Ologies with Alie Ward

In celebration of Dr. Tom Volk’s life: Mushrooms! Psilocybin! Humongous fungus! Black mold! Foraging! The incredibly charming and warm Dr. Tom Volk, world-renowned mushroom expert, welcomes Alie into his office to dive deep into the underground world of fungal enthusiasts and touch on pathogens and medicinal therapies. Dr. Volk himself was a heart transplant patient, and shared how his life had be...

Soil! Dirt! Earth. Dr. Lydia Jennings, aka Native Soil Nerd, breaks down the stuff under our feet and explains everything from mining to why soil can be different colors. Also: medicine from microbes, giving back to the land after extractive processes, collecting samples in urban rivers, elders’ ecological knowledge, planting hot Cheetos, potting soil mysteries, lung fungus, the smell of rain and...

ANNOUNCEMENT: SMOLOGIES NOW HAS ITS OWN FEED! SUBSCRIBE  FOR NEW EPISODES EVERY THURSDAY.  Subscribe to Smologies: https://pod.link/1746567248 Kid-friendly and quick! It’s another Smologies G-rated cut of a classic episode. Loosen your belts and tuck a napkin under your chin because feasting season is here. Katherine Spiers -- journalist, food anthropologist, editor of HowtoEatLA.com and host of t...

It’s November and you need chill vibes. And Native American Heritage Month is the perfect time to encore this classic. World-renowned author, botanist, Indigenous ecology professor and bryologist Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of “Gathering Moss” and “Braiding Sweetgrass,”  talks about her passion for moss. Cozy up for the most beautifully doled-out information about hidden worlds, overlooked mys...

Landfills! Treasures in the trash! Corporate conspiracies! Composting! An instantly classic conversation with the incredibly knowledgeable, frank and wonderful Dr. Robin Nagle of New York University’s Liberal Studies! She is a clinical professor, author, TED speaker and former New York City sanitation worker and truly the best person on Earth to trash talk with. We cover what you can and can’t act...

ANNOUNCEMENT: SMOLOGIES NOW HAS ITS OWN FEED! SUBSCRIBE  FOR NEW EPISODES EVERY THURSDAY.  Subscribe to Smologies: https://pod.link/1746567248 A kid-friendly, shortened version of our classic episode on …flags! E. Tory Laitila, a textile expert who has also handled Honolulu's flag protocol, gives the skinny on the oldest flags, skull and crossbone Jolly Rogers, his favorite state flag, Scandinavia...

Start with Part 1 for all the folkloric history, superstition, and Dracula basics. And then this Part 2 has vampire finches, fang straws, vegan bloodsuckers, threshold invites, horniness, grain alcohol, garlic breath, psychic vampires and all our questions answered by Dr. Jeff Holdeman, professor and Vampirologist in Indiana University’s Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures department....

Fangs! Capes! Undead bloodlust! Are vampires soul-draining ghouls or a hot prom date? No better person to ask than Indiana University professor of Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures," Dr. Jeff Holdeman, who teaches the course “The Vampire in European and American Culture.” In Part 1, it’s a deep dive into the HISTORY. Jeff breaks down the folkloric purpose of vampire stories and how t...

ANNOUNCEMENT: SMOLOGIES NOW HAS ITS OWN FEED! SUBSCRIBE  FOR NEW EPISODES EVERY THURSDAY.  Subscribe to Smologies: https://pod.link/1746567248 We're back with another shorter, cleaner, edition of an Ologies classic. Today it's all the way back from 2018:  INSECTS, just straight up buuuugs. Quite likely Alie's favorite subject ever with an ologist who quite likely also dramatically shifted her life...

Let’s get spooky. Venture below Parisian streets and into the catacombs: hundreds of miles of subterranean tunnels housing millions of human skeletons, some fashioned into sculpture. Alie tracked down Dr. Erin-Marie Legacey – author of “Making Space for the Dead,” professor of French history and one of the world’s foremost experts on this eerie place. We chat about everything from miasmas to sinkh...

Consider this an audio postcard from my first vacation in 13 years. I travel a lot for my other job (as a science correspondent on Innovation Nation for CBS) so I am out of practice on jet-setting for the sake of pure fun. But Jarrett’s family was headed to France so we cashed in some points and tagged along. Join me for some weird stuff I googled on the road, from pastry wars to royal cosplay, wa...

What’s the customary 5th Anniversary gift? Apparently… WOOD! So we wrangled our favorite sawmill owner/operator of LA’s Angel City Lumber, Jeff Perry – who rescues downed street trees from the chipper and turns them into beautiful planks, boards, stumps and chonks. We cover everything from forest management to 2x4s, wood grain, burls, bog logs, sawdust, tree disease, asparagus tips, salvaged lumbe...

