:04:50.519 giant forest rakes mentioned by Donald Trump? 1146 01:04:51.079 --> 01:04:51.800 And they spent a. 1147 01:04:51.719 --> 01:04:55.280 Lot of time on breaking and cleaning and doing things. 1148 01:04:55.000 --> 01:04:57.320 And do we need to rake the forest? 1149 01:04:58.599 --> 01:05:02.559 So you know this this is I think again, this 1150 01:05:02.639 --> 01:05:07.000 is this is just a misunderstanding. So going back to smoke, 1151 01:05:07.199 --> 01:05:09.920 this is a real problem. Right. We don't like being 1152 01:05:09.920 --> 01:05:12.320 exposed to smoke. You remember, I'm sure I don't know Ali, 1153 01:05:12.360 --> 01:05:13.840 if this happened where you were. I think this was 1154 01:05:13.920 --> 01:05:16.960 up in the in the Bay Area. Yeah, last year 1155 01:05:17.000 --> 01:05:19.000 you probably remember seeing all of our social media those 1156 01:05:19.039 --> 01:05:21.760 pictures of you know, San Francisco being just like Orange 1157 01:05:21.840 --> 01:05:25.079 is like some blade runner or something. The problem with 1158 01:05:25.159 --> 01:05:28.119 smoke is that you know it's going to be there, 1159 01:05:28.239 --> 01:05:30.320 It's going to happen. If we're living in a in 1160 01:05:30.360 --> 01:05:33.280 a system that has fire, and that where we need 1161 01:05:33.320 --> 01:05:36.639 to have fire, we're going to also have smoke. That's 1162 01:05:36.719 --> 01:05:38.880 that's just a part of a part of it, right, 1163 01:05:39.559 --> 01:05:42.840 Where there's fire, there's smoke. The real important question is 1164 01:05:43.840 --> 01:05:48.960 how do we want our smoke? You know, And and 1165 01:05:49.000 --> 01:05:51.079 that's that's how some people are trying to think about 1166 01:05:51.079 --> 01:05:54.119 this problem of smoke, because it is a real serious 1167 01:05:54.119 --> 01:05:57.639 public health problem, right with these sort of unplanned big 1168 01:05:57.760 --> 01:06:00.599 quote unquote mega fires that happen all of a sudden, 1169 01:06:00.639 --> 01:06:02.880 get a ton of smoke we didn't know it was coming. 1170 01:06:03.000 --> 01:06:06.360 It disrupts our lives and puts us at risk. And 1171 01:06:06.400 --> 01:06:08.599 there's a lot of smoke right that happens. Just this 1172 01:06:08.679 --> 01:06:12.039 past week or two, I saw people on Twitter, you know, 1173 01:06:12.119 --> 01:06:14.800 out on the East coast saying that they had, you know, 1174 01:06:15.000 --> 01:06:17.119 they were getting some smoke from some of the wildfires 1175 01:06:17.119 --> 01:06:23.320 in the West. That kind of unpredictable nature is I 1176 01:06:23.360 --> 01:06:27.400 think for many people not desirable, Okay, And so the 1177 01:06:27.480 --> 01:06:33.519 idea is if we can use more prescribed and planned fires, 1178 01:06:34.239 --> 01:06:37.480 and more cultural and indigenous fires where we know when 1179 01:06:37.480 --> 01:06:39.960 the smoke is coming, it's a lower amount. It's like, 1180 01:06:40.039 --> 01:06:41.880 you know, less smoke in general is come in our 1181 01:06:41.920 --> 01:06:44.960 way at any given time, but maybe a little more often. 1182 01:06:46.400 --> 01:06:48.320 You know, those are kind of the two options, right 1183 01:06:48.360 --> 01:06:51.920 We can either sort of have our smoke in big 1184 01:06:51.960 --> 01:06:55.039 pulses when we don't know it's coming, or we can 1185 01:06:55.639 --> 01:06:57.079 try to make it a little more predictable. 1186 01:06:57.320 --> 01:07:01.360 It seems like the whares and the why are important here. 1187 01:07:01.920 --> 01:07:03.679 That's exactly right for sure. 1188 01:07:04.239 --> 01:07:09.719 Yes, what about Maria Shuavleva wants to know underground wildfires? 1189 01:07:09.840 --> 01:07:12.239 I understand how they start, but how do they keep going? 1190 01:07:12.480 --> 01:07:15.239 How is there enough oxygen for some to last for years? 1191 01:07:15.280 --> 01:07:19.039 How deep do they go? Jeremiah Miller says, what's the 1192 01:07:19.079 --> 01:07:20.760 strangest place there's been a wildfire? 1193 01:07:21.320 --> 01:07:22.360 They're underground? 1194 01:07:24.280 --> 01:07:27.639 Some Yeah, some fires do burn underground. It's kind of crazy. 1195 01:07:27.679 --> 01:07:32.639 Who So. One of the interesting kind of related phenomenon 1196 01:07:32.679 --> 01:07:36.679 that I've witnessed is sometimes in these areas that have 1197 01:07:36.760 --> 01:07:41.360 recently burned, you come across a gigantic hole in the ground, 1198 01:07:42.119 --> 01:07:45.119 like just a giant hole. There's no tree, there's trees 1199 01:07:45.159 --> 01:07:46.840 around you, and then there's just a gigantic hole in 1200 01:07:46.840 --> 01:07:49.719 the ground. Okay, when I started doing this work in 1201 01:07:50.079 --> 01:07:52.280 these post fire landscapes, I was like, what in the 1202 01:07:52.320 --> 01:07:55.320 heck is going on here? And I started asking around, 1203 01:07:55.360 --> 01:08:00.000 and these are basically trees that have burned and kept 1204 01:08:00.079 --> 01:08:04.639 burning and smoldering and smoldering and the smoldering fire continued 1205 01:08:04.679 --> 01:08:09.320 down through their root system underground, throughout the whole root system, 1206 01:08:09.320 --> 01:08:11.400 and maybe they'll they'll even pop up somewhere else, like 1207 01:08:11.480 --> 01:08:13.559 you know, a little ways away where the root kind 1208 01:08:13.559 --> 01:08:16.800 of pops back up onto the ground. And basically these 1209 01:08:17.159 --> 01:08:21.439 are like gigantic casts for trees, right like where the 1210 01:08:21.479 --> 01:08:24.119 tree and its roots used to be. So fires can 1211 01:08:24.239 --> 01:08:28.800 absolutely burn, you know, in a subterranean way. I've seen 1212 01:08:28.840 --> 01:08:32.680 some of these sort of root holes following fire, which 1213 01:08:32.680 --> 01:08:35.279 is just kind of wild to see. 1214 01:08:35.720 --> 01:08:37.560 It is wild to see, and I know because I 1215 01:08:37.600 --> 01:08:42.079 just watched a ton of videos of smoldering, flickering root systems. 1216 01:08:42.359 --> 01:08:45.680 They can burn for weeks, months, maybe even through a 1217 01:08:45.720 --> 01:08:50.479 whole season, and the fire will just pop up somewhere else. Also, 1218 01:08:50.920 --> 01:08:55.479 somewhere in Pennsylvania, there is an abandoned Centralia coal mine 1219 01:08:55.560 --> 01:09:00.279 that's been on fire since nineteen sixty two X. Let's 1220 01:09:00.319 --> 01:09:02.960 say there was enough fuel to just keep it burning 1221 01:09:03.319 --> 01:09:05.840 for two hundred and fifty years. No one knows what 1222 01:09:05.920 --> 01:09:08.159 to do. They just all left town except for five 1223 01:09:08.199 --> 01:09:10.800 people who still live there. They're like, we're not going anywhere, 1224 01:09:10.800 --> 01:09:18.239 Like that's cool, But yes, fires, underground flames flames, breathing, heaving. 1225 01:09:19.319 --> 01:09:22.560 Oh man, I didn't even know that was possible. 1226 01:09:23.159 --> 01:09:27.159 I would not have thought that that is bananas ough. 1227 01:09:27.560 --> 01:09:31.439 Some of y'all patrons, Lizzy mar bushfire asker, Brandy Harbaugh, 1228 01:09:31.600 --> 01:09:35.520 first time question asker, longtime lurker, Adriana Alfaro, and want 1229 01:09:35.560 --> 01:09:38.359 to know what can we expect the normal amount of 1230 01:09:38.479 --> 01:09:41.600 wildfires to be? Is there a normal? They all want 1231 01:09:41.600 --> 01:09:45.520 to know numerically, how much worse are big wildfires gonna get? 1232 01:09:45.600 --> 01:09:47.119 Give us numbers. We need numbers. 1233 01:09:47.520 --> 01:09:50.640 So you know, if you look at how fires have 1234 01:09:50.760 --> 01:09:54.159 changed in the last thirty forty years, we have seen 1235 01:09:54.199 --> 01:09:57.720 a lot more fire activity now than we did ten, fifteen, 1236 01:09:57.800 --> 01:10:02.359 twenty years ago, forty years ago. So one of my 1237 01:10:02.479 --> 01:10:04.680 colleagues I just mentioned a moment ago, is named Sean 1238 01:10:04.800 --> 01:10:07.600 Parks with US for a service and one of his colleagues, 1239 01:10:07.760 --> 01:10:11.159 they put out a study recently showing that between nineteen 1240 01:10:11.159 --> 01:10:15.680 eighty five and twenty seventeen there was an eight fold 1241 01:10:16.239 --> 01:10:19.880 increase in area that burned at high severity on an 1242 01:10:19.880 --> 01:10:25.119 annual basis in the western US. Eight So there is 1243 01:10:25.239 --> 01:10:30.079 certainly a lot more large fires now, and there's also 1244 01:10:30.399 --> 01:10:32.920 when those those fires are burning more severely now than 1245 01:10:32.960 --> 01:10:35.479 they did thirty five or so years ago, thirty five 1246 01:10:35.520 --> 01:10:39.279 forty years ago. But that's like the sort of small 1247 01:10:39.319 --> 01:10:42.720 scale context. But then if you zoom back out and 1248 01:10:42.760 --> 01:10:44.880 look at sort of the whole context of the last 1249 01:10:44.880 --> 01:10:48.840 several thousand years, we are seeing less fire now than 1250 01:10:48.880 --> 01:10:51.439 we did way back when it's a different kind of 1251 01:10:51.439 --> 01:10:54.159 fire that's burning, right, that's not necessarily natural in some 1252 01:10:54.239 --> 01:10:56.920 of these systems. And then also we are we are 1253 01:10:57.039 --> 01:11:00.239 experiencing more of the effects of fire than we ever 1254 01:11:00.319 --> 01:11:03.039 have as humans, and the negative effects because we're living 1255 01:11:03.079 --> 01:11:05.720 in these fire prone areas where for a long time, 1256 01:11:05.760 --> 01:11:08.359 it was you know, somewhat safe to live, right because 1257 01:11:08.800 --> 01:11:12.279 fires weren't burning that much for the last hundred years 1258 01:11:12.359 --> 01:11:14.760 in a lot of these areas because you're pretty good 1259 01:11:14.760 --> 01:11:17.680 at putting them out. But now that those fires are 1260 01:11:18.000 --> 01:11:20.960 burning more severely and more intensely and we're living there 1261 01:11:21.399 --> 01:11:24.000 and we have the news to cover it all the time, yeah, 1262 01:11:24.000 --> 01:11:26.800 we certainly are hearing about it more, right, and it 1263 01:11:26.880 --> 01:11:29.199 is having a serious impact on people, as you know, 1264 01:11:29.239 --> 01:11:32.279 you know, there's all sorts of really tragic stories of 1265 01:11:32.319 --> 01:11:34.880 these fires burning through towns. In one of those towns 1266 01:11:34.920 --> 01:11:38.079 just you know, the Dixie Fire I believe, burned through Greenville, California, 1267 01:11:38.159 --> 01:11:40.000 in the last day or two. And that's an incredibly 1268 01:11:40.000 --> 01:11:43.000 tragic thing to have happened. And right like we are, 1269 01:11:43.640 --> 01:11:45.920 we are living in a world that's really different. 1270 01:11:45.680 --> 01:11:48.760 Now, right, I know, it's kind of like top of 1271 01:11:48.840 --> 01:11:50.880 mind for everyone. I feel like when you say, oh, 1272 01:11:50.920 --> 01:11:53.800 I live in California, people ask you, like, is your 1273 01:11:53.840 --> 01:11:54.560 sitting on fire? 1274 01:11:54.640 --> 01:11:56.600 And you're like, I don't know, let me check Twitter. 1275 01:11:57.079 --> 01:11:59.199 I just texted one of my friends who lives in 1276 01:11:59.199 --> 01:12:01.479 California be like, are you guys, where are you? Are 1277 01:12:01.520 --> 01:12:02.600 you okay? Are you burning? 1278 01:12:02.720 --> 01:12:02.920 Yeah? 1279 01:12:03.000 --> 01:12:06.680 So yeah, literally, b BITPB like this just in. According 1280 01:12:06.720 --> 01:12:09.479 to an NPR report that dropped about an hour ago, 1281 01:12:09.840 --> 01:12:13.000 the US Four Service just announced that wildfires will be 1282 01:12:13.159 --> 01:12:17.840 aggressively extinguished this summer and all the preventative controlled burns 1283 01:12:18.159 --> 01:12:21.439 are suspended. Apparently fire season is predicted to be so 1284 01:12:21.600 --> 01:12:25.119 bad they can't spare any of the thousands of firefighters 1285 01:12:25.159 --> 01:12:28.159 on the ground to go do prescribed burns. Kind of 1286 01:12:28.199 --> 01:12:30.439 like not being able to go to bed because you 1287 01:12:30.479 --> 01:12:32.840 have a paper due, but then you can't finish the 1288 01:12:32.880 --> 01:12:36.039 paper because you're too tired. Something's got to change. Tune 1289 01:12:36.039 --> 01:12:38.239 in next week for more on that. Now, on the 1290 01:12:38.279 --> 01:12:43.560 topic of heavy hearts amid blazing wildfires, is there anything 1291 01:12:44.079 --> 01:12:49.600 that is the most difficult thing about being a fire ecologist. 1292 01:12:49.920 --> 01:12:52.079 I mean, I already the idea of like a charred 1293 01:12:52.159 --> 01:12:55.600 owl leg is going to hurt my heart until the 1294 01:12:55.680 --> 01:12:56.239 day I die. 1295 01:12:56.399 --> 01:13:00.800 But anything that is just really frustrating or difficult for you, hm. 1296 01:13:01.880 --> 01:13:06.760 I would say that one of the frustrating things is 1297 01:13:06.760 --> 01:13:09.960 just how difficult this problem is. It's it's just such 1298 01:13:10.000 --> 01:13:14.119 a big problem, and sometimes it's hard to sort of 1299 01:13:14.319 --> 01:13:17.039 feel like we can get out of it. I'm I 1300 01:13:17.159 --> 01:13:19.960 like to call myself a reckless optimist. I don't think, 1301 01:13:20.479 --> 01:13:22.840 you know, for me, like the glass is not half full, 1302 01:13:22.880 --> 01:13:24.920 it's like, oh my god, it's almost overflowing. It's like, 1303 01:13:25.000 --> 01:13:26.960 you know, we can do this, you guys, like we 1304 01:13:27.000 --> 01:13:30.399 can totally do this. This is such a difficult problem. 1305 01:13:30.399 --> 01:13:32.960 It seems like we're facing the same problems every year. 1306 01:13:33.239 --> 01:13:36.279 But I think that there there is a light at 1307 01:13:36.279 --> 01:13:38.680 the end of the tunnel, and that light has to 1308 01:13:38.720 --> 01:13:41.439 do with getting more of that good fire on the landscape, 1309 01:13:42.000 --> 01:13:45.199 and that's something that I know is a priority for 1310 01:13:45.399 --> 01:13:48.119 the agency. I work for the US four Service and 1311 01:13:48.319 --> 01:13:51.680 trying to restore the resiliency of these forests. And I think, 1312 01:13:51.760 --> 01:13:54.199 like what I the sort of nugget of goodness that 1313 01:13:54.239 --> 01:13:57.239 I try to take is that we, as you know, 1314 01:13:57.359 --> 01:14:00.399 at least on my side, the science side of this agency, 1315 01:14:00.880 --> 01:14:07.560 we have this incredible opportunity to learn about this, you know, 1316 01:14:07.760 --> 01:14:09.760 about fires, why they burn, how they burn, what their 1317 01:14:09.760 --> 01:14:12.239 consequences are, and what we can do about it. And 1318 01:14:12.279 --> 01:14:14.399 we get to work with the managers and the people 1319 01:14:14.399 --> 01:14:17.159 who are again out doing that stuff on the ground. 1320 01:14:17.439 --> 01:14:19.239 We've got our hands on some of the levers. We 1321 01:14:19.279 --> 01:14:21.800 can make a positive impact, and we can make a 1322 01:14:21.880 --> 01:14:25.600 change in you know, how these fires are burning, even 1323 01:14:25.840 --> 01:14:28.680 as we're thinking about you know, these bigger problems like 1324 01:14:28.680 --> 01:14:30.680 climate change. We can put our fingers on the on 1325 01:14:30.720 --> 01:14:32.800 the lever a little bit, and so there's a huge 1326 01:14:32.840 --> 01:14:37.439 opportunity in the coming decades to make a big difference 1327 01:14:37.560 --> 01:14:39.880 in sort of the next century of fire. 1328 01:14:40.479 --> 01:14:43.880 Yeah, how do you think an average joe like myself 1329 01:14:45.159 --> 01:14:48.279 sitting around biting my nails at the news, what can 1330 01:14:48.319 --> 01:14:48.560 we do? 1331 01:14:50.239 --> 01:14:50.439 You know? 1332 01:14:51.239 --> 01:14:54.399 I would say, follow Smokey the Bear's advice, So we'll 1333 01:14:54.399 --> 01:14:56.439 put him on the pedestal for a minute and say 1334 01:14:56.560 --> 01:14:59.039 just you know, watch out for yourself and make sure 1335 01:14:59.039 --> 01:15:01.880 that you are not contributing to any of the problems 1336 01:15:01.880 --> 01:15:05.039 with you know, these unplanned ignitions and fires. That's one 1337 01:15:05.039 --> 01:15:07.760 thing you can do. So you know, maybe try to 1338 01:15:07.840 --> 01:15:12.199 avoid you know, explosive gender reveal parties. Uh, you know 1339 01:15:12.399 --> 01:15:16.640 that's good. Probably not do that. You know, don't be 1340 01:15:16.680 --> 01:15:20.439 throwing your cigarettes out, and don't drive your car anything 1341 01:15:20.479 --> 01:15:22.800 on dry grass and things like that. You know, like 1342 01:15:23.159 --> 01:15:25.359 there's there's little little things like that you can do. 1343 01:15:25.640 --> 01:15:28.000 But this is a big problem and it takes both 1344 01:15:28.039 --> 01:15:30.479 sort of individuals to make sure they're you know, not 1345 01:15:30.880 --> 01:15:35.000 starting these these unplanned fires, but also these big sort 1346 01:15:35.000 --> 01:15:39.520 of institutional actions and management to fight this problem. So 1347 01:15:39.560 --> 01:15:42.159 it's you know, I would say, don't don't bite your 1348 01:15:42.239 --> 01:15:44.560 nails down to the to the bone. Just make sure 1349 01:15:44.600 --> 01:15:46.199 you're not the one who's starting that fire. 1350 01:15:47.039 --> 01:15:50.840 Okay, good to know. Don't start any fires. Don't try 1351 01:15:50.840 --> 01:15:52.960 to impress any ex girlfriends. 