Insect photographer/advocate Danae Wolfe (of ChasingBugs.com) talks with me about amazing insects (like the spiders, butterflies, moths, and fireflies that I saw in the Appalachia mountains) and why they and their habitats are deserving of our protection, instead of our disdain, zappers, and poisons. We discuss cool tips in her new book "Grass Isn't Greener" to be wildlife-friendly in our greenspaces/ yards (as insect populations are declining and need our help), like by: passing on the pesticid...
Aug 16, 2025•47 min•Ep. 106
I was excited to have longtime food and animal activist (and local Atlantan) Leah Garces, CEO of Mercy for Animals, join me in the WRFG studio to share interesting stories from her latest book “TransFARMation: The Movement to Free Us From Factory Farming.” In this 49-minute podcast (recorded July 2025), we discuss all kinds of animals, including many humans, who are affected by industrial animal agribusiness -- from animal farmers, to rural communities, to slaughterhouse workers (many of whom ar...
Aug 08, 2025•49 min•Ep. 105
Join me on the second segment of my ecotourism trip to Tasmania, Australia (my unscientific, amateur, American, vegan, wombat-obsessed perspective) with all my own audio recordings from my June 2025 trip. This 58-minute (part 2) segment of the trip takes you along with me to my favorite part -- Maria Island National Park and its wombats, kangaroos and wallabies, stingrays, and ruby red anemones, and the culling issue of marsupial "overpopulation" -- through to Port Arthur Historic Convict Site, ...
Jul 17, 2025•58 min•Ep. 104
I’m so excited to share my three-week ecotourism trip through Tasmania, Australia. This 50-minute podcast is the first of a multi-part podcast series I created from the audio that I took along my June 2025 trip (and you can pair that with the gorgeous photos I posted on https://www.facebook.com/InTunetoNature ) to get a feel for this extraordinary place, and its animals, like wombats, kangaroos, wallabies, seals, whales, sheep, cows, and birds like cockatoos, forest ravens, magpies, wrens, and k...
Jul 10, 2025•50 min•Ep. 103
Environmental communication scholar Dr. Hanna Morris shared her insights from "Apocalyptic Authoritarianism: Climate Crisis, Media, and Power," her 2025 book with Oxford Univ Press. This book meets the political moment in analyzing the way most mainstream news media actually lean moderate to right in climate coverage that "others" and villianizes the New Left activists and progressive politicians as too 'radical' or 'woke' (like A.O.C. and often other women of color or those proposing the Green ...
Jun 09, 2025•50 min•Ep. 102
When you hear the term "animal welfare" you probably think cats, dogs, horses, maybe pet parakeets. But there is an organization called Wild Animal Initiative that is expanding the notion of animal welfare to include wild/free-living animal individuals. For my 100th podcast episode, my guest Cat Kerr with Wild Animal Initiative was here to talk about how scientists try to measure wellbeing in wild animals (you can guess some of the criteria) and why we have not often done that in scientific rese...
May 31, 2025•52 min•Ep. 101
In this mass extinction era, can we save the Endangered Species Act? We discuss how engaged citizens can speak out against the trump regime's recent proposal to weaken the notion of what “harm” legally means (so the Endangered Species Act would essentially no longer protect animals’ habitats from exploitation, even though habitat destruction is the largest threat to species). Here's a link to a public comment opportunity for engaged citizens to post their thoughts to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife...
May 13, 2025•44 min•Ep. 100
In honor of National Park Week and Earthday 2025, we are supporting OUR national parks by sharing stories about what we love about the parks that we all collectively own (the most beautiful and ecologically significant wild places/habitats in the nation...and in the world, as some earned UNESCO World Heritage Site designations), to help encourage Americans to ask for political support to stop trump and musk/DOGE from defunding OUR parks and to stop firing our hard-working park rangers and staff ...
May 10, 2025•28 min•Ep. 99
We reframe the “egg crisis” (high prices and low supply of commercial hen’s eggs in a bird flu outbreak) as a crisis of mass farming of animals , proposing sustainable alternative food solutions that can replace eggs and reduce the spread of zoonotic diseases, pollution, and the killing and harm of millions of wild and domesticated animals. Jennifer and Carrie discuss this in the context of the bird flu outbreak, as avian influenza is spreading and mutating in a variety of animal species (includ...
