The EarthStory Podcast

Coyote Valley is a miracle. For decades, large companies had their sights on building massive warehouses and paving over the valley floor. Others had visions of an entirely new town built to provide housing for the large corporations hoping to build on this ancient landscape. But it didn’t actually happen. The wildflowers continued to bloom in the spring and the farmers continued to labor with the...

Meet Marco Lopez and the Osa Regenerative Farm. What is regenerative agriculture? It sounds like a good thing, but what does it look like in practice? And what does it mean in the middle of dense tropical rainforest? While I was visiting Osa Conservation, I had the opportunity to volunteer on their regenerative farm. The first thing I learned about regenerative farming: it requires intense, unyiel...

We continue our journey on the Osa Peninsula at the Osa Conservation Tree Nursery. I had the pleasure of the meeting the arborist, Mairon, or Titi, as he prefers to be called. Titi is passionate about trees. He showed me around the expansive tree nursery where Osa is growing a 280 different tree species. These saplings will eventually be taken to one of the 300 partner farms that Osa works with to...

The Osa Peninsula of Costa Rica is a land of ecological resplendence. Not only is it well cared for under the protection of Corcovado National Park, it is also looked after by a biological corridor and conservation campus called Osa Conservation. I had the immense pleasure of traveling to Osa Conservation last summer to spend a week learning about all of their work in conservation, native plant re...

Happy Winter Solstice! We are observing the longest night of the year by revisiting a collection of music, stories, and poetry contributed some of our storytellers. On this long night, we are holding space for the darkness, the waiting, and the possibilities that can only emerge from the dark. With gratitude for the co-creators of Solstice Stories: Story sharing by: Youssef Ismael, Alrie Middlebro...

Katherine Boland is an artist and advocate for the climate. Based on the southeast coast of Australia, Katherine experienced the terrifying impacts of the bush fires that gripped global headlines in 2019. As a multi-disciplinary artist, Katherine creates evocative work that holds space for the coexistence of beauty and devastation. Her work focuses on shining light on climate change and the ecolog...

The EarthStory Podcast returns for a third season beginning with the artistry of Théodora Jonsson. As an artist and archeologist, she explores the geology of the Pacific Northwest listening to the poetry of the land. She creates art and sound in response to her deep listening. Her creativity is a duet, of sorts, with the world around her. Théo collects tree saps and resins from around the world....

Our world has lost a giant. While we mourn the loss of a truly remarkable human being (and fellow primate), we will strive to be a part of her legacy. Jane taught us that we are all a part of nature and nature is a part of us. We are all interconnected in this great world’s web of life and no matter how we try, we cannot separate from it. We share this video today to honor Jane’s life and to invit...

Thor Hanson is a delightful storyteller who keeps his eyes and ears close to the ground. After researching plants and animals all over the world from Tanzania to Costa Rica, Thor has come home to his own backyard biology. In his latest book, Close to Home , Thor shares stories and research uncovering entire new species discovered right in his own backyard and in the backyards of others around the...

Cláudio Carvalhaes is an author, teacher, ritual-leader, playwright, and all-round creative soul. He describes himself as an Earth-thinker. He leads by example, sharing the stories of his life where he learned how to live more closely with the natural world and where he unlearned ways of being that separated him from Mother Earth. Cláudio has spent his life as a student of the natural world. He wo...

We continue our conversation with Cultivating Place by exploring the creative spirit and how our gardens teach us to live together as neighbors. We are spending more time with founder and host of Cultivating Place, Jennifer Jewell and her co-hosts, Abra Lee and Ben Futa. Jennifer shares about how she decided to create Cultivating Place. Ben shares about creating his community plant shop and how it...

Cultivating Place convenes community through thoughtful conversations around the many interwoven layers of ecology, humanity, and community that can be found in the practice of gardening. We are joined by founder and host, Jennifer Jewell and her co-hosts, Abra Lee and Ben Futa who shared stories of growing up in their family gardens, their life-long relationships with plants, and how that has sha...

Alexander Liebermann is a composer who is passionate about the natural world. He specializes in birdsong, notating to exacting detail the contours and nuances of bird calls so that an instrumentalist or vocalist can perform their best imitation of the bird’s artistry. Alexander also works closely with biologists who are studying arctic ground squirrels. Alexander’s love for animals is so present i...