1352 01:15:53.199 --> 01:15:56.640 Yes, don't buy starting are going to be impressed. 1353 01:15:56.560 --> 01:15:57.680 Not going to be impressed. 1354 01:15:58.600 --> 01:16:01.279 The gender reveal party couple who started a fire last 1355 01:16:01.359 --> 01:16:05.119 year in November were charged with manslaughter for a firefighter's death, 1356 01:16:05.560 --> 01:16:10.720 and that lovelorn arsonist of the twenty fourteen kingfire sentenced 1357 01:16:10.960 --> 01:16:15.199 twenty years in prison and ordered to somehow pay sixty 1358 01:16:15.239 --> 01:16:18.600 million dollars to victims of the crime. So imagine what 1359 01:16:18.640 --> 01:16:22.840 you could do with sixty million dollars and twenty years 1360 01:16:22.920 --> 01:16:26.319 of your life. Yeah, I think twice before doing any 1361 01:16:26.399 --> 01:16:28.399 hornt up fire tumfoolery. 1362 01:16:29.039 --> 01:16:31.159 Just get it. Just get them a cupcake or something with. 1363 01:16:31.520 --> 01:16:36.279 Get them a cupcake. Do that, don't be on the news. 1364 01:16:36.760 --> 01:16:40.239 What about your favorite thing about fire ecology, Like, is 1365 01:16:40.239 --> 01:16:41.680 it putting puzzles together? 1366 01:16:41.800 --> 01:16:42.880 Is it being out in the field. 1367 01:16:43.079 --> 01:16:45.199 I would say my favorite part about being a fire 1368 01:16:45.199 --> 01:16:49.600 ecologist is similar to my favorite part about being a scientist, 1369 01:16:49.800 --> 01:16:54.560 which is just that we it's the world is infinitely 1370 01:16:54.600 --> 01:16:57.199 more complex than we think it is, and I learn 1371 01:16:57.319 --> 01:16:59.880 new things every day about what's going on with these 1372 01:17:00.399 --> 01:17:04.119 and how animals are responding. My preconceptions are always just 1373 01:17:04.239 --> 01:17:06.079 kind of blown out of the water whenever I start 1374 01:17:06.119 --> 01:17:09.039 digging into this stuff. So it's just such a wonderfully 1375 01:17:09.199 --> 01:17:13.079 rich world out there, and fire is such a critical 1376 01:17:13.159 --> 01:17:17.640 part of that whole system, and so being able to 1377 01:17:17.680 --> 01:17:22.079 step into that complexity and try and just use my 1378 01:17:22.159 --> 01:17:24.840 little you know, pick to chip away at one corner 1379 01:17:24.840 --> 01:17:27.520 of that you know, vast unknown in the world of 1380 01:17:27.520 --> 01:17:31.720 fire ecology is just the greatest honor and pleasure. I've 1381 01:17:31.720 --> 01:17:36.279 got three little kids, and you know, I when I 1382 01:17:36.439 --> 01:17:38.800 sit down on my computer and start clacking away every day, 1383 01:17:39.399 --> 01:17:42.079 I'm partly thinking, like, what can I do to make 1384 01:17:42.279 --> 01:17:45.039 this world better than I, you know, than when I 1385 01:17:45.039 --> 01:17:49.680 came into it. And you know, sometimes it may seem 1386 01:17:49.720 --> 01:17:52.800 that my little corner of the world is insignificant, but yeah, 1387 01:17:52.840 --> 01:17:55.279 I like to think that that me and all my 1388 01:17:55.439 --> 01:17:59.319 wonderful colleagues within my agency and outside of it as well, 1389 01:17:59.680 --> 01:18:02.399 work in this area. We're all pulling in the same direction. 1390 01:18:02.600 --> 01:18:06.119 We're trying to, you know, make this world a better 1391 01:18:06.159 --> 01:18:09.920 place as well, and get that good fire back on 1392 01:18:09.960 --> 01:18:15.720 the landscape and try and yeah, change the game a 1393 01:18:15.760 --> 01:18:16.159 little bit. 1394 01:18:16.399 --> 01:18:16.840 I love it. 1395 01:18:16.920 --> 01:18:19.640 I appreciate it so much. I'm glad that you are 1396 01:18:20.079 --> 01:18:21.479 not currently in the middle. 1397 01:18:21.199 --> 01:18:21.760 Of a fire. 1398 01:18:22.279 --> 01:18:25.359 Me too, And thank you for talking to me during 1399 01:18:25.880 --> 01:18:29.359 obviously a very very busy time for firefolks. 1400 01:18:29.840 --> 01:18:31.840 It's been my pleasure, absolutely. 1401 01:18:33.159 --> 01:18:33.239 So. 1402 01:18:33.359 --> 01:18:37.119 Yes, fire off your birding questions to the coolest nerds. 1403 01:18:37.119 --> 01:18:40.079 Out there. That is what we do, and stay tuned 1404 01:18:40.119 --> 01:18:42.880 for a special follow up episode next week. Cross your fingers. 1405 01:18:42.880 --> 01:18:46.039 I can make it happen anyway. Learn more about doctor 1406 01:18:46.079 --> 01:18:49.600 Gavin Jones by following him on Twitter at Ecology of Gavin. 1407 01:18:50.039 --> 01:18:52.760 We are on there also at Ologies and I'm on 1408 01:18:52.800 --> 01:18:56.159 there Ali Ward with one l same handles on Instagram. 1409 01:18:56.319 --> 01:18:58.600 Come be our friends. Feel free to support the show 1410 01:18:58.640 --> 01:19:00.800 for a dollar a month if you'll like it at 1411 01:19:00.800 --> 01:19:05.319 patreon dot com. Slash Ologies Merch is available at ologiesmerch 1412 01:19:05.399 --> 01:19:08.159 dot com. Thank you Shannon Felts and Bonnie Dutch of 1413 01:19:08.199 --> 01:19:10.640 the podcast You Are That for managing merch. Thank you 1414 01:19:10.680 --> 01:19:14.279 Aaron Talbert for admitting the Ologies podcast Facebook group. Thank 1415 01:19:14.279 --> 01:19:17.680 you to Emily White of the Wordery for making the transcripts. 1416 01:19:17.920 --> 01:19:20.680 Caleb Patton bleeps them and those are all available for 1417 01:19:20.680 --> 01:19:23.039 free at the link in the show notes. Every other 1418 01:19:23.199 --> 01:19:28.880 Thursday we also release new Smologies. They are edited down, short, clean, 1419 01:19:29.159 --> 01:19:33.279 classroom friendly versions of your favorite episodes. Thank you to 1420 01:19:33.399 --> 01:19:36.880 Zeke Rodriguez Thomas of mind Jam Media for editing those big. 1421 01:19:36.920 --> 01:19:39.399 Thanks to Kelly Dwyer for website design. If you need 1422 01:19:39.399 --> 01:19:41.880 a website, She's your gal. Link in the show notes 1423 01:19:41.880 --> 01:19:44.960 to her Thanks Noel Dilworth and Susan Hale for keeping 1424 01:19:44.960 --> 01:19:47.640 the schedules running and for social media Quizzz and Merch 1425 01:19:47.680 --> 01:19:52.479 Monday posts. Thank you to Main Squeeze and Hottest Hell 1426 01:19:52.640 --> 01:19:55.520 editor Jared Sleeper of Mindjam Media for putting it all 1427 01:19:55.560 --> 01:19:59.199 together and of course longtime editing help Stephen Ray Morris 1428 01:19:59.239 --> 01:20:01.760 of the podcast The per Cast and See Jurassic Right. 1429 01:20:02.159 --> 01:20:04.840 Nick Thorburn wrote and performed the theme music. He's in 1430 01:20:04.840 --> 01:20:07.439 a band called Islands. They have a new album out Alamania. 1431 01:20:08.039 --> 01:20:10.119 And if you listen to the end, you know I 1432 01:20:10.119 --> 01:20:13.079 tell you a secret. And this week's secret is sometimes 1433 01:20:13.199 --> 01:20:16.199 if I need a brain break, I'll go on Craigslist 1434 01:20:16.680 --> 01:20:19.199 and I'll just click the free section to see what 1435 01:20:19.239 --> 01:20:21.079 people are given away, so you could see things that 1436 01:20:21.119 --> 01:20:23.119 people just put up there are free, and I just 1437 01:20:23.159 --> 01:20:25.439 sometimes like to look and see what people are getting 1438 01:20:25.520 --> 01:20:27.239 rid of, and then I try to figure out, like 1439 01:20:27.359 --> 01:20:29.520 what a life story is for that, Like why is 1440 01:20:29.520 --> 01:20:32.960 this person giving away like a ballerina statue? What's up 1441 01:20:33.000 --> 01:20:35.159 with this wheelbarrow? Let's look at a couple right now? 1442 01:20:35.239 --> 01:20:38.079 You want to Okay, okay, let's see what's up there? Oh, 1443 01:20:38.119 --> 01:20:42.319 there's two guinea pigs, and it just says need gone. Damn, 1444 01:20:42.359 --> 01:20:44.800 that is the meanest way to give a guinea pig. No, 1445 01:20:44.960 --> 01:20:47.439 I just want to get these guinea pigs. I have 1446 01:20:47.600 --> 01:20:50.199 ten guinea pigs needed for pickup. I can no longer 1447 01:20:50.239 --> 01:20:52.239 take care of them, and we'll have to release them 1448 01:20:52.560 --> 01:20:55.239 if I cannot find anyone to pick them up. Yikes, 1449 01:20:55.319 --> 01:20:58.119 if anyone needs guinea pigs in LA, I don't mean 1450 01:20:58.119 --> 01:21:02.319 to make that so sad. Vintage artists portfolio case. Did 1451 01:21:02.319 --> 01:21:04.760 they quit being an artist? I don't know. I hope not. Oh, 1452 01:21:04.760 --> 01:21:07.680 here's a six foot pine ladder. I don't need one, 1453 01:21:07.760 --> 01:21:10.279 but it's fun to look a lot of free pianos 1454 01:21:10.319 --> 01:21:13.000 on here. Again, I don't want or need these things, 1455 01:21:13.039 --> 01:21:15.920 but sometimes it's just nice to wonder how that person 1456 01:21:15.960 --> 01:21:18.760 get the piano in the first place, and why don't 1457 01:21:18.760 --> 01:21:22.800 they play it anymore? Anyway, I love when people I 1458 01:21:22.840 --> 01:21:25.399 love when people spare things from landfills and other people 1459 01:21:25.439 --> 01:21:35.720 get things for free. What can I say? Ooh, tap shoes, okay, brybye, pacodermatology, bombiology, cryptozoology, lithology, 1460 01:21:36.359 --> 01:21:50.880 new technology, meteorology, matology, ethnology, zeiology, ethology. So how could 1461 01:21:50.920 --> 01:21:53.840 we have avoided all of that. You're asking, please enjoy 1462 01:21:54.680 --> 01:21:58.520 Indigenous virocology. Oh it's so good, Pass it on. Oh hey, 1463 01:21:58.560 --> 01:22:01.119 it's that incense that reminds your freshman year so much 1464 01:22:01.199 --> 01:22:03.359 that you can only smell it sometimes because you don't 1465 01:22:03.399 --> 01:22:06.520 want the nostalgia to fade. Ali Ward back with a 1466 01:22:06.560 --> 01:22:10.039 follow up as promised episode of Ologies that serves as 1467 01:22:10.119 --> 01:22:13.880 a companion piece to last week's fire Ecology episode. So 1468 01:22:14.000 --> 01:22:16.920 perhaps listen to that one first, come here from more context, 1469 01:22:17.319 --> 01:22:21.000 or don't. Ultimately, none of my beeswax. Okay, so just 1470 01:22:21.119 --> 01:22:24.279 a little behind the scenes on this one's format. Format 1471 01:22:24.359 --> 01:22:26.199 is a little different than what you're used to. I 1472 01:22:26.479 --> 01:22:28.239 spoke with this ologist while she was up in the 1473 01:22:28.319 --> 01:22:31.960 wilderness of Canada on vacation, and the internet was spotty. 1474 01:22:32.039 --> 01:22:34.000 So the first ten minutes or so, it's not the 1475 01:22:34.079 --> 01:22:36.720 finest quality audio we've ever had on Ologies, but we 1476 01:22:36.800 --> 01:22:40.800 did our best, and then she sent some standalone recordings 1477 01:22:40.840 --> 01:22:43.960 answering more questions, and then after the break we're featuring 1478 01:22:44.199 --> 01:22:48.319 excerpts from her own indigenous fire ecology podcast, Good Fire 1479 01:22:48.479 --> 01:22:51.319 with Matt Christoff. Making this a real community effort and 1480 01:22:51.600 --> 01:22:55.000 a fire mosaic episode. Indeed, So this ologist got her 1481 01:22:55.079 --> 01:22:58.800 master's and PhD and hazard management and fire science and 1482 01:22:58.960 --> 01:23:03.000 works as a fire social scientist for the Canadian Forest Service. 1483 01:23:03.239 --> 01:23:06.079 She is a meytea woman from Treaty six Territory on 1484 01:23:06.239 --> 01:23:09.439 land now known as Canada, and has authored papers such 1485 01:23:09.479 --> 01:23:13.199 as social science Research on Indigenous wildfire management in the 1486 01:23:13.239 --> 01:23:16.560 twenty first century and future research needs. So she is 1487 01:23:16.920 --> 01:23:19.079 well schooled on this. And then I saw she has 1488 01:23:19.119 --> 01:23:22.640 a podcast called Good Fire, recorded with Matt Christoff, who 1489 01:23:22.720 --> 01:23:26.239 also hosts the Your Forest podcast. So this ologist was 1490 01:23:26.319 --> 01:23:28.840 on vacation. I desperately wanted to chat with her the 1491 01:23:28.920 --> 01:23:31.319 one week she was trying to relax, but she luckily 1492 01:23:31.520 --> 01:23:33.640 was very up to take a little break and chat 1493 01:23:33.760 --> 01:23:37.039 amid spotty internet and some techtifs. Huge thanks to Matt 1494 01:23:37.159 --> 01:23:39.760 for getting us in touch and for lending us excerpts 1495 01:23:39.840 --> 01:23:42.119 from Your Forest and Good Fire to a future. Also 1496 01:23:42.199 --> 01:23:44.439 thank you to everyone at Patreon dot com slash Ologies 1497 01:23:44.479 --> 01:23:47.560 for making the show possible. This episode was informed by 1498 01:23:47.600 --> 01:23:51.000 the questions you left about indigenous fire stewardship. And thanks 1499 01:23:51.039 --> 01:23:53.439 to everyone who rates and reviews a podcasts It matters 1500 01:23:53.479 --> 01:23:55.640 more than you will ever know, and I read them 1501 01:23:55.640 --> 01:23:57.880 all so I can prove it with a fresh shout 1502 01:23:57.920 --> 01:24:00.560 out for one left this week, such as Sarah ib 1503 01:24:00.840 --> 01:24:03.039 who wrote, I started listening to this podcast and got 1504 01:24:03.079 --> 01:24:05.680 to the gynecological episode and decided to make my first 1505 01:24:05.840 --> 01:24:10.079 obgyn appointment after turns out I have endometrial cancer. I 1506 01:24:10.119 --> 01:24:13.119 had a hysterectomy and I'm currently doing radiation therapy. Thank you, 1507 01:24:13.199 --> 01:24:18.520 Dad Ford for this informative podcast. Sarah, what what sending 1508 01:24:18.560 --> 01:24:21.479 you the biggest, biggest hugs and the best vibes for 1509 01:24:21.600 --> 01:24:24.520 a speedy defeat of that, and thank you for getting 1510 01:24:24.600 --> 01:24:27.960 checked out. Okay, onward to the episode. Etymology is simple. 1511 01:24:28.119 --> 01:24:31.159 Indigenous means native fire has a root meaning fire and 1512 01:24:31.359 --> 01:24:33.960 ecology the study of where we live. So we'll be 1513 01:24:34.039 --> 01:24:39.199 covering cultural burns, drip torches, forest debris, healthy trees, the 1514 01:24:39.359 --> 01:24:44.560 legality of indigenous fire stewardship, fighting fires with strategy, napping 1515 01:24:44.680 --> 01:24:48.479 on the fire line, evacuations and more with Fire Scientist 1516 01:24:48.800 --> 01:24:54.640 Advocate podcast host Canadian Forest Service employee, scholar and Indigenous 1517 01:24:54.760 --> 01:24:57.560 fire ecologist doctor Amy Christiansen. 1518 01:25:16.399 --> 01:25:17.720 Yeah, no problem at all. 1519 01:25:17.800 --> 01:25:19.520 It's great too to have so much. 1520 01:25:19.680 --> 01:25:21.279 Attention on this topic as well. 1521 01:25:21.800 --> 01:25:26.319 Oh, it's wonderful wonderful to have you. So, now, are 1522 01:25:26.359 --> 01:25:28.880 you at the top of a mountain right now trying 1523 01:25:28.880 --> 01:25:29.720 to get cell service? 1524 01:25:30.880 --> 01:25:33.680 No, I'm actually at my parents' cabin, but they do 1525 01:25:33.880 --> 01:25:36.079 not have great internet. But does it sound okay? 1526 01:25:36.760 --> 01:25:38.119 Yeah, it sounds great so far. 1527 01:25:38.520 --> 01:25:41.840 Literally, they're at like the very north end of a 1528 01:25:41.960 --> 01:25:45.640 lake called Shoeshwap Lake, and currently we're actually surrounded by 1529 01:25:45.720 --> 01:25:46.960 three fires as well. 1530 01:25:48.079 --> 01:25:48.840 Oh my gosh. 1531 01:25:49.039 --> 01:25:51.720 And is that an area that you're pretty familiar with? 1532 01:25:51.800 --> 01:25:53.199 Has your family been there for a long time? 1533 01:25:53.520 --> 01:25:55.640 Yeah, my parents have this cabin that we've had in 1534 01:25:55.720 --> 01:25:57.840 our family I think for about thirty years now. 1535 01:25:58.319 --> 01:26:01.920 Have you seen a change at all in how the 1536 01:26:02.000 --> 01:26:06.520 summers go in terms of say, being surrounded by fire. 1537 01:26:07.000 --> 01:26:09.079 So the area that we're in is actually kind of 1538 01:26:09.159 --> 01:26:12.920 a rainforest area. We always kind of jokingly refer to 1539 01:26:13.039 --> 01:26:15.079 it as that, and we used to get so much 1540 01:26:15.279 --> 01:26:18.520 rain out here in the summer. In probably the last 1541 01:26:18.640 --> 01:26:21.960 ten years, we've noticed it's been getting warmer in this 1542 01:26:22.159 --> 01:26:25.000 area and we've been getting less rain and even the 1543 01:26:25.159 --> 01:26:28.199 cedars are really starting to not look as healthy. And 1544 01:26:28.439 --> 01:26:32.319 then the last probably five years, we've had more summers 1545 01:26:32.399 --> 01:26:36.680 of smoke. So it's really been yeah, I've really noticed 1546 01:26:36.680 --> 01:26:38.640 the change just even in my lifetime. 