KZYX The Ecology Hour

Our guest, Dr. Mayumi Arimitsu of Ocean Bight LLC, is leading research on the pelagic (offshore) components of the food web, and also monitors forage fish that are the key link in the marine food web. She was formerly a Research Ecologist with the United States Geological Survey, Alaska Science Center. In this interview she takes us into the world of forage fish, what they are, why they matter, wh...

Interview with Dr.  Christina Pasparakis, Assistant Professor in the Department of Environmental Toxicology at the University of California Davis, Bodega Marine Laboratory. She conducts field and laboratory research on marine toxicology - how toxics enter and affect marine organisms. Much of her work involves microplastics, an emerging concern, and her work is advancing our understanding of their...

Re-run of an interview in 2022 with Dr. John Marzluff, who studies how humans affect birds through habitat fragmentation and increased urbanization, as well as the challenges of conserving birds on islands. Conversely, he is also interested in all the ways that birds affect people—how, for instance, birds influence art, or language. He focuses primarily on corvids—that is, ravens, crows, and jays....

Our guest, Dr. Peter Weiss-Penzias is a Faculty Researcher and Continuing Lecturer at the University of California, Santa Cruz and runs an Environmental Chemistry Laboratory there. He has discovered that fog is carrying minute but detectable quantities of mercury, which is moving inland and appearing in the food chain. 

Dr. Konrad Meister, Assistant Professor of Chemistry at Boise State University, tells us about his research discovering that fungal spores and other tiny particles cause rain by condensing water vapor into droplets. Given the importance of rainfall to most terrestrial ecosystems - not to mention the existence of agriculture - this is a big deal!

Fantastic interview with Dr. Emily Taylor, Professor of Biological Sciences, California Polytechnic State University and Director of the Physiological Ecology of Reptiles Laboratory. She is a herpetologist conducting research on lizards and rattlesnakes, with particular interest in the ways they manage heat and moisture. 

Interview with Dr. Víctor M. Ortega Jiménez, Assistant Professor of Integrative Biology at the University of California, Berkeley. He conducts research into the ways in which animals interact with their immediate environment – applying physical principles of fluid dynamics and electrostatics to understand how they move and capture prey. His work is innovative and fascinating, and we had a great ti...

Interview with Dr. Mark Davis, emeritus Professor of Biology at Macalester University and author of the textbook on "Invasion Biology."

Sea Otters were once abundant from the Aleutian Islands to central California, before being hunted nearly to extinction. Dr. James Bodkin of the US Fish & Wildlife Service devoted much of his career to studying these charismatic marine mammals, particularly in the aftermath of the Exxon Valdez oil tanker disaster. On The Ecology Hour he reunites with his old colleague Dr. Robert Spies and brin...

We talk with Dr. Marc Epstein, Senior Insect Biosystematist at the California Department of Food and Agriculture for Lepidoptera, about moths and their taxonomy. Dr. Epstein has worked for the last twenty two years at the Plant Pest Diagnostics Center in South Sacramento and is also a Research Associate at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History. While identifying Lepidopt...

The Ecology Hour goes viral this week when hosts Bob Spies and Tim Bray talk with Dr. Tony Goldberg, veterinarian and pathobiologist at the University of Madison-Wisconsin. He studies viruses and the diseases they can cause in everything from mussels to humans, everywhere from the Appalachians to Africa. He particularly focuses on "zoonautic" diseases - those that can jump from one species to anot...

Mountain Lions are a frequent topic of conversation in Mendocino County, and there is often concern about them preying on livestock or pets. We talk with Dr. Quinton Martins, principal investigator for the Living with Lions project, a partnership between Audubon Canyon Ranch and True Wild.  Dr. Martins explains why Mountain Lions are so secretive, why they hide their food (and even their scat!), a...

Our guest is Dr. Mark Hoddle, Distinguished Professor of Extension in Biological Control at the University of California - Riverside, a renowned expert in the field of biological control of invasive insect pests. He presents the checkered history of efforts to find organisms that target damaging invasive species, including some early efforts that succeeded and some that backfired. His work is grou...