Tiffany Yap is a Senior Scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity. Meital Smith is an art teacher and a visual artist. Tiffany wrote and Meital illustrated the graphic novel Tales of the Urban Wild: A Puma’s Journey. This engaging story follows a Puma called C-8 through his life journey. Through a series of encounters with the built world, Tiffany and Meital give the readers an idea of what...

Happy Earth Day. We want to share this day with you by offering some poetry written and sung by Zoë García. Zoë shares: “While growing up in the Bay Area, I was very grateful to have had a childhood filled with a vast variety of natural wonders. That I Was Awake was inspired by the feeling many of us in the Bay Area know far too well: the feeling of an earthquake in the middle of the night. This p...

The EarthStory Podcast returns for a second season. Sampson Kofi Nani shares a wide-ranging conversation about the natural world in Ghana. Sampson Kofi is a research assistant at Ashesi University in Berekuso, Ghana. He shares with us his hopes for instilling the next generation with a love for the environment. He sees love of the environment as an act of protection for biodiversity. In the face o...

I met Alrie Middlebrook after the first EarthStory festival. We connected immediately. Ever since, I have learned so much from her, not only about ecology and the ways the Earth renews herself, but how to lead a life of purpose. Alrie just retired as the Executive Director of the California Native Garden Foundation. She is also in her ninth decade of life. In one of our early conversations, Alrie...

A special EarthStory podcast for the winter solstice featuring Michelé Crowder, Viveka Hall-Holt, Robert Hasselblad, Grace Alexander, Tess McCarty, Youssef Ismail, Alrie Middlebrook, Zoë García, Vicente Moreno, and Barbara Coleman. Join us by the fire as we share music, poetry, and ecology for long evenings. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get...

Jeremiah Lopez is a chef, poet, and his family's story keeper. He tells the stories of his family as they struggled to survive in the harrowing civil wars of Nicaragua and El Salvador as well as starting new lives in the United States. He is a gifted chef who brings people together around the table to share food that is connected to home. He shares poetry that weaves his own stories together in a...

Vicente Moreno is an indigenous cultural practitioner in the San Fransisco Bay Area. He is Otomi and shares Comanche lineage on his mother's side. He has lived his life embedded in community and culture within the Bay Area. Vicente focuses on sharing native arts with indigenous youth and families as a way to remain connected to ancestral wellness. He believes that connection to the Earth, our Moth...

Grace Alexander is a violinist, story keeper, and a tree farmer. She shares how her relationship with the land has been impacted by her family and their stories. In the aftermath of a devastating wildfire that threatened her home, Grace was moved to collaborate with composers to create new music that evokes resilience in the face of destruction. In this post election season, may we learn from the...

Anna Vroengindeweij is a product designer specializing in biomimicry. She sees the Earth as her first teacher. Anna finds the interconnections and intricacies of nature to be the ultimate example of a well designed system. She shares about her initiative: the Oyster Spot and her desire to help restore the oyster reefs in the North Sea simply by giving them a place to live. The live premiere of Fad...

tsi sq́ʷalʔalq́ʷal Lora Pennington is an Upper Skagit storyteller, teacher, and artist. She shares The Year Round Story as taught to her by Vi taqʷšəblu Hilbert. Robert Hasselblad shares his own poetry as a companion to the story. Grace Alexander and Will Rand offer musical underscore throughout. Join us around the fire for storytelling and the creative spirit in action. This is a public episode....

Alrie Middlebrook is a garden designer, non-profit leader, botanist, ecologist, and an avid hiker. She knows the sustaining promise of native ecology and has a vision for how the human community can live in harmony with the rest of the biotic community. Her friend and apprentice, Sophie Chertok, an environmental planner, believes that the garden is the center of community life. Together, their fri...

Youssef Ismail is a photographer, teacher, and scholar. He cares deeply for the wellbeing of the natural world and he is a living example of how to wait, watch, and listen for the wisdom that the Earth is offering in every moment. Youssef shares stories from his life journey and how they have shaped the way that he sees through his lens and from his heart. This is a public episode. If you would li...