1547 01:26:39.199 --> 01:26:42.680 And how long have you been studying fire? How long 1548 01:26:42.760 --> 01:26:44.399 had you been a fire scientist. 1549 01:26:44.960 --> 01:26:48.239 I grew up in northern Alberta. There's always kind of 1550 01:26:48.399 --> 01:26:51.800 fires around my family, although we didn't kind of have 1551 01:26:51.960 --> 01:26:55.880 the connection. We were disconnected from cultural burning practices, but 1552 01:26:56.359 --> 01:26:59.560 my family was kind of always, you know, a bit 1553 01:26:59.640 --> 01:27:03.520 involved than fire, and my husband's a wildland firefighter, and yeah, 1554 01:27:03.640 --> 01:27:05.960 just growing up it seemed like kind of a normal 1555 01:27:06.079 --> 01:27:08.800 thing in the north. And when I moved down south 1556 01:27:08.920 --> 01:27:12.479 to an urban center, that was when I really realized, 1557 01:27:12.560 --> 01:27:15.520 you know, that other people didn't have that, or you know, 1558 01:27:15.720 --> 01:27:19.119 we weren't so used to that. I guess I started 1559 01:27:19.399 --> 01:27:22.840 actually as a geologist, but I always loved hazards, but 1560 01:27:23.039 --> 01:27:25.760 more volcanic hazards and things that I was interested in. 1561 01:27:26.319 --> 01:27:28.920 So I did two years actually in New Zealand, where 1562 01:27:28.920 --> 01:27:32.600 I did my masters on volcanic hazard management. But you know, 1563 01:27:32.760 --> 01:27:35.039 I always kind of feel like bound to the forest 1564 01:27:35.359 --> 01:27:39.000 in Alberta. So I ended up kind of coming back. 1565 01:27:39.159 --> 01:27:42.119 And I even said to my PhD supervisor, like, you know, 1566 01:27:42.279 --> 01:27:45.079 I'll study anything but fire. You know, I don't want 1567 01:27:45.800 --> 01:27:48.319 to have fire in my life because I just you know, 1568 01:27:48.439 --> 01:27:51.199 it was around it all the time and wanted something different. 1569 01:27:51.319 --> 01:27:54.960 But yeah, kind of slowly got pulled back into the field. 1570 01:27:55.119 --> 01:27:57.840 And yeah, I've been at the Canadian Forest Service now 1571 01:27:57.960 --> 01:27:59.119 for about ten years. 1572 01:28:00.239 --> 01:28:02.960 Just when I thought I was out, they pulled me. 1573 01:28:04.359 --> 01:28:07.000 Oh my god, what is your what is your work like? 1574 01:28:07.199 --> 01:28:10.359 And have you grown to appreciate it it all? Are 1575 01:28:10.439 --> 01:28:13.800 you still like fire? Here we are again, you and 1576 01:28:13.920 --> 01:28:14.399 me fire? 1577 01:28:14.640 --> 01:28:14.840 Yeah? 1578 01:28:14.920 --> 01:28:16.600 No, I think yeah, it's kind of one of those 1579 01:28:16.640 --> 01:28:19.680 things you have to realize that maybe you're just like 1580 01:28:20.000 --> 01:28:22.720 I don't know, I don't want to say destined to be, 1581 01:28:23.039 --> 01:28:25.279 but you know, I think that living in the North, 1582 01:28:25.399 --> 01:28:27.760 it's just you know, I think that you have that 1583 01:28:27.920 --> 01:28:31.359 experience with fire and seeing it around you. And that's 1584 01:28:31.399 --> 01:28:33.640 one thing I always find interesting is when I meet, 1585 01:28:33.920 --> 01:28:37.880 you know, other fire scientists who aren't, you know, from 1586 01:28:38.159 --> 01:28:40.680 areas that experience fire, and I think sometimes it's may 1587 01:28:40.720 --> 01:28:43.880 be hard for them to relate, especially when we're talking 1588 01:28:43.960 --> 01:28:46.960 about fire risk and kind of how people act during 1589 01:28:47.039 --> 01:28:47.840 a fire event. 1590 01:28:48.359 --> 01:28:51.319 So one of doctor Christensen's areas of research and work 1591 01:28:51.479 --> 01:28:55.239 is studying evacuations. So when to leave your home with 1592 01:28:55.479 --> 01:28:58.399 just a few possessions and your life for what might 1593 01:28:58.520 --> 01:29:01.079 be the last time. And it's something that she says 1594 01:29:01.279 --> 01:29:04.199 fire scientists who haven't grown up around fire and had 1595 01:29:04.239 --> 01:29:07.880 to themselves evacuate might not understand. And if you listened 1596 01:29:07.880 --> 01:29:10.279 to last week's episode, I mentioned that my parents lived 1597 01:29:10.279 --> 01:29:13.720 in the remote Sierra Nevadas for years and coercing them 1598 01:29:14.000 --> 01:29:17.199 to evacuate during the King Fire was not easy, even 1599 01:29:17.279 --> 01:29:19.239 with the promise of a night or two at the 1600 01:29:19.319 --> 01:29:21.359 fantasy end with a mirrored ceiling. 1601 01:29:21.960 --> 01:29:24.640 When I first started on at the Canadian for Service, 1602 01:29:24.680 --> 01:29:28.199 there was like no interest really in indigenous fire management 1603 01:29:28.960 --> 01:29:32.720 or cultural burning practices or indigenous firefighters. So I would 1604 01:29:32.760 --> 01:29:35.800 say it was like a very lonely kind of first 1605 01:29:36.600 --> 01:29:39.800 five or six years. And so most of my colleagues 1606 01:29:39.800 --> 01:29:44.920 are actually international folks, so mainly folks from actually California 1607 01:29:45.319 --> 01:29:48.359 and Australia who are in this field as well. But 1608 01:29:48.680 --> 01:29:51.319 I think like pretty much since we've started having the 1609 01:29:51.439 --> 01:29:55.479 big fire events in Canada, that's really what's forced people 1610 01:29:55.560 --> 01:29:58.000 to kind of look at maybe a different way of 1611 01:29:58.159 --> 01:30:02.000 looking at fire on the landscape. My interest in fire 1612 01:30:02.119 --> 01:30:05.560 is also tied to like my own family's histories, so 1613 01:30:06.039 --> 01:30:09.720 my family's Mayti. So we're from northern Alberta, the Cardinal 1614 01:30:09.760 --> 01:30:13.520 and Labcan families, and we kind of had like a 1615 01:30:13.640 --> 01:30:17.199 weird kind of disconnection from culture, which in most mate 1616 01:30:17.359 --> 01:30:22.319 families in Canada actually experience during colonization, and so it's 1617 01:30:22.760 --> 01:30:25.720 basically we weren't allowed to practice any of our traditions 1618 01:30:25.760 --> 01:30:28.239 and other things. It's interesting to me because it almost 1619 01:30:28.319 --> 01:30:31.760 parallels fire in a way. So when settler's you know, 1620 01:30:31.960 --> 01:30:34.279 first came to Canada, one of the first things that 1621 01:30:34.359 --> 01:30:38.039 they brought with them was actually fire suppression. And as 1622 01:30:38.119 --> 01:30:42.000 they moved kind of west across Canada, they basically just 1623 01:30:42.880 --> 01:30:46.560 put into place fire suppression policies wherever they went. And 1624 01:30:46.960 --> 01:30:49.000 the big reason for that was, you know that they 1625 01:30:49.359 --> 01:30:52.119 saw the forest as this wilderness is this kind of 1626 01:30:52.720 --> 01:30:56.199 natural place. But really now we know, like and lots 1627 01:30:56.239 --> 01:30:59.079 of scientific studies now are pointing out that that wasn't natural, 1628 01:30:59.279 --> 01:31:03.039 Like many of those areas were actually stewarded by indigenous 1629 01:31:03.119 --> 01:31:06.159 people to look that way. Actually, the first fire suppression 1630 01:31:06.239 --> 01:31:09.920 campaign was in sixteen ten in Newfoundland in Canada, where 1631 01:31:09.960 --> 01:31:12.479 that was like kind of the first you know, enactment 1632 01:31:12.600 --> 01:31:16.119 of you know, thou shelt not light fires on the landscape. 1633 01:31:16.680 --> 01:31:19.479 Amy says that she's from northern Alberta and there were 1634 01:31:19.560 --> 01:31:23.319 only two fire rangers for the entire province. 1635 01:31:25.119 --> 01:31:28.439 So even though they had like a fire suppression policy, 1636 01:31:28.680 --> 01:31:31.279 you know, those guys couldn't be everywhere obviously, so there 1637 01:31:31.399 --> 01:31:33.600 was still a lot of cultural burning that went on. 1638 01:31:34.239 --> 01:31:36.560 So I would say that in where I'm from, it 1639 01:31:36.720 --> 01:31:40.119 really only kind of stopped or halted around the sixties 1640 01:31:40.239 --> 01:31:43.840 or the seventies where fire really stopped being allowed on 1641 01:31:43.960 --> 01:31:47.159 the landscape in the north. And what we've seen with that, 1642 01:31:47.359 --> 01:31:50.520 you know, is just a massive increase in fuel loading 1643 01:31:50.600 --> 01:31:54.680 and also kind of these like monoculture forests where there 1644 01:31:54.720 --> 01:31:58.279 are the stands are you know, all one species, like 1645 01:31:58.720 --> 01:32:02.479 all similar age, and they're really vulnerable to pest. There's 1646 01:32:02.600 --> 01:32:06.119 other disturbances like fire, and so we're getting these massive, 1647 01:32:06.199 --> 01:32:10.119 big fire events that have come through. And so for 1648 01:32:10.239 --> 01:32:13.560 indigenous people, you know, like my family and others, they 1649 01:32:13.720 --> 01:32:17.239 my family were actually buffalo hunters and they used fire 1650 01:32:17.520 --> 01:32:20.479 in the buffalo hunt, but also afterwards to improve the 1651 01:32:20.600 --> 01:32:23.880 habitat for buffalo and other things that to help them 1652 01:32:23.920 --> 01:32:27.560 in their hunting. When the settlers started coming across and 1653 01:32:27.680 --> 01:32:30.079 saying like no you can't do this, like you don't 1654 01:32:30.159 --> 01:32:32.760 know as much as us, Like, you know, it really 1655 01:32:32.880 --> 01:32:35.880 devalued Indigenous people and their knowledge. And then when you 1656 01:32:36.039 --> 01:32:38.840 add into that, you know, we had residential schools in 1657 01:32:38.960 --> 01:32:42.359 Canada where Indigenous people you know, were sent there and 1658 01:32:42.479 --> 01:32:45.960 basically told you know that you know, it said they 1659 01:32:45.960 --> 01:32:49.239 were savages, that their way of knowing their family, of 1660 01:32:49.359 --> 01:32:52.319 knowing the earth wasn't proper, and you know that they 1661 01:32:52.359 --> 01:32:54.720 had to learn this new way that was much better. 1662 01:32:54.960 --> 01:32:58.560 So we like my colleague fives A Mulla, he was 1663 01:32:58.640 --> 01:33:02.760 telling me that they called that like a cultural severance activity, 1664 01:33:02.840 --> 01:33:06.600 where basically you're just told that, you know, suddenly you know, 1665 01:33:06.720 --> 01:33:10.319 you cannot practice your culture anymore. And so the impacts 1666 01:33:10.359 --> 01:33:14.319 of that are just massive on people, not only on like, 1667 01:33:14.680 --> 01:33:17.319 you know, their ability to use fire, but also just 1668 01:33:17.479 --> 01:33:19.840 on who they are as a person, their pride and 1669 01:33:19.920 --> 01:33:23.000 their family and other things. And so I too, like 1670 01:33:23.119 --> 01:33:25.880 even now, I still have a lot of anger about that, 1671 01:33:26.119 --> 01:33:28.880 and you know how I wasn't able to learn from 1672 01:33:28.920 --> 01:33:33.239 my elders about landscape, stewardship and other things because of that, 1673 01:33:33.439 --> 01:33:36.199 you know, like kind of dominant Western worldview. 1674 01:33:36.800 --> 01:33:39.439 Do you know or has there been research into how 1675 01:33:39.600 --> 01:33:41.680 much of that knowledge is lost. 1676 01:33:42.359 --> 01:33:44.920 Yeah, so, actually Henry and Lewis, who is a researcher, 1677 01:33:45.199 --> 01:33:47.600 He actually started in California but then was at the 1678 01:33:47.720 --> 01:33:48.840 University of Alberta. 1679 01:33:49.239 --> 01:33:54.079 Doctor Henry T. Lewis aka Hank was an anthropology professor 1680 01:33:54.199 --> 01:33:56.600 at the University of Alberta and was one of the 1681 01:33:56.680 --> 01:34:00.960 first researchers to really document indigenous fire stewardship and its 1682 01:34:01.079 --> 01:34:03.640 role in shaping the landscape. And he wrote the paper 1683 01:34:03.880 --> 01:34:06.479 A Time for Burning. It was published in nineteen eighty 1684 01:34:06.479 --> 01:34:09.239 two and a PDF to it is linked on my site. 1685 01:34:09.520 --> 01:34:13.119 It's typewritten on a typewriter. It's wild and it details 1686 01:34:13.199 --> 01:34:16.079 all of the different biomes and how indigenous cultures shaped 1687 01:34:16.119 --> 01:34:20.279 them with fire and if you're like no reading, need visuals. 1688 01:34:20.920 --> 01:34:25.079 He also made a sixteen millimeters documentary titled The Fires Spring. 1689 01:34:25.479 --> 01:34:28.000 All of this was managed by people who had developed 1690 01:34:28.039 --> 01:34:32.640 a complex technology of fire to assure a continued successful 1691 01:34:32.640 --> 01:34:34.840 adjustment to the Northern Royal Forest. 1692 01:34:35.119 --> 01:34:37.119 Somehow this ended up on YouTube. 1693 01:34:37.359 --> 01:34:40.720 Hank God he went up and worked with the woodland 1694 01:34:40.960 --> 01:34:44.800 kreen Denny people in northern Alberta. So actually kind of 1695 01:34:44.840 --> 01:34:47.840 where my family's from as well, and what he was 1696 01:34:47.880 --> 01:34:50.439 saying was in the nineteen seventies when he did his 1697 01:34:50.600 --> 01:34:53.399 work that he thought that between ninety and ninety five 1698 01:34:53.479 --> 01:34:56.479 percent of that knowledge had been lost. So I mean 1699 01:34:56.560 --> 01:34:58.840 that was now, like it's hard to believe it almost 1700 01:34:58.880 --> 01:35:02.199 fifty years ago, right when that was happening. So for me, 1701 01:35:02.439 --> 01:35:06.520 like I often hear people say in meetings like you know, 1702 01:35:06.760 --> 01:35:10.199 oh well, indigenous knowledge is inapplicable to today and cultural 1703 01:35:10.279 --> 01:35:13.640 burning practices because you know, now we have climate change, 1704 01:35:13.720 --> 01:35:16.680 like now there's more values on the landscape in terms 1705 01:35:16.720 --> 01:35:20.319 of thinking about structures and other things. But I always 1706 01:35:20.439 --> 01:35:23.760 argue against that because for me, like it's not about 1707 01:35:24.960 --> 01:35:29.119 like indigenous people, like we're alive today, we're part of society, 1708 01:35:29.279 --> 01:35:32.640 like we see all these things, like indigenous people are 1709 01:35:32.720 --> 01:35:35.399 on the front lines of climate change, Like of course 1710 01:35:35.600 --> 01:35:40.039 we don't. That's occurring. And you know, indigenous knowledge, the 1711 01:35:40.159 --> 01:35:43.039 most beautiful thing about it is how adaptable it is 1712 01:35:43.479 --> 01:35:47.640 to the local environment. So like, for like, because you 1713 01:35:47.720 --> 01:35:50.840 know you're living in that environment, you're dependent on it. 1714 01:35:51.520 --> 01:35:54.439 Okay, So Amy's internet cut out again, so we tried 1715 01:35:54.560 --> 01:35:56.680 a new way of recording just via the phone and 1716 01:35:56.760 --> 01:35:59.399 her laptop, and it sounds much better, which is great 1717 01:35:59.680 --> 01:36:01.640 so clear. In fact, you may even be able to 1718 01:36:01.800 --> 01:36:05.239 discern the pitter pattern of children's footsteps on the cabin 1719 01:36:05.319 --> 01:36:07.760 stairs as her family vacationed around her. 1720 01:36:08.479 --> 01:36:11.079 Hi, maybe this will work. 1721 01:36:11.720 --> 01:36:14.039 I can hear you great at home. It's funny because 1722 01:36:14.039 --> 01:36:17.760 I have a pretty good setup with a podcasting microphone, headphones, 1723 01:36:17.840 --> 01:36:20.840 And of course I'm like, oh, it's this week when 1724 01:36:20.880 --> 01:36:22.319 I'm gone, but no worries. 1725 01:36:23.079 --> 01:36:26.399 But where were we? Yes, that indigenous fire knowledge is 1726 01:36:26.520 --> 01:36:29.920 starting to get more attention as climate change worsens and 1727 01:36:30.119 --> 01:36:34.159 larger fires erupt And as a fire scientist, what is 1728 01:36:34.239 --> 01:36:34.920 her workday? 1729 01:36:35.079 --> 01:36:35.119 Like? 1730 01:36:36.000 --> 01:36:39.000 Sure, yeah, So with my job with the CFS, I 1731 01:36:39.600 --> 01:36:42.479 most fire research scientists, I say, kind of do the 1732 01:36:42.680 --> 01:36:46.000 same thing. So we have our research projects that we 1733 01:36:46.239 --> 01:36:48.159 run or that we're a part of. So a lot 1734 01:36:48.239 --> 01:36:51.560 of my day is actually kind of meeting about research 1735 01:36:51.680 --> 01:36:54.960 and other things that are going on. So really similar 1736 01:36:55.039 --> 01:36:58.640 to like you know, an academic researcher from a university. 1737 01:36:59.199 --> 01:37:01.079 But then as well, we also kind of have the 1738 01:37:01.239 --> 01:37:04.279 policy or the government side, So I said, on a 1739 01:37:04.319 --> 01:37:08.319 lot of like national or international committees or working groups 1740 01:37:08.720 --> 01:37:11.800 you know, looking at fire and trying to direct policy 1741 01:37:12.720 --> 01:37:16.439 we just recently in Canada finished the Blueprint for Wildland 1742 01:37:16.520 --> 01:37:20.560 Fire Science for twenty nineteen to twenty twenty nine, so 1743 01:37:20.720 --> 01:37:24.119 looking at, you know, topics that we should really be 1744 01:37:25.279 --> 01:37:29.039 spending money basically in time doing research on. And one 1745 01:37:29.079 --> 01:37:32.920 of those the themes from that was actually on indigenous fires. 