We’re back! Listen to Part 1 first, then hit this follow-up with your favorite geologist Schmitty Thompson, who answers listener questions a-plenty. Such as: What is a geode? Are crystals in gift shops even real? Where’s the best place to look at rocks? Is ice a rock? Plus: rock puns, favorite rocks, best and worst rock names, long hikes, imposter syndrome, lab-grown diamonds, fossilized trees, sp...

ANNOUNCEMENT: SMOLOGIES NOW HAS ITS OWN FEED! SUBSCRIBE  FOR NEW EPISODES EVERY THURSDAY.  Subscribe to Smologies: https://pod.link/1746567248 It’s a shorter, swear-free version of the wonderful Genealogy episode with author Stephen Hanks -- who teaches genealogy classes in Portland, Oregon and has contributed to PBS genealogy documentaries. We chat histories, mysteries, memories and families, plu...

What is a rock? How big is a boulder? Why are they pretty and heavy? It’s rock talk with a true enthusiast, the charming and beloved Geologist Schmitty Thompson. Schmitty walks us through different types of rocks, minerals, geological formations, roadside wonders, countertop crystals, stone skipping, and why you should stare lovingly into a pit of gravel. There were so many listener questions, we...

Mountain goats are not goats. And there’s only one living species, Oreamnos americanus. WHAT?? Montana-based wildlife biologist and Oreamnologist Julie Cunningham counts mountain goats from helicopters, traps and tests them for science, and spends even her off days searching for them on mountaintops. We cover their population, sensual mating habits, the feel of their wool, pungent goatwhiff, tips...

How many legs? Why so many legs? What's a millipede versus a centipede? And again WHY SO MANY LEGS. We have just the guy for that: Diplopodologist Dr. Derek Hennen. As a person who’s spent over a decade sorting through leaf litter and naming scores of new species, Derek is truly a champion for the multi-limbed little critters. If you liked what Casey Clapp brought to Dendrology, get ready to appre...

How do societal structures affect the planet? Why should we get to know our neighbors? What’s the ecological price we pay for … stuff? Yep, there’s an -ology for that. We chat with the founder of Critical Ecology: biogeochemist, National Geographic Explorer, researcher and plant nerd, Dr. Suzanne Pierre. Dr. Pierre’s Critical Ecology Lab is involved with research on the biomes of former plantation...

If you have a physical body, or know someone who does, this episode is for you! Hello, we’re all going to die. And we’re probably all going to lose someone we love. Thanatologist Cole Imperi has become a dear friend and on July 17, 2022 we pulled up a street corner in LA to chat about what she’s been up to and how to cope with the loss of a loved one. Hear about the blooming of friendship and the...

As I round out my bereavement leave following your beloved Grandpod’s passing, we’re serving up a special updated Encore of an episode and an Ologist who changed my life. Hoooo boy. We get all up in death and dying's business and to my shock, it's not a bummer. Confront and perhaps OVERCOME existential anxiety as we discuss not only the science of death but the nature and goddang beauty of life. E...

Hope you dug tortoises because we’re back, shellin’ out the good stuff, with this week’s encore of sea turtles, so get ready to become wildly obsessed with them. Cheloniologist Dr. Camryn Allen met up with Alie on a tropical island (ok, in a hotel room on a tropical island) to chat about flipper slappings, turtle rodeos, nesting BBs, current surfing, endangered statuses, field work, sleeping under...

We're bringing back one shell of an episode with today's encore. What's a tortoise? What's a turtle? Why do they live so dang long? What's up with their junk? Wildlife biologist and testudinologist Amanda Hipps studies gopher tortoises and dishes about turtle nomenclature, cliques, dicks, behavior, burrows, evolution, habitats and more. If you don't dig tortoises yet, you're about to fall deep int...

Nothin' like crackin' open a cold one with the Ologites, amirite? If you like booze, you'll love... fungus! Alie goes Rogue and takes a field trip to a brewery in Newport, OR where she smells vats of bubbling beer slop and learns about the microorganisms that are the workhorses of the brewing industry. Learn about yeasts, how beer is made, the hardest part about being a beer maker, the thick histo...

A few personal updates from your internet dad and then … WHO ARE WE? This one is a banger, folks. Personality researcher & psychology professor Dr. Simine Vazire dishes about introverts, extroverts, self-esteem, sociopaths, neuroticism, conscientiousness, Buzzfeed quizzes, yearbook inscriptions, trusting people, screwing up your kids, acting like your parents, changing personality traits through t...

ANNOUNCEMENT: SMOLOGIES NOW HAS ITS OWN FEED! SUBSCRIBE  FOR NEW EPISODES EVERY THURSDAY.  Subscribe to Smologies: https://pod.link/1746567248 A Smologies kid-friendly version of… ALIENS! EXTRATERRESTRIALS! MARTIANS! The phenomenal Dr. Kevin Peter Hand of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory dishes on the oceans of distant moons, methane rivers, ice crusts, the James Webb Space Telescope findings, wha...