 Eleven years ago, a mysterious disease killed most of the adult starfish off California and Oregon. The most severely affected, Sunflower Seastar, was the main predator limiting the spread of Purple Urchins. The sudden disappearance of a key predator triggered a "trophic cascade" that led to an ongoing ecological crisis, including the collapse of the kelp forests. After a decade of painstaking re...

Gray Whales were once nearly wiped out by commercial whaling. Once that ceased in the late 20th century, they staged a remarkable comeback, reaching a population of around 26,000 by 2016. But since then many have died on migration, and a new estimate indicates their population has been cut in half. We talk with Dr. Aimee Lang of the NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center about that estimate, and...

Just when you think you've got life all figured out... scientists find something that redefines the whole concept.  Ecology Hour hosts Bob Spies and Tim Bray talk with Dr. Karen Lloyd, Professor of Earth Sciences at the University of Southern California, about her research into alien life forms right here on Earth - what she calls "Intraterrestrials" in her new book. Some of these organisms challe...

Have you ever seen an Albatross? They are an awe-inspiring sight and there are hundreds of them off the Mendocino coast right now. Many of them are coming here to get food for their chicks, which are more than two thousand miles away, on remote islands in the Hawaiian chain. Ecology Hour hosts Bob Spies and Tim Bray get the whole story from Dr. Jonathan Plissner, Supervising Wildlife Biologist at...

We hear a lot about the immediate effects of a major oil spill, but what happens later? Our guest Dr. Jeffrey Short is a biochemist who has investigated ecosystem effects of major spills. Working with our host Dr. Robert Spies after the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster, he discovered that large quantities of oil persisted in the subsurface long after the spill - a finding that was quite controversial at...

Tim Bray and Bob Spies talk with Erin Zulliger of the Institute for Wildlife Studies, who has been studying Elk in northern California. Always an impressive sight, these fascinating animals have a long history here and are currently adapting to changing conditions. Listen to find out more about their lives, their predators, and their populations. 

Robert Jamgochian and Doug Nunn talk about the SONAR program (School of Natural Resources) they created and ran at Mendocino High School for several years. Students learned how to follow scientific protocols, collect field data, analyze it and write up their findings in scientific reports. Many have gone on to pursue education and careers in environmental law, engineering, or biology. Some were ac...

We see them in cartoons as well as in our gardens, but how much do we really know about Praying Mantises? We learn a lot about them from doctoral candidate Lohit Garikipati at the American Museum of Natural History. Originally from California, Lohit became fascinated by these bizarre insects at an early age and has been studying them ever since. They display many amazing adaptations and Lohit reli...

In the last few weeks, many sick and dying California Sea Lions began showing up on central California beaches, even hauling out at Pier 39 in San Francisco. They were victims of Amnesic Shellfish Poisoning, aka Domoic Acid Toxicosis . What is domoic acid, where does it come from, and why is it affecting so many marine mammals? For answers we turn to Dr. Pádraig Duignan , Director of Pathology at...

We spoke with Dr. Eric Bjorkstedt of the NOAA Fisheries Ecosystem Science Center. He talked about some of the work being done at the Telonicher Marine Laboratory in Trinidad, Humboldt County, monitoring the offshore marine ecosystem in this little-studied region. Dr. Bjorkstedt gives us an update on current research and some recent findings, including how some key elements of the food web have res...

Birds invest considerable effort in the reproductive processes and have evolved myriad ways to improve their chances of success. The entire process of mating, nest-building, brooding, and rearing young consumes enormous amounts of energy, often leaving the parent birds nearly worn-out by the time their young reach independence. It is perhaps no wonder, then, that a few birds have developed a way t...

On the April 2024 episode, we delve into how best to support the environment through charitable giving.  We hear from Tom Wheeler, Executive Director of EPIC in Arcata, CA, and from Lawyer Paula Goodwin of Perkins Coie, as well as take a closer look at a number of nonprofits.  Check out our Primer for Giving !  The show also features music from artist and activists Diane Patterson and Alice Dimice...