1746 01:37:33.039 --> 01:37:37.359 So we also have an evacuation database actually with the 1747 01:37:37.439 --> 01:37:41.920 Canadian for Service, where we've tracked wildfire evacuations in Canada 1748 01:37:42.039 --> 01:37:45.960 since nineteen eighty. So during this summer, like that's one 1749 01:37:46.039 --> 01:37:48.159 thing is that we have like lots of our staff 1750 01:37:48.239 --> 01:37:51.399 working on that doing data entry into it. Yeah, it's 1751 01:37:51.479 --> 01:37:54.640 a big job this summer. Like in twenty twenty, I 1752 01:37:54.720 --> 01:37:58.119 think we only had twenty different evacuations in Canada, but 1753 01:37:58.560 --> 01:38:00.439 this year I think we're already at one hundred and 1754 01:38:00.520 --> 01:38:04.560 twenty five different evacuation events. So it's a huge job. 1755 01:38:05.279 --> 01:38:08.920 So this Blueprint for a Wildland Fire Science in Canada 1756 01:38:09.000 --> 01:38:12.600 twenty nineteen to twenty twenty nine outlines, in its own words, 1757 01:38:12.880 --> 01:38:16.960 a business case to increase investment in wildland fire science. 1758 01:38:17.239 --> 01:38:20.359 And it is fifty seven pages of really great strategies 1759 01:38:20.520 --> 01:38:25.760 covering themes like understanding fire in a changing world, recognizing 1760 01:38:25.840 --> 01:38:30.039 Indigenous knowledge and enhancing knowledge exchange mechanisms to improve the 1761 01:38:30.079 --> 01:38:33.399 ways in which wildland fire science and technology are shared, understood, 1762 01:38:33.479 --> 01:38:36.520 and implemented. So Amy's team had been working on that, 1763 01:38:36.760 --> 01:38:38.640 and for the curious, I will link to the full 1764 01:38:38.720 --> 01:38:43.600 pdf on my website. Now, as far as the increasing evacuations, 1765 01:38:44.039 --> 01:38:48.319 that issue gets more personal as this episode unfolds, even 1766 01:38:48.359 --> 01:38:51.520 more personal than my parents in an hourly motel in Rynow, 1767 01:38:51.920 --> 01:38:53.880 and this is something I think a lot of people 1768 01:38:54.039 --> 01:38:58.039 have trouble wrapping their brain around. And maybe there is 1769 01:38:58.239 --> 01:39:02.920 no good answer. But is it climate change? Is it 1770 01:39:03.520 --> 01:39:09.920 human ignition and carelessness? Is it not letting the forest 1771 01:39:10.000 --> 01:39:13.479 burn as it naturally would? How do you scientists come 1772 01:39:13.560 --> 01:39:17.079 up with plans to tackle this issue? If it's kind 1773 01:39:17.079 --> 01:39:18.960 of like a trifle problem. 1774 01:39:19.479 --> 01:39:20.399 Yeah, I agree with you. 1775 01:39:20.479 --> 01:39:23.000 It's just such a complex issue. I mean, there's also 1776 01:39:23.119 --> 01:39:26.840 the fact that people are just building more in you know, 1777 01:39:27.000 --> 01:39:29.800 areas that are of higher risk to fire. You know, 1778 01:39:29.920 --> 01:39:32.880 as communities get larger and kind of expand out into 1779 01:39:33.319 --> 01:39:35.960 what you know, some people call the wildline urban interface, 1780 01:39:36.359 --> 01:39:38.520 it's really increasing fire risks. 1781 01:39:38.600 --> 01:39:40.199 I think that that's the hard thing too. 1782 01:39:40.199 --> 01:39:43.960 Is that there's no like magic bullet solution, right, like 1783 01:39:44.880 --> 01:39:47.359 even with cultural burning, like you know, I'm such a 1784 01:39:47.479 --> 01:39:50.840 strong proponent of getting that back on the ground, but 1785 01:39:51.319 --> 01:39:53.840 that doesn't at all tackle you know, how vulnerable some 1786 01:39:54.039 --> 01:39:56.479 homes and other things are to fire at the moment. 1787 01:39:56.960 --> 01:39:59.920 Climate change, she said, is also a pretty big frickin deal. 1788 01:40:00.439 --> 01:40:03.039 But the one thing you know that I think locally, 1789 01:40:03.319 --> 01:40:05.199 like you know, in our towns and stuff, that we 1790 01:40:05.359 --> 01:40:08.800 can control is the fuels that are available to burn. 1791 01:40:09.319 --> 01:40:12.439 And so that's why, you know, I think that cultural 1792 01:40:12.560 --> 01:40:16.479 burning or landscape level fuel management as well as the 1793 01:40:16.600 --> 01:40:20.800 community wildfire mitigation is so important to do in combination. 1794 01:40:21.039 --> 01:40:23.560 And lately too, I've been seeing I don't know if 1795 01:40:23.600 --> 01:40:25.560 you are seeing in the States as much, but in 1796 01:40:25.680 --> 01:40:27.840 Canada there's a bit of a movement to just kind 1797 01:40:27.920 --> 01:40:32.000 of you know, fireproof communities or you know, keep homes 1798 01:40:32.159 --> 01:40:36.239 or you know, structures safe from fire. But to me, 1799 01:40:36.399 --> 01:40:40.199 that's really missing the point of like the landscape around 1800 01:40:40.279 --> 01:40:43.399 your home. Like for me, I don't want to be living, 1801 01:40:43.560 --> 01:40:46.279 you know, if my home is standing in like the 1802 01:40:46.399 --> 01:40:49.600 middle of you know, a black and landscaping. In Canada, 1803 01:40:49.680 --> 01:40:51.760 it can take a long time for the forest to 1804 01:40:51.840 --> 01:40:56.039 regenerate sometimes, you know, twenty thirty forty years and even 1805 01:40:56.159 --> 01:40:58.720 then they're finding up north in the boreal forest that 1806 01:40:58.840 --> 01:41:01.600 burns or just so hot that they're basically kind of 1807 01:41:01.760 --> 01:41:07.000 killing the soil and any vegetation around. So, yeah, it's 1808 01:41:07.119 --> 01:41:10.560 quite a complex issue. But I think when I think 1809 01:41:10.600 --> 01:41:13.119 as an indigenous person, I look at the forest, I 1810 01:41:13.159 --> 01:41:15.680 don't just see it as trees or timber values or 1811 01:41:15.720 --> 01:41:18.119 other things. You see it as like part of who 1812 01:41:18.199 --> 01:41:21.640 you are, right like your relations So you want to 1813 01:41:21.920 --> 01:41:25.000 be able to, you know, steward and protect that area 1814 01:41:25.439 --> 01:41:27.720 as much as you do you know, your own home 1815 01:41:28.119 --> 01:41:28.800 or structure. 1816 01:41:29.239 --> 01:41:33.960 And can you describe a little bit about prescribed fires 1817 01:41:34.279 --> 01:41:40.319 and indigenous fire stewardship versus cultural burns. I think a 1818 01:41:40.359 --> 01:41:42.279 lot of people maybe want to lump them in together, 1819 01:41:42.359 --> 01:41:44.239 but can you describe a little bit about how they 1820 01:41:44.319 --> 01:41:45.239 work or what they are. 1821 01:41:46.279 --> 01:41:48.600 Yeah, so there's a bit of a danger of that 1822 01:41:48.840 --> 01:41:51.840 this whole thing now where we're seeing prescribed fire and 1823 01:41:52.000 --> 01:41:56.479 just kind of throwing cultural burning into that. So prescribe 1824 01:41:56.560 --> 01:42:00.239 fire is you know, generally what agencies do, so where 1825 01:42:00.239 --> 01:42:04.199 they're setting fire on the landscape, but in many cases 1826 01:42:04.239 --> 01:42:07.119 they're setting you know, high severity fires. 1827 01:42:07.279 --> 01:42:08.680 It's burning really fast. 1828 01:42:08.760 --> 01:42:11.199 And they want to burn a lot of land in 1829 01:42:11.279 --> 01:42:14.119 a little bit of time. So we see like lots 1830 01:42:14.159 --> 01:42:16.159 of aerial ignition of fires. 1831 01:42:16.359 --> 01:42:18.199 We see them using you. 1832 01:42:18.279 --> 01:42:22.800 Know, basically like helicopter ignition, and in Canada, like lots 1833 01:42:22.840 --> 01:42:25.479 of times people put that together as you know, being 1834 01:42:25.560 --> 01:42:28.079 a crown fire being these big, bad, kind of out 1835 01:42:28.119 --> 01:42:31.720 of control fires that are burning up you know, mountain sides. 1836 01:42:31.800 --> 01:42:35.039 That's generally the media that we see in Canada about 1837 01:42:35.119 --> 01:42:39.560 prescribed fire, but it really differs from cultural burning because 1838 01:42:39.600 --> 01:42:44.079 cultural burning is more about achieving a cultural objective around 1839 01:42:44.479 --> 01:42:47.359 the forest around where you live. So you don't really 1840 01:42:47.479 --> 01:42:50.840 want to have these big, large, standard placing fires that 1841 01:42:50.960 --> 01:42:54.840 go through and and can kill everything in a prescribed 1842 01:42:54.960 --> 01:42:59.000 fire event. That sometimes is what happens in Canada. Yeah, 1843 01:42:59.279 --> 01:43:01.840 so for culture fire too, the thing is that most 1844 01:43:01.960 --> 01:43:05.600 fires are actually pretty low intensity. In Australia they call 1845 01:43:05.640 --> 01:43:08.560 them like slow burns or cool burns, and they generally 1846 01:43:08.720 --> 01:43:12.760 move through the understory and they're done it certain times 1847 01:43:12.840 --> 01:43:17.640 of year where the potential fire behavior is very low risks. 1848 01:43:17.800 --> 01:43:20.520 So you know where you're not getting, you know, potential 1849 01:43:20.600 --> 01:43:23.600 of crown fire. There's lots of natural fuel breaks around 1850 01:43:23.680 --> 01:43:27.319 the fire in Canada that's usually snow still on the ground. 1851 01:43:28.000 --> 01:43:31.399 For Indigenous people, cultural burning too, is like a family 1852 01:43:31.479 --> 01:43:34.640 a community activity, So like when I'm doing burns and things. 1853 01:43:34.560 --> 01:43:38.199 Like, I take my daughters. My mom was on the 1854 01:43:38.319 --> 01:43:39.439 last one that we did. 1855 01:43:40.000 --> 01:43:42.000 There's a great photo that's run in a few news 1856 01:43:42.079 --> 01:43:45.439 articles about Amy's work, and she's standing in a golden 1857 01:43:45.760 --> 01:43:49.359 grassy field. It's hazy with smoke as a cultural burn 1858 01:43:49.439 --> 01:43:52.920 grass fire she's overseeing lurches behind her, and there's a 1859 01:43:53.039 --> 01:43:55.640 husky wolfy dog sitting to her right staring off. And 1860 01:43:55.720 --> 01:43:58.960 Amy's wearing black leggings and a red flannel shirt and 1861 01:43:59.119 --> 01:44:01.960 is pregnant with would be her second daughter. So the 1862 01:44:02.079 --> 01:44:05.560 mood is very calm, unlike what most people's experience of 1863 01:44:05.920 --> 01:44:07.359 land on fire might be. 1864 01:44:08.000 --> 01:44:11.039 Lots of times, you know, we don't wear personal protective equipment, 1865 01:44:11.119 --> 01:44:13.159 you know, like the kind of gnomes that you usually 1866 01:44:13.239 --> 01:44:17.800 see firefighters wearing, because usually the fires are honestly just 1867 01:44:18.000 --> 01:44:21.520 so slow and most people find them I think a 1868 01:44:21.600 --> 01:44:24.039 bit boring too, because it can take a really long 1869 01:44:24.119 --> 01:44:27.600 time to burn a really small piece of land, and 1870 01:44:27.760 --> 01:44:31.079 so for agencies it doesn't really work well, right because 1871 01:44:31.119 --> 01:44:34.560 that for them means more staffing, dollars and other things. 1872 01:44:34.760 --> 01:44:37.760 To achieve, like you know, a smaller area burned. 1873 01:44:38.319 --> 01:44:43.279 Yeah, when it comes to how much fuel is in 1874 01:44:43.920 --> 01:44:47.720 some of the forests, now that would be too much 1875 01:44:47.960 --> 01:44:52.119 for say a prescribed burn maybe to tackle I'm reading 1876 01:44:52.279 --> 01:44:54.960 like there's so much you know, dead timber and fallen 1877 01:44:55.000 --> 01:44:58.079 timber because we've suppressed fire for so long, Like where 1878 01:44:58.279 --> 01:45:01.119 does fire management even begin? And to kind of tackle 1879 01:45:01.199 --> 01:45:01.680 that issue. 1880 01:45:03.199 --> 01:45:05.199 Yeah, it's it is a big issue, and I think 1881 01:45:05.279 --> 01:45:08.159 people often get overwhelmed, Like I just hear you know 1882 01:45:08.279 --> 01:45:08.760 all the time. 1883 01:45:08.880 --> 01:45:10.079 Oh, it's so complex. 1884 01:45:10.239 --> 01:45:13.520 There's so many things and so many people's competing values. 1885 01:45:13.600 --> 01:45:16.279 But I think that we often lose the focus on 1886 01:45:16.520 --> 01:45:21.399 like local communities. So in Canada, our first nations have reserves, 1887 01:45:21.600 --> 01:45:25.199 and so if you go on to a reserve, many times, 1888 01:45:25.319 --> 01:45:27.359 like when you speak to the elders and other people, 1889 01:45:27.479 --> 01:45:30.600 like they know what needs to be done in their area, 1890 01:45:30.800 --> 01:45:34.239 Like they know if certain areas are too fuel loaded, 1891 01:45:34.279 --> 01:45:36.439 and you know, they want to go in there and 1892 01:45:36.760 --> 01:45:40.840 kind of mechanically treat the forest, so you know, by 1893 01:45:41.000 --> 01:45:44.600 using machines and labor to go in and do thinning 1894 01:45:44.680 --> 01:45:47.439 and other things before they can burn to kind of 1895 01:45:47.600 --> 01:45:50.920 keep the fuel load low in those areas. So I 1896 01:45:51.000 --> 01:45:53.279 think for me that's that the biggest thing is that 1897 01:45:53.479 --> 01:45:55.720 we really need to go back to kind of these 1898 01:45:55.840 --> 01:45:58.760 local solutions to fire and that's really kind of what 1899 01:45:58.920 --> 01:46:01.840 our research is showing that, you know, local people want 1900 01:46:01.920 --> 01:46:05.439 to be involved. So you know, I talk mostly about 1901 01:46:05.439 --> 01:46:09.039 indigenous peoples, but you know, ranchers, farmers, other people who 1902 01:46:09.159 --> 01:46:13.000 you know use the landscape for their livelihood, they also 1903 01:46:13.199 --> 01:46:16.199 you know, really want to have a healthy forest and 1904 01:46:16.399 --> 01:46:19.880 environment around them, and they know the areas too, and 1905 01:46:20.000 --> 01:46:23.439 even forestry companies. Like the one nice thing about cultural 1906 01:46:23.560 --> 01:46:26.560 burning is that because we're doing kind of these low 1907 01:46:26.760 --> 01:46:29.840 understory burns, like we don't want to burn the nice, big, 1908 01:46:29.960 --> 01:46:34.000 healthy trees, right because those are so important for cultural 1909 01:46:34.079 --> 01:46:37.760 activities and for other other like our relations other animals. 1910 01:46:37.840 --> 01:46:41.079 It's actually really nicely works together because you kind of 1911 01:46:41.239 --> 01:46:44.880 can get cultural burns going through and really removing some 1912 01:46:45.000 --> 01:46:48.359 of that dead fall and promoting those healthy big tree 1913 01:46:48.479 --> 01:46:50.920 growth that like the timber companies love. 1914 01:46:51.319 --> 01:46:55.920 And obviously this is something that is a family issue 1915 01:46:55.960 --> 01:46:58.239 for you two, having you know, being married to someone 1916 01:46:58.279 --> 01:47:01.800 who is a firefighter. Point did you decide to spread 1917 01:47:01.800 --> 01:47:05.520 the word about good fire. And the term good fire 1918 01:47:05.600 --> 01:47:08.359 too is something that I'm I kind of just learned too. 1919 01:47:09.439 --> 01:47:11.479 Can you talk a little bit about what good fire is? 1920 01:47:12.000 --> 01:47:12.199 Sure? 1921 01:47:12.319 --> 01:47:15.319 So if good fire I think comes just from the 1922 01:47:15.479 --> 01:47:18.079 idea that you know, it's very obvious that we can 1923 01:47:18.279 --> 01:47:21.560 have good fires on the landscape. You know that fire 1924 01:47:21.800 --> 01:47:25.119 is something that is helpful to the environment and to people. 1925 01:47:25.760 --> 01:47:28.479 And so I think Indigenous people lots of times see 1926 01:47:28.720 --> 01:47:31.159 fire almost in a dichotomy, so kind of you know, 1927 01:47:31.279 --> 01:47:34.439 these bad fires and then the good fire that we 1928 01:47:34.600 --> 01:47:38.359 can use as a tools. But before colonization, indigenous people 1929 01:47:38.399 --> 01:47:41.760 would use fire on the landscape in good ways. But 1930 01:47:41.880 --> 01:47:45.520 then also we did have lightning fires obviously back then, right, 1931 01:47:45.760 --> 01:47:48.840 but they would come across the landscape and kind of 1932 01:47:49.039 --> 01:47:53.359 enter into this mosaic landscape that these indigenous burns and 1933 01:47:53.520 --> 01:47:58.000 other lightning cause fires like, and so as they would 1934 01:47:58.079 --> 01:48:00.840 enter them, then the fire behavior would change. So as 1935 01:48:00.920 --> 01:48:04.600 you know, it entered a meadow, the fire intensity might decrease, 1936 01:48:04.680 --> 01:48:06.319 and then it would go back into the forest and 1937 01:48:06.399 --> 01:48:09.479 maybe increase, and then it would hit like a deciduous 1938 01:48:09.520 --> 01:48:12.399 stand of trees and go down again. And so this 1939 01:48:12.680 --> 01:48:16.720 mosaic or patchwork on the landscape was actually really helpful 1940 01:48:16.840 --> 01:48:20.319 for fire to kind of decrease the intensity of these 1941 01:48:20.439 --> 01:48:23.640 fire events. But what we're seeing right now is because 1942 01:48:23.680 --> 01:48:26.720 we've been suppressing those fire events, there's just so much 1943 01:48:26.840 --> 01:48:30.479 fuel in the forest that we're seeing these bad fires. 1944 01:48:30.600 --> 01:48:32.920 So even like I'm thinking like the Dixie Fire in 1945 01:48:33.039 --> 01:48:36.600 California right now, or we have like multiple fires in 1946 01:48:36.960 --> 01:48:40.600 Canada at the moment too that are bad fires. Like 1947 01:48:41.000 --> 01:48:43.000 lots of times, you know, we look at and say, oh, 1948 01:48:43.079 --> 01:48:47.560 fire's natural, there's good ecologic benefits. But for me, there's 1949 01:48:47.680 --> 01:48:50.720 nothing good about these current fires happening right now. 1950 01:48:51.319 --> 01:48:53.880 So at this point, our FaceTime call cut out because 1951 01:48:53.920 --> 01:48:57.319 of spotty internet, so Amy recorded a clip answering a 1952 01:48:57.359 --> 01:49:00.520 few more questions because she is the best and knew 1953 01:49:00.560 --> 01:49:02.520 that we only had a few days until this went up, 1954 01:49:02.760 --> 01:49:04.399 and she's once again the best. 1955 01:49:04.960 --> 01:49:07.880 I also just wanted to mention the importance of indigenous 1956 01:49:08.039 --> 01:49:12.439 people in fire in Canada but also in other countries. 1957 01:49:12.520 --> 01:49:15.600 You know, we often think about indigenous people in fire 1958 01:49:15.760 --> 01:49:17.880 management as something that happened in the past, but we 1959 01:49:18.000 --> 01:49:22.439 have a lot of amazing indigenous firefighters in Canada, Indigenous 1960 01:49:22.520 --> 01:49:25.359 fire managers and other people who are really, you know, 1961 01:49:25.640 --> 01:49:29.159 on the front lines trying to bring back good fire 1962 01:49:29.399 --> 01:49:33.800 and indigenous fire stewardship and really out there every summer 1963 01:49:34.079 --> 01:49:37.920 kind of protecting our communities from these bad fires, and 1964 01:49:38.600 --> 01:49:41.119 especially in Canada, lots of times there we don't give 1965 01:49:41.239 --> 01:49:45.319 enough attention, I think to those indigenous firefighters. Lots of 1966 01:49:45.399 --> 01:49:48.359 times they're kept kind of from progressing in their careers 1967 01:49:48.399 --> 01:49:52.560 because they might not have the appropriate Western education levels, 1968 01:49:52.640 --> 01:49:55.600 you know, a degree or a diploma or something, but 1969 01:49:55.840 --> 01:49:59.199 they have you know, might have twenty thirty forty years 1970 01:49:59.359 --> 01:50:04.359 experience of being on the fire and so knowledgeable and incredible. 1971 01:50:04.920 --> 01:50:06.159 And I think, you know, a lots of times we 1972 01:50:06.279 --> 01:50:09.560 need to look at where Western science as well got 1973 01:50:09.600 --> 01:50:12.520 some of its ideas. Like I've spoken to many elders 1974 01:50:13.000 --> 01:50:16.439 who've told me about drip torches and how they would 1975 01:50:16.560 --> 01:50:20.840 use tree limbs and sap to create their own drip torches. 1976 01:50:21.039 --> 01:50:23.600 That's what their ancestors did and how they would spread 1977 01:50:23.680 --> 01:50:27.079 fire across the landscape was in doing that. So now 1978 01:50:27.119 --> 01:50:29.399 you know, it's a metal canister with fuel in it, 1979 01:50:29.800 --> 01:50:32.960 but it's kind of the same idea that indigenous people's 1980 01:50:33.079 --> 01:50:37.319 had about how to use fire. Properly on the land, 1981 01:50:37.720 --> 01:50:41.960 and just this incredible knowledge base and people in the communities, 1982 01:50:42.039 --> 01:50:45.279 you know, had roles. In Canada, some nations actually had 1983 01:50:45.520 --> 01:50:49.000 families that were fire keepers. There were many people who 1984 01:50:49.039 --> 01:50:52.319 knew about fire and had knowledge about fire activity. 1985 01:50:52.720 --> 01:50:54.880 After the break, you'll hear a clip from Good Fire 1986 01:50:54.960 --> 01:50:59.000 podcast hosts Amy Christensen and Matt Christoff talking about Indigenous 1987 01:50:59.199 --> 01:51:03.039 firefighters experience on the fire line, And I admit I 1988 01:51:03.119 --> 01:51:06.880 found this discussion hilarious. But before that, remember Henry T. 1989 01:51:07.079 --> 01:51:10.359 Lewis Hank the anthropologist who wrote A Time for Burning 1990 01:51:10.560 --> 01:51:13.520 and made that Fires of Spring film, So the retro 1991 01:51:13.720 --> 01:51:17.239 sixteen millimeter film aesthetics are far from the coolest thing 1992 01:51:17.439 --> 01:51:18.760 about his fireworks. 1993 01:51:19.079 --> 01:51:21.319 One of the coolest things I think from Henry Lewis's 1994 01:51:21.399 --> 01:51:24.239 work was when he was speaking to woodland crean Dana 1995 01:51:24.359 --> 01:51:27.520 elders about how they would use fire to melt the 1996 01:51:27.680 --> 01:51:30.079 frost in the ground. And I've seen actually a few 1997 01:51:30.199 --> 01:51:33.800 kind of Western science studies lately on that, but that's 1998 01:51:33.880 --> 01:51:38.039 actually an older technique that the communities would use. So 1999 01:51:38.439 --> 01:51:40.920 you'd get kind of all the dry grass on top 2000 01:51:41.000 --> 01:51:43.800 of a meadow or something, and they would go and 2001 01:51:43.920 --> 01:51:46.600 burn that in the really early spring, because that's the 2002 01:51:46.720 --> 01:51:50.119 most important thing about indigenous burning, is the time to burn, 2003 01:51:50.600 --> 01:51:53.800 when it's safe to do a good fire, and they 2004 01:51:53.800 --> 01:51:57.399 would that would then turn that level that grass into 2005 01:51:57.560 --> 01:52:00.079 you know, black, and so the black would absorb the 2006 01:52:00.159 --> 01:52:02.159 heat of the sun and then start to melt the 2007 01:52:02.279 --> 01:52:05.159 frost out of the ground in the early spring, and 2008 01:52:05.520 --> 01:52:09.039 that would give you much like earlier green shoots and 2009 01:52:09.119 --> 01:52:12.720 green grass coming up that then moves deer other things 2010 01:52:12.760 --> 01:52:15.800 could come in and eat in that area, so it 2011 01:52:15.800 --> 01:52:18.560 would make your hunting or other things a lot easier 2012 01:52:18.680 --> 01:52:21.760 to do. So yeah, I think that that's those are 2013 01:52:21.840 --> 01:52:24.039 things you know that and there's probably so much more 2014 01:52:24.079 --> 01:52:28.520 out there that we don't even know that communities use 2015 01:52:28.680 --> 01:52:31.760 and how they would use fire in a good way. 2016 01:52:32.319 --> 01:52:34.439 And I mean if people are interested as well. You 2017 01:52:34.520 --> 01:52:37.319 know Frank like I think, is probably one of the 2018 01:52:37.800 --> 01:52:41.479 first kind of fire ecologists who also is an indigenous man, 2019 01:52:42.079 --> 01:52:45.600 who you know, saw very early the importance of indigenous 2020 01:52:45.680 --> 01:52:48.800 fire knowledge and bringing it and he's written some really 2021 01:52:48.960 --> 01:52:53.680 great publications that I think for people who are eye opening, 2022 01:52:53.920 --> 01:52:56.199 you know, about how we can use fire in a 2023 01:52:56.279 --> 01:52:58.439 good way on the landscape. 2024 01:52:58.319 --> 01:53:01.600 And to hear an earload of other incredible Indigenous voices 2025 01:53:01.640 --> 01:53:04.760 in fire ecology. You want to subscribe to Goodfire. It's 2026 01:53:04.800 --> 01:53:07.439 a podcast series by Amy and Matt, and we are 2027 01:53:07.520 --> 01:53:10.600 featuring audio from a discussion as they launched Goodfire in 2028 01:53:10.680 --> 01:53:13.560 twenty nineteen. They were gracious enough to let us steal 2029 01:53:13.640 --> 01:53:16.239 some clips to round out the conversation amid our tech 2030 01:53:16.319 --> 01:53:18.720 issues this week, and as it turned out, Amy and 2031 01:53:18.800 --> 01:53:22.279 I had further trouble connecting because those three fires that 2032 01:53:22.399 --> 01:53:25.199 she mentioned around her family cabin got bigger and they 2033 01:53:25.239 --> 01:53:29.039 were forced to evacuate from their vacation. So yes, her 2034 01:53:29.119 --> 01:53:32.640 work is timely and personal, and she literally wrote the 2035 01:53:32.680 --> 01:53:36.640 book on this, a volume titled First Nations Wildfire Evacuations, 2036 01:53:36.760 --> 01:53:41.319 a Guide for Communities and External Agencies, alongside Tara McGee 2037 01:53:41.479 --> 01:53:44.680 and First Nations Wildfire Evacuation Partnership. So I'm going to 2038 01:53:44.720 --> 01:53:46.239 link to that in the show notes as well. Now 2039 01:53:46.359 --> 01:53:48.239 in her name, we're donating this week to a cause 2040 01:53:48.279 --> 01:53:49.960 of her choosing, and she asked her to go to 2041 01:53:50.399 --> 01:53:55.680 Indigenous Residential School Survivors that's IRSSS dot CAA. For over 2042 01:53:55.800 --> 01:53:58.720 twenty years they've assisted First Nation peoples in British Columbia 2043 01:53:58.800 --> 01:54:02.840 to recognize and be holistically empowered from the primary and 2044 01:54:03.000 --> 01:54:08.159 generational effect of the residential schools by supporting research, education, awareness, 2045 01:54:08.319 --> 01:54:12.359 establishing partnerships and advocating for justice and healing and the 2046 01:54:12.800 --> 01:54:18.199 society SS survivors with counseling, court support, information, referrals, workshops 2047 01:54:18.279 --> 01:54:21.720 and more. And you can find out more at IRSSS 2048 01:54:21.840 --> 01:54:24.039 dot Ca. There's a link in the show notes. And 2049 01:54:24.279 --> 01:54:27.800 in Canada, consider participating in Orange Shirt Day on September thirtieth. 2050 01:54:27.880 --> 01:54:31.720 It's also known as National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. Okay, 2051 01:54:31.760 --> 01:54:34.039 so that donation was made possible by some sponsors of 2052 01:54:34.079 --> 01:54:34.359 the show. 2053 01:54:35.479 --> 01:54:38.239 Do you know what real power is? It's knowing you're 2054 01:54:38.319 --> 01:54:40.960 on the same rate for energy all day, every day 2055 01:54:41.039 --> 01:54:43.880 with a smart all day plan from board Gosh Energy, 2056 01:54:44.159 --> 01:54:46.319 save up to eight hundred and eighty euro on dual 2057 01:54:46.399 --> 01:54:48.840 fuel plus get a two hundred and thirty five You're 2058 01:54:48.880 --> 01:54:52.119 a welcome bonus switch today at board Goosh Energy dot 2059 01:54:52.199 --> 01:54:55.600 Ie Board Gosh Energy. 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You won't receive a price increase 2072 01:55:29.560 --> 01:55:31.399 for the duration of this contract from thirty five euro 2073 01:55:31.600 --> 01:55:34.560 month for twenty four months seventy euro thereafter. NS February eighteenth, 2074 01:55:34.640 --> 01:55:35.399 twenty twenty six. 2075 01:55:35.880 --> 01:55:38.279 Get value you can't argue with at Tesco with their 2076 01:55:38.319 --> 01:55:41.119 amazing club card prices. Have the perfect night in with 2077 01:55:41.199 --> 01:55:44.279 their finest frozen pizza meal deal. Get a finest frozen pizza, 2078 01:55:44.439 --> 01:55:47.159 chips and ice cream all for six euro like our 2079 01:55:47.199 --> 01:55:50.319 delicious spicy salami, hot honey and do Ya or Margarito 2080 01:55:50.399 --> 01:55:53.520 wood fired pizzas, served up with their crispy chunkie chips 2081 01:55:53.760 --> 01:55:56.760 and ice cream like Sea salta caramel or Pistasio for dessert. 2082 01:55:57.199 --> 01:56:00.600 Can't argue with that shop in store or online Tesco. 2083 01:56:01.119 --> 01:56:04.439 Every little helps available in most stories, prices very inn express. 2084 01:56:06.760 --> 01:56:11.159 And so many of you patrons asked about indigenous fire management, namely, 2085 01:56:11.319 --> 01:56:13.319 and I'll list you all off at once, very quickly, 2086 01:56:13.560 --> 01:56:17.439 Cameron Brown, Doug potential future fire ourcologist, Ronan Jackie Crisper Who, 2087 01:56:17.560 --> 01:56:21.479 Kimberly Hoffman, Ellen Skelton, Thomas and Wyndham, Brianna Freeman, Justin Roberts, 2088 01:56:21.520 --> 01:56:26.159 Anthony Willis, Donnell O'Neill, and Alexandra Getul. And because our 2089 01:56:26.239 --> 01:56:28.399 time chatting was cut short again, we're so honored and 2090 01:56:28.479 --> 01:56:31.199 lucky to feature relevant clips from a conversation with The 2091 01:56:31.239 --> 01:56:33.800 Good Fire podcast host Amy Christensen and her co host 2092 01:56:33.960 --> 01:56:36.880 Matt Christoph. Okay, here Amy is talking to Matt about 2093 01:56:36.960 --> 01:56:38.039 fears of fire. 2094 01:56:38.199 --> 01:56:41.399 Even in our indigenous communities, Like lots of people are 2095 01:56:41.479 --> 01:56:44.720 now worried about fire and scared of fire. And I 2096 01:56:44.840 --> 01:56:47.840 think so for me when I come across people like 2097 01:56:47.920 --> 01:56:49.520 you know that kind of have that tendency to think 2098 01:56:49.560 --> 01:56:51.640 of fire as bad, I always say, you know, well, 2099 01:56:51.680 --> 01:56:53.640 there's good fire and that's kind of you know the 2100 01:56:53.760 --> 01:56:56.720 name of from the podcast, So you know, when we're 2101 01:56:56.760 --> 01:56:59.840 doing these kind of good fires, it's basically it's not 2102 01:57:00.159 --> 01:57:00.800 a wildfire. 2103 01:57:00.880 --> 01:57:01.960 It's totally different. 2104 01:57:02.279 --> 01:57:04.680 Most Indigenous people want to bring back burning right and 2105 01:57:04.840 --> 01:57:09.880 bring back that cultural practice to their landscape because most elders, 2106 01:57:09.920 --> 01:57:11.640 when they look at the forest, the first thing that 2107 01:57:11.720 --> 01:57:13.880 they say is that it's unhealthy and that it needs 2108 01:57:14.000 --> 01:57:17.079 cleaning up. When I first started working a bunch of elders, 2109 01:57:17.119 --> 01:57:19.640 I'd always hear this cleaning up phrase, cleaning up, And 2110 01:57:20.279 --> 01:57:22.359 you know, it took a while till I realize that, 2111 01:57:22.479 --> 01:57:24.920 you know, that meant fire that they wanted, because you know, 2112 01:57:25.000 --> 01:57:26.800 you don't normally think of that. You think like I'll 2113 01:57:26.840 --> 01:57:29.000 go out with a rake or something like Donald Trump 2114 01:57:29.079 --> 01:57:31.640 thinks that we're doing. But you know, it was actually, 2115 01:57:31.800 --> 01:57:34.560 you know, that they wanted to use fire to kind 2116 01:57:34.600 --> 01:57:36.920 of clean up all that dead litter on the forest 2117 01:57:37.039 --> 01:57:40.039 for so they just want to do that again in 2118 01:57:40.079 --> 01:57:43.840 their territory. But I think they also realize that because 2119 01:57:43.880 --> 01:57:46.359 of the fire suppression that we've had over the last 2120 01:57:46.439 --> 01:57:49.600 you know, fifty to three hundred years depending where you 2121 01:57:49.680 --> 01:57:52.880 are in Canada, Yeah, that it's not that easy just 2122 01:57:52.960 --> 01:57:56.720 to bring back our burning practices right, because we burned 2123 01:57:56.760 --> 01:58:00.279 on intervals, so depending on where you were. You know, 2124 01:58:00.399 --> 01:58:02.279 if you were burning a meadow, you might burn the 2125 01:58:02.319 --> 01:58:04.800 meadow every three years. If you're burning like you know, 2126 01:58:04.920 --> 01:58:07.720 an old growth forest down, you might burn every twenty years. 2127 01:58:07.800 --> 01:58:11.039 Like you know, it just depended on what you were 2128 01:58:11.079 --> 01:58:13.840 burning or what objective you are trying to achieve. So 2129 01:58:14.399 --> 01:58:16.880 you know, we and now we've excluded fire. So I mean, 2130 01:58:16.960 --> 01:58:19.760 the litter and the build up of fuel is crazy. 2131 01:58:19.840 --> 01:58:22.399 So I think, like now, most of the elders I 2132 01:58:22.479 --> 01:58:24.119 talked to, if they say, like if we went and 2133 01:58:24.239 --> 01:58:26.399 tried to do this now, like we would basically burn 2134 01:58:26.479 --> 01:58:28.720 down the forest because we'd be trying to start a 2135 01:58:28.800 --> 01:58:31.439 low intensity burn, but there's just too much fuel on 2136 01:58:31.520 --> 01:58:35.239 the floor, so it would immediately like escalate. 2137 01:58:35.600 --> 01:58:39.880 So how do indigenous fire scientists and wildlands firefighters approach 2138 01:58:40.000 --> 01:58:43.520 these really different schools of thought? Any explains to that. 2139 01:58:44.039 --> 01:58:46.159 We call it like two eyed seeing, So that's kind 2140 01:58:46.199 --> 01:58:48.159 of the new concept that's come up. So that's like, 2141 01:58:48.720 --> 01:58:51.399 you know, where as indigenous people or even as non indigenous, 2142 01:58:51.439 --> 01:58:53.119 like you know, you're looking at the world through one eye, 2143 01:58:53.159 --> 01:58:56.239 through your western perspective, right, because we're all trained in 2144 01:58:56.319 --> 01:58:59.159 that you know, like there's not there's very few people 2145 01:58:59.279 --> 01:59:01.279 that you know are and raised in the bush and 2146 01:59:01.399 --> 01:59:04.720 have that kind of only subsistence lifestyle. But then out 2147 01:59:04.760 --> 01:59:06.439 of the other eye, you know, you can see with 2148 01:59:06.760 --> 01:59:09.279 your indigenous eye, right, so you can see, you know, 2149 01:59:09.439 --> 01:59:11.680 how you know where things could be better. And I 2150 01:59:11.720 --> 01:59:14.960 think for me that's where fire management comes in because 2151 01:59:15.000 --> 01:59:17.680 you know, I'm trained from the Western perspective, but I 2152 01:59:17.800 --> 01:59:21.560 think you know, from like culture then like you know, 2153 01:59:21.640 --> 01:59:24.760 there's things that Indigenous people do or know better. And 2154 01:59:24.880 --> 01:59:26.920 you know, for me, part of my job is you know, 2155 01:59:27.039 --> 01:59:29.319 advocating for that and trying so you know, it's not 2156 01:59:29.520 --> 01:59:33.399 saying like drop all Western science around fire, right, we 2157 01:59:33.560 --> 01:59:37.279 need that, we need that too, But then indigenous people 2158 01:59:37.359 --> 01:59:39.960 and our cultures also no ways you know for making 2159 01:59:40.000 --> 01:59:42.560 the forest healthy. So to me, if you bring those 2160 01:59:42.600 --> 01:59:44.800 two together, it makes like you know what I mean, 2161 01:59:44.880 --> 01:59:47.479 it's then you have like an incredible knowledge base that 2162 01:59:47.760 --> 01:59:49.159 you're coming from, right. 2163 01:59:49.520 --> 01:59:51.680 Ah, the firefighter stories I promised you. 2164 01:59:52.079 --> 01:59:55.199 One example is like talking to firefighters. So there's this 2165 01:59:55.319 --> 01:59:58.359 one guy who is a non like a non indigenous firefighter. 2166 01:59:58.479 --> 02:00:00.359 So it's kind of funny up on the you know, 2167 02:00:00.600 --> 02:00:02.920 the fire crew is there lots of that. There's like 2168 02:00:03.000 --> 02:00:05.960 thirty or forty year indigenous firefighters that have been on 2169 02:00:06.039 --> 02:00:08.239 the fire line a long time, and they say, you know, 2170 02:00:08.399 --> 02:00:11.359 these new kids, like university grats come up and start 2171 02:00:11.399 --> 02:00:13.479 telling them what to do. So this one guy was 2172 02:00:13.520 --> 02:00:15.479 actually telling me that he, you know, he started out 2173 02:00:15.520 --> 02:00:18.760 of university as kind of a fire boss and went 2174 02:00:18.880 --> 02:00:21.479 up on the one line and he had these native crews, 2175 02:00:21.560 --> 02:00:23.239 and he said he was that he thought they were 2176 02:00:23.279 --> 02:00:25.760 the laziest people in the world because he's like, they 2177 02:00:25.760 --> 02:00:27.760 would get up in the morning and work a little bit, 2178 02:00:27.800 --> 02:00:29.800 but then he's like, then they nap all day and 2179 02:00:29.920 --> 02:00:31.880 then like in the in the bush, you know, yeah, 2180 02:00:31.960 --> 02:00:33.520 and then he's like, but then you know, they would 2181 02:00:33.560 --> 02:00:35.520 get up and kind of work all night. And then 2182 02:00:35.560 --> 02:00:37.680 he's like and then I started like really looking and 2183 02:00:38.319 --> 02:00:39.560 watching what they were doing. 2184 02:00:39.720 --> 02:00:40.479 And he said that. 2185 02:00:40.640 --> 02:00:42.560 Then one of the guys came up and told him, like, 2186 02:00:42.680 --> 02:00:45.279 we fight the fire when it's the weakest, because we 2187 02:00:45.439 --> 02:00:47.960 see fire as a living being, and why would you 2188 02:00:48.079 --> 02:00:50.520 fight something at the height of its day, you know, 2189 02:00:50.680 --> 02:00:53.600 like at two pm on a really sunny, hot day 2190 02:00:53.680 --> 02:00:56.680 with high winds, right, like, why would you do anything? 2191 02:00:56.800 --> 02:00:56.920 Right? 2192 02:00:57.000 --> 02:00:59.319 Like the fire can just jump or yeah, you know, 2193 02:00:59.479 --> 02:01:01.840 but if you know, fight it in the morning when 2194 02:01:01.880 --> 02:01:05.399 it's the weakest, or in the evening or overnight is. 2195 02:01:05.439 --> 02:01:08.520 High and the temperature is low, and so the activities. 2196 02:01:08.159 --> 02:01:11.000 Yeah, decrease. Yeah, and everyone, well I should say generally 2197 02:01:11.039 --> 02:01:13.600 now with climate change, who knows, but generally fire activity 2198 02:01:13.640 --> 02:01:14.439 decreases at night. 2199 02:01:14.520 --> 02:01:14.640 Right. 2200 02:01:14.760 --> 02:01:17.479 So Sony's but that these guys have got that not 2201 02:01:17.600 --> 02:01:21.000 from textbooks, but from years of being out and watching fires, 2202 02:01:21.479 --> 02:01:24.119 so I think. And so he was saying, like to me, 2203 02:01:24.319 --> 02:01:27.439 like this non indigenous kid that that it was just 2204 02:01:27.600 --> 02:01:30.119 amazing to see that because he didn't learn any of 2205 02:01:30.199 --> 02:01:32.840 that in school. And so for him, he said he'd 2206 02:01:32.880 --> 02:01:35.239 learned more that summer working with the native crews about 2207 02:01:35.279 --> 02:01:38.760 fire than going to school. Basically not to say, you know, 2208 02:01:38.920 --> 02:01:44.239 don't stay in school, kids, but like because that's important too, 2209 02:01:44.359 --> 02:01:46.560 but you know, there's other ways and other things to 2210 02:01:47.319 --> 02:01:50.399 learn as well about about fire. Lots of the indigenous 2211 02:01:50.439 --> 02:01:52.600 fire guys they'd always tell me. One of the funniest 2212 02:01:52.680 --> 02:01:55.479 things is like the when the fire season first starts 2213 02:01:55.520 --> 02:01:57.760 in like in Cree, the word for white boy or 2214 02:01:57.800 --> 02:02:01.159 whatever mooniew. So they say, like, oh, it's so funny. 2215 02:02:01.199 --> 02:02:02.760 Ande like the mooney I'll come on the fire because 2216 02:02:02.760 --> 02:02:05.000 he's like, they're all just doing selfies with the fire 2217 02:02:05.079 --> 02:02:07.520 in the background, and he's like and we're all like, 2218 02:02:07.680 --> 02:02:10.039 you know, actually working and he's like and you look 2219 02:02:10.119 --> 02:02:12.399 and all the moonya are just lined up way away 2220 02:02:12.439 --> 02:02:15.640 from the fire take itself. And then it was funny 2221 02:02:15.640 --> 02:02:18.079 because then I started seeing on Facebook. 2222 02:02:17.640 --> 02:02:20.640 Like lots of people well on Instagram. 2223 02:02:20.840 --> 02:02:23.079 Yeah, but I think that that's like just maybe a 2224 02:02:23.119 --> 02:02:24.960 bit of and it's kind of more of like because 2225 02:02:25.239 --> 02:02:27.720 for Indigenous people, it's more of a lifestyle, right, so 2226 02:02:27.840 --> 02:02:31.359 they're they've been doing that. That's so it's it's a 2227 02:02:31.439 --> 02:02:34.079 great career for indigenous people because they can go out 2228 02:02:34.560 --> 02:02:36.800 in the summer, make money, be on the land, and 2229 02:02:36.880 --> 02:02:38.760 then in the winter they can go and like run 2230 02:02:38.840 --> 02:02:42.159 their chaplines or hunt, be with their families and like 2231 02:02:42.279 --> 02:02:45.239 kind of participate in their their culture. So I think 2232 02:02:45.279 --> 02:02:48.119 that that's why it's become like kind of a nice 2233 02:02:48.199 --> 02:02:50.479 life style for certain people. 2234 02:02:50.600 --> 02:02:51.439 Yeah, yeah, sure. 2235 02:02:51.680 --> 02:02:54.520 So how do agencies and nations work together? How can 2236 02:02:54.640 --> 02:02:58.319 ecologists and fire keepers spark those collaborations. 2237 02:02:58.680 --> 02:03:00.560 People always say, oh, you need to gauge with the 2238 02:03:00.640 --> 02:03:04.199 Indigenous communities and and well, like to me, that's a 2239 02:03:04.279 --> 02:03:06.880 nice concept. I know that lots of non Indigenous people 2240 02:03:07.000 --> 02:03:09.479 or companies get frustrated because you know, they go to 2241 02:03:09.560 --> 02:03:12.319 these communities and try to engage and nobody turns up 2242 02:03:12.479 --> 02:03:14.159 or you know, they can't get a hold of anybody, 2243 02:03:14.239 --> 02:03:17.720 nobody returns their calls. And so I think for me, 2244 02:03:17.920 --> 02:03:20.159 like the thing to remember with that is, you know, 2245 02:03:20.279 --> 02:03:24.640 for people to remember that like first nations are under 2246 02:03:24.720 --> 02:03:27.920 the Indian Act, right, so basically all their resource and 2247 02:03:28.279 --> 02:03:31.039 you know, how their capital for how they're run all 2248 02:03:31.119 --> 02:03:34.600 basically is decided in Ottawa almost you know, and how 2249 02:03:34.680 --> 02:03:37.079 much money comes down to them. So most of the times, 2250 02:03:37.159 --> 02:03:40.920 you know, even though the communities have high capacity, you know, 2251 02:03:41.039 --> 02:03:44.479 for forestry or other things, it's often very underfunded because 2252 02:03:44.520 --> 02:03:46.439 of what comes down the stream from Ottawa. 2253 02:03:46.680 --> 02:03:49.399 Ottawa is an eastern Canada in Ontario. And did you 2254 02:03:49.439 --> 02:03:51.920 know that Ottawa is the capital of Canada. I didn't 2255 02:03:52.119 --> 02:03:55.479 until right now. So if you feel the same, it's okay. 2256 02:03:55.800 --> 02:03:58.279 Basically there's not enough money, right so they you know 2257 02:03:58.439 --> 02:04:00.520 might not have a forestry cordate, or they might not 2258 02:04:00.640 --> 02:04:03.279 have a lands person or you know, or the chief 2259 02:04:03.399 --> 02:04:05.239 might be like that. You know, the chief has to 2260 02:04:05.399 --> 02:04:09.520 manage housing, healthcare, like you know, everything like you get so, 2261 02:04:09.560 --> 02:04:12.000 I know, people get frustrated. But at the same time, 2262 02:04:12.079 --> 02:04:13.439 I think, you know, there's it needs to be a 2263 02:04:13.479 --> 02:04:16.399 bit of patience and understanding there that lots of the 2264 02:04:16.520 --> 02:04:19.159 nations are trying as much as they can, and some 2265 02:04:19.359 --> 02:04:21.319 are great. Like there's some nations you know that have 2266 02:04:21.960 --> 02:04:24.800 really gone into forestry there, you know, the community forests 2267 02:04:24.840 --> 02:04:27.840 in BC. I think that those are a really great 2268 02:04:27.880 --> 02:04:30.439 example of things that are working well. Or I know 2269 02:04:30.520 --> 02:04:34.760 there's been partnerships like between different like forest industries and 2270 02:04:34.920 --> 02:04:39.399 indigenous nations too. Most forestry people don't go into forestry 2271 02:04:39.439 --> 02:04:41.640 because they want to you know, kill all the trees 2272 02:04:41.800 --> 02:04:44.319 and everything, right, They go into because they love being 2273 02:04:44.399 --> 02:04:46.720 in the forest, right, so they want to sustain that. 2274 02:04:47.199 --> 02:04:49.640 Most indigenous people love being in the forest, right, So 2275 02:04:49.800 --> 02:04:52.199 right there you have a match of you know, so 2276 02:04:52.359 --> 02:04:54.159 then it almost goes to well, then, you know, if 2277 02:04:54.199 --> 02:04:57.840 these are our shared values, how then can we you know, 2278 02:04:58.079 --> 02:05:00.479 move forward together. But I think think one of the 2279 02:05:00.560 --> 02:05:03.359 problems is that there's a real lack of trust because 2280 02:05:03.399 --> 02:05:05.600 there's been a lot of people that have taken advantage 2281 02:05:05.640 --> 02:05:09.079 of indigenous communities, so you know, come in and said 2282 02:05:09.159 --> 02:05:11.640 good things, said all the right things, and then you know, 2283 02:05:11.800 --> 02:05:14.760 ended up taking money and you know, not involving the nation, 2284 02:05:15.039 --> 02:05:18.560 and so it takes it can take a while. I 2285 02:05:18.680 --> 02:05:21.359 think like a helpful thing too, as employing indigenous people. 2286 02:05:21.840 --> 02:05:23.479 So you know, when you make or want to work 2287 02:05:23.520 --> 02:05:25.239 in a certain nation or with them, you know, to 2288 02:05:25.359 --> 02:05:28.319 employ people from that band and give them, you know, 2289 02:05:28.439 --> 02:05:32.399 a sustainable you know career. And there's lots of indigenous 2290 02:05:32.439 --> 02:05:35.600 people that actually have forest tech diplomas and other. 2291 02:05:35.560 --> 02:05:37.840 Things, yep, that that can do that. 2292 02:05:38.079 --> 02:05:41.560 So I think, you know, and I know it's not 2293 02:05:41.720 --> 02:05:43.800 easy either. I don't want people to think like, oh yeah, 2294 02:05:43.840 --> 02:05:45.720 you just sit at a table and decide your values 2295 02:05:45.760 --> 02:05:47.520 and then everything goes away. 2296 02:05:48.279 --> 02:05:51.600 Amy explains that over the many years, promises have been 2297 02:05:51.640 --> 02:05:55.479 made and broken, and outside collaboration has seemed to come 2298 02:05:55.560 --> 02:05:56.359 with a price tag. 2299 02:05:56.920 --> 02:05:59.199 You know, I think you need to recognize, you know, 2300 02:05:59.239 --> 02:06:01.239 if you want to do this kind of work that 2301 02:06:01.359 --> 02:06:03.199 there has to be some kind of benefit for the 2302 02:06:03.239 --> 02:06:06.039 community as a whole as well, whether that's you know, 2303 02:06:06.239 --> 02:06:10.359 monetarily or you know, supporting like a recreational forest or 2304 02:06:10.840 --> 02:06:13.520 you know something. Yeah, to kind of come to that, 2305 02:06:13.640 --> 02:06:16.039 I don't like, there's not I think an easy answer 2306 02:06:16.119 --> 02:06:18.119 for you know, like just do this one step and 2307 02:06:18.239 --> 02:06:20.479 you know, indigenous people will love to work with you. 2308 02:06:20.600 --> 02:06:23.399 But for me, I think that forestry really has an 2309 02:06:23.439 --> 02:06:26.520 advantage over say like the oil and gas industry because 2310 02:06:26.520 --> 02:06:29.000 I think that there's many more shared values or like 2311 02:06:29.359 --> 02:06:31.680 I think the worldview of an indigenous person in a 2312 02:06:31.760 --> 02:06:35.560 forestry is much more similar. So yeah, I think that 2313 02:06:35.640 --> 02:06:39.039 that's kind of exciting almost, and you know, something kind 2314 02:06:39.039 --> 02:06:40.520 of a future. And I've seen like a bunch of 2315 02:06:40.640 --> 02:06:43.439 nations now you know, are opening their own little sawmills 2316 02:06:43.479 --> 02:06:46.199 and other things, and to me, that's like exciting. So 2317 02:06:46.359 --> 02:06:48.520 because it has to do with the housing crises we have, 2318 02:06:48.800 --> 02:06:50.760 right so they want to be able to you know, 2319 02:06:51.119 --> 02:06:53.760 harvest their own wood to build their own homes, which 2320 02:06:54.199 --> 02:06:56.159 I mean, why we aren't doing that, I have no idea, 2321 02:06:57.479 --> 02:06:59.880 you know, instead of shipping in the wood and timber 2322 02:07:00.000 --> 02:07:03.000 and stuff. So I think, yeah, there's Unfortunately there's not 2323 02:07:03.119 --> 02:07:05.520 like a really easy answer. But I would say, like 2324 02:07:05.600 --> 02:07:07.560 the biggest thing is, you know, to be genuine and 2325 02:07:07.680 --> 02:07:11.520 patient and then understand that history. You know that the 2326 02:07:11.640 --> 02:07:14.479 situation that you're coming into because lots of people get like, 2327 02:07:14.600 --> 02:07:18.239 a I don't want to say white savior because that 2328 02:07:18.399 --> 02:07:20.119 sounds really bad, but you know it's kind of like, oh, 2329 02:07:20.119 --> 02:07:21.920 I'm going to go to the community and help them, 2330 02:07:22.039 --> 02:07:24.720 or you know, like yeah, and I think the problem 2331 02:07:24.840 --> 02:07:26.880 is that there's a revolving door of these you know, 2332 02:07:27.039 --> 02:07:30.479 white saviors or people that you know are coming to 2333 02:07:30.600 --> 02:07:33.520 save them. And like even like if you go to 2334 02:07:33.600 --> 02:07:36.079 a First Nation conference, like there's just kind of business 2335 02:07:36.159 --> 02:07:38.359 people all over the place trying to sell the chiefs 2336 02:07:38.439 --> 02:07:42.279 on different ideas and different different things. So yeah, it's 2337 02:07:42.319 --> 02:07:45.760 almost kind of being becoming trusted in the community and 2338 02:07:45.880 --> 02:07:48.439 then also working long term. And that's something that you know, 2339 02:07:48.560 --> 02:07:52.239 are especially in government, like we don't really support because 2340 02:07:52.239 --> 02:07:53.880 you know, everyone kind of wants to climb the ladder 2341 02:07:53.920 --> 02:07:56.600 in government, whereas you know, the most trusted people are 2342 02:07:56.640 --> 02:07:58.600 generally the ones from the community who've been in the 2343 02:07:58.640 --> 02:08:01.520 community the longest. Yeah, and that's generally who like an 2344 02:08:01.560 --> 02:08:03.000 Indigenous person would trust. 2345 02:08:03.159 --> 02:08:03.359 Yeah. 2346 02:08:04.279 --> 02:08:07.880 So yeah, it's almost like doing these relationships long term too. 2347 02:08:07.960 --> 02:08:10.560 And I think there's some great examples out there of 2348 02:08:10.720 --> 02:08:12.479 things that are going really well. 2349 02:08:12.880 --> 02:08:16.760 So yes, trust and incentives really matter, as does plain 2350 02:08:16.840 --> 02:08:17.319 old money. 2351 02:08:17.560 --> 02:08:19.319 And I would say lots of that does come from 2352 02:08:19.680 --> 02:08:22.319 like that funding issue. You know that sometimes they just 2353 02:08:22.399 --> 02:08:25.359 don't have enough money. And then also other times, you know, 2354 02:08:25.560 --> 02:08:27.960 we're dealing with lots of issues that have been brought 2355 02:08:28.039 --> 02:08:30.199 on by colonization, right, So like if you're dealing with 2356 02:08:30.279 --> 02:08:33.079 a suicide crisis in your community, you're not really going 2357 02:08:33.159 --> 02:08:36.479 to care about forestry, right, And so I hear people 2358 02:08:36.560 --> 02:08:39.119 say that too, like to me sometimes about you know, 2359 02:08:39.159 --> 02:08:41.399 when I talk about how we're stewards of the environment, 2360 02:08:41.439 --> 02:08:43.279 they'll say to me, like, have you ever been on 2361 02:08:43.399 --> 02:08:46.760 a reserve and looked at like you know, there's garbage everywhere, 2362 02:08:46.880 --> 02:08:49.520 and you know, and people don't care about their houses, 2363 02:08:49.600 --> 02:08:53.960 and like that's hardly an environmental steward. And to me, 2364 02:08:54.119 --> 02:08:57.680 that's colonization, right, Like that's where where we've gone and 2365 02:08:57.760 --> 02:08:58.840 where we've been pushed. 2366 02:08:59.199 --> 02:09:03.760 So reminder that cultural burning practices were criminalized, but now 2367 02:09:03.840 --> 02:09:07.159 they're becoming of interest to Western scientists. And Amy says 2368 02:09:07.199 --> 02:09:10.840 that returning to that fired stewardship could be really healing 2369 02:09:11.319 --> 02:09:14.640 for forests, for people who love the forest, and for 2370 02:09:14.760 --> 02:09:16.680 the people who have been kept from doing it for 2371 02:09:16.800 --> 02:09:17.159 so long. 2372 02:09:17.800 --> 02:09:21.920 Moving forward, it's kind of like re like regaining our 2373 02:09:22.000 --> 02:09:24.560 culture back. And so that's like where to relate it 2374 02:09:24.600 --> 02:09:27.920 to burning. That's we're burning in those things because burning 2375 02:09:28.000 --> 02:09:30.840 for us is a cultural practice, right, And so I 2376 02:09:30.920 --> 02:09:34.119 think by getting fire back on the landscape, by kind 2377 02:09:34.159 --> 02:09:37.319 of making our forests healthier, you know, than that promotes 2378 02:09:37.359 --> 02:09:41.079 a healthier community. So you know, instead of kids sitting inside, 2379 02:09:41.119 --> 02:09:42.800 you know, they're out on the land and like what 2380 02:09:42.960 --> 02:09:45.720 kid doesn't like fire, right, So they're out with their 2381 02:09:45.840 --> 02:09:48.880 elder like burning, and and it is those neat things 2382 02:09:48.960 --> 02:09:52.720 like even just showing kids like how smart their ancestors were. 2383 02:09:52.880 --> 02:09:55.920 Like the one elder that I was talking to was 2384 02:09:55.960 --> 02:09:58.399 telling me about how drip torches actually came from First 2385 02:09:58.520 --> 02:10:00.760 Nations people, which I didn't know, but I think, like that, 2386 02:10:01.039 --> 02:10:03.279 to me, that's neat because you take kids out there 2387 02:10:03.920 --> 02:10:06.640 and you show them like, well, you know, drip torches 2388 02:10:06.720 --> 02:10:09.640 came from your you know, and and and even like 2389 02:10:09.760 --> 02:10:12.640 kids had jobs on fires, right, So oh man, I 2390 02:10:12.800 --> 02:10:15.159 actually heard this fantastic well that also made me cry 2391 02:10:15.239 --> 02:10:18.000 the other day from this guy in Australia and he 2392 02:10:18.199 --> 02:10:21.479 was saying for them, burning is such a family affair. 2393 02:10:21.560 --> 02:10:23.159 And actually that's what I hear too from all of 2394 02:10:23.239 --> 02:10:25.359 our that people I've talked to here, is that you know, 2395 02:10:25.439 --> 02:10:26.960 it wouldn't just be the men that would go out 2396 02:10:26.960 --> 02:10:29.960 and burn. It's the entire family and the kids. Like 2397 02:10:30.199 --> 02:10:32.840 one thing they would do is pick up like pine 2398 02:10:32.920 --> 02:10:35.680 cones and you know, light them on fire and then 2399 02:10:35.920 --> 02:10:36.880 from the fire and then. 2400 02:10:36.880 --> 02:10:37.600 Throw them right. 2401 02:10:38.359 --> 02:10:41.079 It's like awesome for kids. And I know, like there's 2402 02:10:41.119 --> 02:10:43.319 fire managers probably listening to this saying, oh my goodness, 2403 02:10:43.319 --> 02:10:46.399 they're going to burn down the Please do not do this. 2404 02:10:46.760 --> 02:10:48.600 If you are just a kid listening, I don't want 2405 02:10:48.600 --> 02:10:51.880 to start throwing flaming balls of fire. Don't do that. 2406 02:10:52.079 --> 02:10:54.920 Yeah, but this was obviously under the direction of elders, 2407 02:10:54.960 --> 02:10:57.039 and you know also burning at like a very low 2408 02:10:57.159 --> 02:11:01.399 risk times, right, Like this was not in the very yes, 2409 02:11:01.920 --> 02:11:03.680 but so you know, it's to give the kids a 2410 02:11:03.800 --> 02:11:06.600 job on the fire. And the one guy from Australia 2411 02:11:06.720 --> 02:11:09.960 was saying that for his mob that for them it 2412 02:11:10.239 --> 02:11:13.560 was bringing children's laughter back to the forest because the 2413 02:11:13.640 --> 02:11:16.239 trees hadn't heard the children laugh in a long time 2414 02:11:16.760 --> 02:11:18.920 and they felt that that was needed for the trees 2415 02:11:18.960 --> 02:11:21.239 to be healthy too. And I mean that kind of 2416 02:11:21.279 --> 02:11:24.960 relates like obviously children's laughter does not you know, directly 2417 02:11:25.079 --> 02:11:28.319 affect the tree, but it's more that like if people 2418 02:11:28.399 --> 02:11:31.239 are out on the land stewarding it, right, then that 2419 02:11:31.399 --> 02:11:33.880 promotes health for the health of the trees. 2420 02:11:34.039 --> 02:11:35.319 So anyways, to me, that. 2421 02:11:35.399 --> 02:11:38.920 Was such a beautiful like quote because I think too often, 2422 02:11:39.000 --> 02:11:42.079 you know, we kind of remove that or remove kind 2423 02:11:42.119 --> 02:11:43.439 of the community. 2424 02:11:43.760 --> 02:11:45.920 Patron n Nikki DeMarco asked, is there any way we 2425 02:11:45.920 --> 02:11:48.319 could go back to indigenous sewardship to help with this 2426 02:11:48.439 --> 02:11:51.960 problem or does the red tape make it not feasible? 2427 02:11:52.319 --> 02:11:54.600 So moving forward, what are the legalities of it? 2428 02:11:55.199 --> 02:11:59.279 So on our like the reserves were technically allowed to burn, 2429 02:11:59.479 --> 02:12:02.840 right because that's the you know the band, Well it's 2430 02:12:02.920 --> 02:12:05.159 federal jurisdiction, but you know, the band kind of has 2431 02:12:05.199 --> 02:12:06.880 a bit of control over it, so you know that 2432 02:12:06.960 --> 02:12:09.840 you don't need provincial permission to do that. So, you know, 2433 02:12:09.920 --> 02:12:12.399 lots of agents fire management agencies say, you know, oh, 2434 02:12:12.479 --> 02:12:14.960 we're so supportive of indigenous people and we want to 2435 02:12:15.039 --> 02:12:17.840 help that, you know, you know, support their practices, you know, 2436 02:12:17.960 --> 02:12:20.800 until we say, you know, we want to burn something. 2437 02:12:21.319 --> 02:12:23.239 And so you know what I've seen even you know, 2438 02:12:23.359 --> 02:12:25.640 in BC is where I'm doing a lot of work 2439 02:12:25.760 --> 02:12:28.680 right now, because the nations there are so passionate about burning. 2440 02:12:28.760 --> 02:12:31.840 But you know, they they're going into these meetings and 2441 02:12:31.920 --> 02:12:34.560 it's you know, like a really complicated process to get 2442 02:12:34.640 --> 02:12:37.960 prescribed burning on the ground, and it's very Western base, 2443 02:12:38.039 --> 02:12:40.159 you know, you have to know like fuel types that 2444 02:12:40.239 --> 02:12:46.239 are out there. Yeah, it's like a crazy twelve step process. 2445 02:12:46.319 --> 02:12:48.680 And most of the communities look at that and just say, 2446 02:12:49.000 --> 02:12:51.560 you know, we'll screw this, we're burning ourselves, you know. 2447 02:12:51.880 --> 02:12:53.920 And then even when they want to burn, like I've 2448 02:12:53.960 --> 02:12:56.399 heard of lots, you know where somebody sees smoke and 2449 02:12:56.439 --> 02:12:59.319 then you know, calls the you know, calls the emergency number, 2450 02:12:59.359 --> 02:13:01.319 and then you know, a helicopter will just come and 2451 02:13:01.399 --> 02:13:04.640 put out their little fires that they're burning right without 2452 02:13:04.680 --> 02:13:06.840 you know, coming and dropping down and maybe talking to 2453 02:13:06.960 --> 02:13:09.840 the people or seeing what's going on. So there's a 2454 02:13:09.880 --> 02:13:11.600 bit of a disconnect, and I can see it from 2455 02:13:11.640 --> 02:13:14.960 both sides, right because especially in BC, like the fires 2456 02:13:15.000 --> 02:13:17.199 has been so crazy that I think, you know, the 2457 02:13:17.279 --> 02:13:20.680 BC Fire Manager or Wildfire Service there, you know, obviously 2458 02:13:20.760 --> 02:13:24.239 doesn't want out of control fires, but the nations there 2459 02:13:24.520 --> 02:13:26.479 want to burn. And so what I'm seeing right now 2460 02:13:26.600 --> 02:13:30.920 is because they they're just like smashing heads basically, like 2461 02:13:31.000 --> 02:13:33.960 they're supportive until we want to burn. And because of 2462 02:13:34.039 --> 02:13:36.319 that smashing of heads, is that now the nations are 2463 02:13:36.359 --> 02:13:38.680 saying like, well, screw you, this is our territory. We're 2464 02:13:38.720 --> 02:13:41.000 doing what we want, you know, and then like it 2465 02:13:41.119 --> 02:13:44.680 becomes like this real conflict situation and we're trying to 2466 02:13:44.760 --> 02:13:47.439 work with like the agency and you know, maybe even 2467 02:13:47.520 --> 02:13:51.399 introduce some sort of like cultural burn protocol or procedure 2468 02:13:51.920 --> 02:13:54.600 you know that's more indigenous based, that same thing, like 2469 02:13:54.640 --> 02:13:57.960 you're kind of getting permission, you know, you're notifying the 2470 02:13:58.000 --> 02:14:00.560 correct authorities, but it's not as crazy. Is this like 2471 02:14:00.800 --> 02:14:01.880 existing process? 2472 02:14:02.119 --> 02:14:04.079 Well, I think that's and we've just again it's another 2473 02:14:04.239 --> 02:14:05.880 thing we've discussed a bit on the on the other 2474 02:14:05.920 --> 02:14:08.319 episodes we did that, yeah, the Good Fire podcast. But 2475 02:14:09.239 --> 02:14:13.720 talking about that, that's another big barrier to indigenous burning 2476 02:14:13.840 --> 02:14:17.039 or cultural burning however you want to call it. Is 2477 02:14:17.199 --> 02:14:20.800 the like the Western barriers on that because like you're right, 2478 02:14:20.840 --> 02:14:23.039 we don't want out of control of fires. So the 2479 02:14:23.119 --> 02:14:25.680 Western like the Western government, we want to make sure 2480 02:14:25.720 --> 02:14:28.319 that like any fire that is started is not going 2481 02:14:28.359 --> 02:14:32.600 to become a problem for anything outside of the reserve 2482 02:14:32.720 --> 02:14:36.000 or whatever, right, but also at the same time recognizing that, 2483 02:14:36.279 --> 02:14:38.840 like you Nick, you were saying, Indigenous people have been 2484 02:14:38.920 --> 02:14:42.479 working with fire for thousands of years and understand the relationship. 2485 02:14:42.840 --> 02:14:48.239 So how do you make sure that government feels comfortable 2486 02:14:48.880 --> 02:14:53.039 with this going on? But also ensuring that because it's 2487 02:14:53.159 --> 02:14:55.720 entirely possible. Also like this is something that somebody who's 2488 02:14:55.760 --> 02:14:58.640 playing Devil's advocate would say, right, is just saying that, like, well, 2489 02:14:58.640 --> 02:15:00.159 how do we ensure that they know what they're doing, 2490 02:15:00.199 --> 02:15:02.159 because it could be somebody who just because they're Indigenous 2491 02:15:02.159 --> 02:15:03.760 doesn't mean they know what's going on, right, they have 2492 02:15:03.840 --> 02:15:06.159 to have that knowledge passed down and collected somehow. 2493 02:15:06.399 --> 02:15:08.439 Yeah, and you know, I've heard that all the time, like, oh, 2494 02:15:08.479 --> 02:15:10.319 if we allow this, the Indians are going to be 2495 02:15:10.399 --> 02:15:12.359 lighting fires everywhere, Like yeah. 2496 02:15:12.239 --> 02:15:12.800 Exactly right. 2497 02:15:12.920 --> 02:15:14.479 And then that kind of fear yeah. 2498 02:15:14.359 --> 02:15:17.239 Right, So there's that fear of will they take advantage 2499 02:15:17.239 --> 02:15:19.479 of this and just do it for fun or whatever? 2500 02:15:19.880 --> 02:15:22.319 And that exists, So we have to address that fear. 2501 02:15:22.399 --> 02:15:24.760 So how do we There's going to have to be 2502 02:15:24.800 --> 02:15:29.119 a collaboration somehow to be like, Okay, we acknowledge that 2503 02:15:29.439 --> 02:15:32.840 like these four people somehow, Unfortunately, that's the way it's 2504 02:15:32.840 --> 02:15:34.199 going to happen. I think it's probably going to have 2505 02:15:34.239 --> 02:15:36.479 to go that these four people in this band have 2506 02:15:36.640 --> 02:15:39.039 the knowledge and they have to be like I don't know, 2507 02:15:39.359 --> 02:15:41.920 And this is super westernized for me to think, right, like, 2508 02:15:42.159 --> 02:15:44.840 these people have the knowledge and understanding of how to 2509 02:15:44.880 --> 02:15:46.680 do this, so if they're in charge, we're not going 2510 02:15:46.760 --> 02:15:51.279 to worry about it. But I also feel like indigenous 2511 02:15:51.279 --> 02:15:54.439 communities having to talk to the overlord, the government of 2512 02:15:54.439 --> 02:15:56.640 all what they're doing on their own land is counter 2513 02:15:56.880 --> 02:15:59.199 is exactly the opposite of what you're trying to accomplish here. 2514 02:15:59.399 --> 02:16:01.319 Yeah, and so that's like so you know, like there's 2515 02:16:01.399 --> 02:16:04.720 fireboss training, right or no burn boss training, So there's 2516 02:16:04.760 --> 02:16:07.000 like different levels of that you can go through. Same thing. 2517 02:16:07.039 --> 02:16:09.760 It's very Western like I know that now, like there's 2518 02:16:09.800 --> 02:16:12.000 Bob Gray and other guys who train on that who 2519 02:16:12.039 --> 02:16:14.840 are starting to incorporate a bit of Indigenous knowledge or 2520 02:16:15.239 --> 02:16:17.960 you know the importance of Indigenous knowledge and burning, but same, 2521 02:16:18.039 --> 02:16:20.159 it's very like kind of Western. You know, this is 2522 02:16:20.199 --> 02:16:21.840 how we light a prescribe fire. 2523 02:16:21.720 --> 02:16:22.800 And that's all we know. 2524 02:16:22.880 --> 02:16:25.119 That's the only culture I know, right, So it's where 2525 02:16:25.159 --> 02:16:26.520 my perspective is going to come from. 2526 02:16:26.640 --> 02:16:28.960 Yeah. So we were doing brainstorms on the fire keepers 2527 02:16:29.000 --> 02:16:31.199 and we're like, you know, well they do a certification 2528 02:16:31.399 --> 02:16:33.360 course to get that, So maybe what we need to 2529 02:16:33.440 --> 02:16:36.239 do then is have a cultural burning certification course, right, 2530 02:16:36.680 --> 02:16:39.040 so that you know, people would go through and then 2531 02:16:39.079 --> 02:16:40.840 once they get that, then you know they can go 2532 02:16:41.040 --> 02:16:44.799 and and light fires or whatever. But then then we 2533 02:16:44.879 --> 02:16:47.600 had a lot of fire keepers that were saying like, no, 2534 02:16:47.920 --> 02:16:50.040 that is basically just us trying to fit into a 2535 02:16:50.079 --> 02:16:53.159 Western system, right, And they were saying, like the one 2536 02:16:53.200 --> 02:16:55.360 guy actually at the fire keeper's conference, I just went 2537 02:16:55.399 --> 02:16:57.719 to the government people were talking, and he stood up 2538 02:16:57.760 --> 02:16:59.959 and he just said, you know, I find this really difficult. 2539 02:17:00.000 --> 02:17:01.760 Well because they were talking about, you know, like all 2540 02:17:01.799 --> 02:17:03.920 the procedures you need to go through to get approval. 2541 02:17:04.079 --> 02:17:06.520 He stood up and he just said, you know, for me, 2542 02:17:07.040 --> 02:17:10.120 this is my families and like my nation's inherent right 2543 02:17:10.239 --> 02:17:12.239 to steward the land, this is my responsibility. This is 2544 02:17:12.280 --> 02:17:14.559 why I was put on this earth, you know. So 2545 02:17:15.200 --> 02:17:17.280 for me then to have to go and ask you 2546 02:17:17.920 --> 02:17:21.239 for permission to do what is my responsibility and my 2547 02:17:21.600 --> 02:17:25.000 right that doesn't make any sense. And then he was saying, like, 2548 02:17:25.120 --> 02:17:27.760 you know, one hundred years ago, you guys were telling 2549 02:17:27.879 --> 02:17:30.200 us we couldn't burn because we were destroying the forest, 2550 02:17:30.280 --> 02:17:33.120 and now you're saying, Tess, oh, only we can burn 2551 02:17:33.559 --> 02:17:38.239 because you know, because now the forest is destroyed. And 2552 02:17:38.360 --> 02:17:41.079 he's like, you're the ones, you know who's practices because 2553 02:17:41.120 --> 02:17:43.760 you wouldn't listen to us, you know, have led to this. 2554 02:17:43.840 --> 02:17:46.559 If you would have listened to my ancestors, you know, 2555 02:17:46.680 --> 02:17:48.799 then we wouldn't be in this predicament we're in now, 2556 02:17:48.920 --> 02:17:50.840 So like, let us kind of take it over. So 2557 02:17:51.280 --> 02:17:53.399 I think it's one of those like I don't hate. 2558 02:17:53.440 --> 02:17:55.520 I don't really like that term like wicked issue, you know, 2559 02:17:55.600 --> 02:17:58.920 where it's like super complex, but it is kind of 2560 02:17:59.079 --> 02:18:02.159 like that in a way, because you like you're worried 2561 02:18:02.239 --> 02:18:05.120 the forest isn't healthy right now. I don't personally want 2562 02:18:05.159 --> 02:18:07.399 to say to somebody like, yeah, go out and burn 2563 02:18:07.479 --> 02:18:09.959 and then have you know, a massive crown fire start. 2564 02:18:10.399 --> 02:18:14.040 But I think the thing is with indigenous fire practice 2565 02:18:14.239 --> 02:18:18.760 is that it's you know, you're burning at very specific times, 2566 02:18:18.879 --> 02:18:21.239 so you know it's like early spring before the snow 2567 02:18:21.360 --> 02:18:24.399 is left. In Canada, it's late fall, just like the 2568 02:18:24.479 --> 02:18:27.239 day or two before the first snow fall, right, you're 2569 02:18:27.319 --> 02:18:29.799 not burning like obviously in the summer. So like I 2570 02:18:29.840 --> 02:18:32.200 would think that that, you know, obviously still should be 2571 02:18:32.879 --> 02:18:35.799 criminalized to some extent. You know that you need to 2572 02:18:35.959 --> 02:18:38.040 find people or whatever that are just going because that 2573 02:18:38.200 --> 02:18:39.200 is very high risk. 2574 02:18:40.399 --> 02:18:41.479 And so like what our. 2575 02:18:43.120 --> 02:18:45.879 Like elders and ancestors say from like the different nations 2576 02:18:45.920 --> 02:18:48.120 that I've talked to, is that you know, our burning 2577 02:18:48.159 --> 02:18:50.520 that we do is so low risk. That's why we 2578 02:18:50.600 --> 02:18:53.319 don't need protective equipment. That's why we don't need a 2579 02:18:53.399 --> 02:18:57.000 burn plan, because if we're doing it right, you know, 2580 02:18:57.680 --> 02:19:01.799 there's there's literally very low or zero risk. Well, I 2581 02:19:01.840 --> 02:19:04.079 think they would say zero risk to what they're doing, 2582 02:19:04.159 --> 02:19:05.959 you know, to starting an out of control fire is 2583 02:19:06.040 --> 02:19:07.000 somebody getting hurt. 2584 02:19:07.479 --> 02:19:09.680 It's amazing how complicated the situation is to try and 2585 02:19:09.760 --> 02:19:11.520 navigate this, but I think, yeah, the only way forward 2586 02:19:11.600 --> 02:19:13.600 is to come together and have his discussions right on this. 2587 02:19:13.879 --> 02:19:15.520 It seems like a cop out to say that because 2588 02:19:15.520 --> 02:19:17.959 it's just like like we need to discuss it, but 2589 02:19:18.200 --> 02:19:19.520 unfortunately that's the truth. 2590 02:19:19.959 --> 02:19:22.440 Yeah, Well, and on the Good Fire podcast, I think 2591 02:19:22.520 --> 02:19:25.000 like that's what's interesting is because with the range of 2592 02:19:25.079 --> 02:19:27.399 people that we talked to on there, like you know, 2593 02:19:27.479 --> 02:19:30.520 you go from somebody who thinks, you know, like it's 2594 02:19:31.000 --> 02:19:33.639 their right to burn and they're not working with any agency, 2595 02:19:33.760 --> 02:19:36.879 and then to like other people who you know, are employed, 2596 02:19:36.920 --> 02:19:39.920 like mean kind of buy an agency. Yeah, like Frank Lake, 2597 02:19:40.000 --> 02:19:42.120 you know, he works for US Forest Service and he's 2598 02:19:42.319 --> 02:19:45.079 used his you know, work within this kind of western 2599 02:19:45.159 --> 02:19:48.120 government structure to bring more fire back to his territory. 2600 02:19:48.440 --> 02:19:50.559 So yeah, it's just it's really interesting to see kind 2601 02:19:50.559 --> 02:19:52.120 of all the different perspectives. 2602 02:19:52.239 --> 02:19:52.440 Yeah. 2603 02:19:52.879 --> 02:19:56.159 So that conversation was from the Your Forest podcast, which 2604 02:19:56.200 --> 02:19:59.239 is hosted by Matt Christoff, who also co hosts Good 2605 02:19:59.280 --> 02:20:01.639 Fire with a Me. And of course there's a whole 2606 02:20:01.799 --> 02:20:05.079 Good Fire episode with Frank Lake, and there's so many 2607 02:20:05.120 --> 02:20:08.120 other great voices in indigenous fire ecology. So I'm going 2608 02:20:08.200 --> 02:20:10.280 to link that episode in the podcast in general on 2609 02:20:10.399 --> 02:20:12.520 my website, and I will also put up a link 2610 02:20:12.559 --> 02:20:16.000 to the wonderful forty seven page book called Blazing the Trail, 2611 02:20:16.319 --> 02:20:20.959 celebrating Indigenous fire stewardship. So many resources, so much learning. 2612 02:20:21.360 --> 02:20:24.079 Now to wrap up, though, let's talk about some pains 2613 02:20:24.159 --> 02:20:28.680 in some assets so the most vexing thing about Amy's job, I'd. 2614 02:20:28.520 --> 02:20:31.000 Have to say my least favorite thing about my job 2615 02:20:31.159 --> 02:20:34.680 is the bureaucracy, which I think that most people who 2616 02:20:34.840 --> 02:20:37.360 work in a government agency can relate to. 2617 02:20:37.879 --> 02:20:39.920 It's sometimes really frustrating when. 2618 02:20:40.520 --> 02:20:42.600 You know, you know something needs to be done or 2619 02:20:43.040 --> 02:20:45.639 what a solution could be, but then you kind of 2620 02:20:45.680 --> 02:20:49.360 get held up in all sorts of bureaucratic processes. 2621 02:20:49.440 --> 02:20:51.399 So I mean that's my least favorite. 2622 02:20:51.479 --> 02:20:54.319 Unfortunately, it takes up a lot of time that we 2623 02:20:54.399 --> 02:20:56.200 could be, you know, devoting to other things. 2624 02:20:56.360 --> 02:20:59.040 So that's frustrating for sure. 2625 02:20:59.719 --> 02:21:03.840 In the stand out best aspect, the most brightly glowing coal. 2626 02:21:04.479 --> 02:21:05.639 But I think my most. 2627 02:21:05.520 --> 02:21:09.000 Favorite thing about my job is that I'm able to 2628 02:21:09.159 --> 02:21:13.040 work with communities and knowledge keepers from across Canada and 2629 02:21:13.159 --> 02:21:17.159 then internationally sometimes as well. And I really realize that that's, 2630 02:21:17.200 --> 02:21:19.760 you know, a position of privilege that I have and 2631 02:21:19.879 --> 02:21:22.399 that I'm in to be able to do that, and 2632 02:21:22.520 --> 02:21:25.120 it comes like with a lot of responsibility that often 2633 02:21:25.200 --> 02:21:28.040 you know, keeps me awake at night, but for me, 2634 02:21:28.239 --> 02:21:31.559 when I'm able to bring fire keepers or other people 2635 02:21:32.479 --> 02:21:36.879 to events or other things and just see their pride 2636 02:21:36.920 --> 02:21:40.120 and finally, being recognized in their knowledge being known, and 2637 02:21:40.719 --> 02:21:42.840 sometimes like I've been referring to that as kind of like, 2638 02:21:42.920 --> 02:21:45.200 you know, we had this big severance event with fire, 2639 02:21:45.319 --> 02:21:47.760 but now what we're almost seeing is this reunion with 2640 02:21:47.879 --> 02:21:51.040 fire where Indigenous people are coming back to it. And so, 2641 02:21:51.120 --> 02:21:53.719 you know, we have the land back movement for Indigenous people, 2642 02:21:53.760 --> 02:21:55.840 and often I think, you know, we need a fireback 2643 02:21:55.959 --> 02:22:00.600 movement as well, where Indigenous people, you know, impact again 2644 02:22:00.680 --> 02:22:02.840 to make those decisions on the land. And what I'm 2645 02:22:02.879 --> 02:22:06.680 seeing right now in Canada especially is that there is 2646 02:22:06.760 --> 02:22:09.479 a movement where people want to be involved in fire 2647 02:22:09.600 --> 02:22:12.639 management decisions that are happening in their territories. 2648 02:22:12.680 --> 02:22:14.319 And so I think that's really exciting. 2649 02:22:18.239 --> 02:22:22.440 So ask smart people exciting questions because sometimes the situation 2650 02:22:22.719 --> 02:22:25.600 is impossibly complex and they can help break it down 2651 02:22:25.639 --> 02:22:28.719 for you, like a focus on a fallen lock. And 2652 02:22:28.840 --> 02:22:31.079 so for more on this topic, you can get yourself 2653 02:22:31.159 --> 02:22:34.680 some good fire podcasts Into your Ears. It's hosted by 2654 02:22:34.719 --> 02:22:37.239 Amy and by Matt Christoff and it's linked in the 2655 02:22:37.280 --> 02:22:40.440 show notes. Matt's podcast again is Your Forest Podcast. Thank 2656 02:22:40.479 --> 02:22:42.360 you so much to him for letting us use so 2657 02:22:42.479 --> 02:22:45.040 much of his interview with Amy. You can follow Amy 2658 02:22:45.200 --> 02:22:48.440 at Christiansen Amy on Twitter. There are more links in 2659 02:22:48.520 --> 02:22:50.680 the show notes and up at my website, Aliward dot com, 2660 02:22:50.760 --> 02:22:53.920 slash Ologies, slash good Fire. You can follow us at 2661 02:22:53.959 --> 02:22:56.920 Ologies on Twitter and Instagram. I'm at ali Ward with 2662 02:22:57.000 --> 02:23:00.680 one l New full length adult friendly episode codes continue 2663 02:23:00.680 --> 02:23:03.920 to come out on Tuesday, and we're moving smolodies releases 2664 02:23:03.920 --> 02:23:06.559 to the weekend I think Sundays or Mondays, so look 2665 02:23:06.639 --> 02:23:08.680 for a new kid friendly episode next week. Also, I'm 2666 02:23:08.680 --> 02:23:10.760 sorry that my neighbor's dog's barking. I can't really do 2667 02:23:10.799 --> 02:23:16.319 anything about it. We gotta get this episode up. I'm 2668 02:23:16.399 --> 02:23:20.440 So Sweaty. Merch is available at ologiesmerch dot com. Thank 2669 02:23:20.479 --> 02:23:22.399 you to sisters Shannon fellas Us and Body Dutch for 2670 02:23:22.479 --> 02:23:24.639 managing merch. They host a podcast called You Are That, 2671 02:23:24.719 --> 02:23:28.120 a comedy podcast. Thank you to longtime friend Aaron Talbert 2672 02:23:28.200 --> 02:23:31.000 we met when we were four, for admitting the Ologies 2673 02:23:31.040 --> 02:23:33.479 podcast Facebook group. Thank you to Emily White of the 2674 02:23:33.600 --> 02:23:38.000 Wordery Professional Transcription Company for making transcripts for Ologies. They're 2675 02:23:38.000 --> 02:23:40.479 available for free on my website. Thank you Caleb Patten 2676 02:23:40.520 --> 02:23:43.120 for bleeping episodes. Thank you Noel Dilworth for all the 2677 02:23:43.200 --> 02:23:45.479 scheduling and Susan Hale, both of you for helping with 2678 02:23:45.559 --> 02:23:48.680 social media quizes and such as always giant thank you 2679 02:23:49.200 --> 02:23:52.280 to Resident editor by resident, I mean we live in 2680 02:23:52.399 --> 02:23:55.559 the same bed, shared sleeper, who helped me stitch all 2681 02:23:55.680 --> 02:23:58.239 these audio clips together. And also of course to Steph 2682 02:23:58.280 --> 02:24:00.600 Maray Morris for all the editing help for working on 2683 02:24:00.639 --> 02:24:03.840 somologies now too. Nick Thorburn wrote and performed the theme music. 2684 02:24:04.000 --> 02:24:05.239 And if you listen to the end, you know I 2685 02:24:05.360 --> 02:24:09.040 tell you secret. This week's secret. It's pretty juicy. It's 2686 02:24:09.120 --> 02:24:13.079 actually not. It's that I prefer dry pulpy oranges. I 2687 02:24:13.120 --> 02:24:15.399 don't want a juicy orange. I want the pulp to 2688 02:24:15.479 --> 02:24:17.000 hold all the juice. I don't want to need juice 2689 02:24:17.000 --> 02:24:21.000 on my hands. I want to dry pulpy orange. I 2690 02:24:21.040 --> 02:24:23.040 don't know if it's a certain kind of orange or 2691 02:24:23.040 --> 02:24:24.360 if I have to just let them stand on the 2692 02:24:24.399 --> 02:24:27.680 counter longer. But if you are a pulpologist and you 2693 02:24:27.799 --> 02:24:30.399 know this, holler let me know. Because every time I 2694 02:24:30.520 --> 02:24:32.719 open an orange, I'm rolling the dice. I'm like, come on, 2695 02:24:32.959 --> 02:24:35.479 give me a dry one. Is it gross? I don't know, 2696 02:24:35.799 --> 02:24:37.719 I don't care anyway. 2697 02:24:37.639 --> 02:24:51.360 Byebye, Packidermatology Homology Crypto zoology, lithology, technology, meteorology, althology, nathology, ceiology. 2698 02:24:51.280 --> 02:25:00.600 Elenology, And now that you've stuck around to two episodes, 2699 02:25:00.799 --> 02:25:03.520 I feel like you deserve to be burdened with a 2700 02:25:03.600 --> 02:25:07.319 double mega secret, which is afreshy. This is no Encore secret. 2701 02:25:07.399 --> 02:25:12.280 It's June seventh, twenty twenty three. I thanks for dealing 2702 02:25:12.360 --> 02:25:15.600 with a couple of encores recently. Your dad words, not 2703 02:25:15.840 --> 02:25:21.360 feeling great. I'm doing okay. Nothing is nothing is like 2704 02:25:21.440 --> 02:25:26.680 scary or anything. But I have switched an antidepressant that 2705 02:25:26.799 --> 02:25:29.479 I was on because I'm now medicated for ADHD, which 2706 02:25:29.479 --> 02:25:33.120 is helping. But if anyone out there, there's a couple 2707 02:25:33.159 --> 02:25:35.639 of you probably have gotten off of effects for or 2708 02:25:35.760 --> 02:25:39.600 back on it. It's a toughie. Don't google it unless 2709 02:25:39.719 --> 02:25:42.879 you want to be sad for anyone who's gone off it. 2710 02:25:43.239 --> 02:25:46.280 Uh and not solely tapered anyway. I've been feeling just 2711 02:25:47.440 --> 02:25:52.399 just terrible, and then it that coincided with my endocrinologists 2712 02:25:52.440 --> 02:25:54.159 being out of the office for most of the summer 2713 02:25:54.239 --> 02:25:58.520 and not having the hormones that I require to survive 2714 02:25:58.639 --> 02:26:01.079 because I went through a varia failure at an early age. 2715 02:26:01.479 --> 02:26:06.399 So I'm a mess, just a goddamn mess. But your 2716 02:26:06.440 --> 02:26:11.239 girl is doing her best. I've cried so much today 2717 02:26:11.920 --> 02:26:16.040 for no real reason. But thanks for sticking it out. 2718 02:26:16.079 --> 02:26:18.360 Thanks for dealing with encores. Every once in a while 2719 02:26:18.399 --> 02:26:20.440 I'll get someone who goes, why are you putting up 2720 02:26:20.440 --> 02:26:23.840 an encore? And I'm like, because I can barely function, 2721 02:26:24.319 --> 02:26:26.440 And that's just how it goes when you put out 2722 02:26:27.760 --> 02:26:32.479 fifty to sixty five hour long episodes a year. So 2723 02:26:32.719 --> 02:26:34.520 thanks for dealing with it. Thanks for rolling with it. 2724 02:26:34.719 --> 02:26:37.399 This is a vulnerable secret. I appreciate you listening and caring. 2725 02:26:38.600 --> 02:26:42.600 Hopefully I will be on the mend soon. If you 2726 02:26:42.680 --> 02:26:44.360 have dealt with anything like this, please know that you're 2727 02:26:44.399 --> 02:26:47.120 not alone. Okay. Please enjoy the fresh air if you 2728 02:26:47.200 --> 02:26:50.200 have any, and please enjoy indoor filtered air if you don't. Okay, 2729 02:26:51.239 --> 02:26:53.479 scallops next week, fresh episode, byebye. 2730 02:26:54.239 --> 02:26:57.719 We're freezing prices for two years in the Virgin Media playhouse. 2731 02:26:58.000 --> 02:27:01.479 Switch to our super fast, reliable now and freeze your 2732 02:27:01.520 --> 02:27:04.639 prices or law broadband offers for twenty four months from 2733 02:27:04.760 --> 02:27:08.079 just thirty five euro month with no activation fee. Switch 2734 02:27:08.200 --> 02:27:13.000 in store or at Virginidia dot I Virgin Media. It's playtime. 2735 02:27:13.159 --> 02:27:16.079 Tcenc's applied subject to availability new broadband customers and twenty 2736 02:27:16.120 --> 02:27:18.239 four month contracts only. You won't receive a price increase 2737 02:27:18.239 --> 02:27:20.120 for the duration of this contract from thirty five euro 2738 02:27:20.319 --> 02:27:23.280 month for twenty four months seventy euro thereafter. N February eighteenth, 2739 02:27:23.360 --> 02:27:24.120 twenty twenty six. 2740 02:27:24.600 --> 02:27:27.000 Get value you can't argue with at Tesco with their 2741 02:27:27.040 --> 02:27:29.840 amazing club card prices. Have the perfect night in with 2742 02:27:29.920 --> 02:27:33.000 their finest frozen pizza meal deal. Get a finest frozen pizza, 2743 02:27:33.159 --> 02:27:35.879 chips and ice cream all for six euro like our 2744 02:27:35.920 --> 02:27:39.040 delicious spicy salami, hot honey and do Ya or Margarito 2745 02:27:39.120 --> 02:27:42.239 wood fired pizzas, served up with their crispy chunkie chips 2746 02:27:42.479 --> 02:27:45.479 and ice cream like sea salta caramel or pistachio for dessert. 2747 02:27:45.920 --> 02:27:49.319 Can't argue with that. Shop in store or online. Tesco 2748 02:27:49.799 --> 02:27:53.120 Every Little helps available in most stories, Prices varying Express