Mar 20, 2025•42 min•Ep. 98
Our National Park Service staff are under seige, as so many federal employees are, from trump and Elon Musk’s unfair attacks on our federal government agencies with haphazard and frankly cruel mass firings of public servants (not truly based on inefficiency or poor performance) along with spending and hiring freezes that are traumatizing and debilitating park employees and surrounding communities, creating a culture of fear and demoralization (the rhetoric not only lacks appreciation but is insu...
Mar 08, 2025•48 min•Ep. 97
We gotta start eating plants not other animals. A 2025 article published in the journal “Oxford Open Climate Change” titled “Solving climate change requires changing our food systems” outlines the need for human societies globally to transition to plant-based food systems and phase out factory farming, offering pathways to make that vision a reality to reach climate mitigation goals and spare the worst warming and deforestation impacts. (the article is open-access and available to share, with a ...
Feb 09, 2025•29 min•Ep. 96
We discuss the concept of animal dignity – two words that don’t often get put together; we typically only hear of human dignity, as if it means we are dignified precisely because we aren’t animals, yet we humans are part of the animal kingdom and not the only animal species who possesses a dignity that should be respected. In this special 55-minute podcast, host Carrie Freeman explores this novel ethical and legal concept with our guest, award-winning British author, philosopher, and animal advo...
Jan 27, 2025•56 min•Ep. 95
Carrie and Melody discuss how to incorporate animal and eco protection into your life in meaningful ways to meet your own life goals, priorities, and interests in big and small ways, syncing up with actions and virtues the world needs from us humans. Since the beginning of each new year is a time to reassess our own goals and priorities, it seemed a good time to have an In Tune to Nature show that focused on our own personal growth resolutions and how that can synergize with efforts to help othe...
Jan 01, 2025•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 94
This Christmas, I thought it would be fun to analyze 6 popular Christmas songs referencing animals-other-than-humans (mostly mammals who are forced to pull people around the snow in sleds, and then some birds, mainly birds that humans kill and eat but sometimes birds humans admire for their beauty). The songs are Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, Run Run Rudolph, Sleigh Ride, Jingle Bells, The 12 Days of Christmas, and Nat King Cole’s The Christmas Song. I’m going to deconstruct these Christmas so...
Dec 24, 2024•24 min•Ep. 93
To have a greener holiday season (and beyond) and avoid buying a bunch of cluttering stuff your friends and family don't need (and probably don't want), this annual holiday show focuses not on eco-friendly products/items but more on eco-friendly experiences and services in order to avoid cluttering up our lives (and planet) with more items that land in our homes permanently and ultimately weigh us and our descendants down (or just end up in a landfill down the line). So my emphasis here is on sh...
Nov 26, 2024•44 min•Ep. 92
I decided animals needed an election postmortem after being erased from the political and media agenda by self-centered anthropocentrism; so I wanted to use this media platform with my friend from Oregon, Dr. Debra Merskin, to collectively grieve, vent, and discuss how we really feel this week as animal rights activists, vegans, environmentalists, social justice advocates, human animal earthlings, and feminists who were excited to have America's first women president after 200+ years! While the ...
Nov 11, 2024•33 min•Ep. 91
This election season is the ultimate time to consider that this decade is our last best chance to transition to a liveable planet instead of continuing to further recklessly degrade the sustainability of our own species’ future, and that of fellow earthlings, and our one Oasis Earth. Marine conservationist, former U of Alaska professor, and clean energy and wildlife consultant, Dr. Rick Steiner speaks with In Tune to Nature radio host Carrie Freeman about his book Oasis Earth: Planet in Peril – ...
Oct 20, 2024•52 min•Ep. 90
We voters really do care about eco issues (it's aligned with our health and economy and love for other animals...and future generations), so I wanted to get us prepared, motivated, and confident for early voting in Georgia Oct 15 - Nov 1st, with resources and tips shared by Brionte McCorkle, Executive Director of the nonpartisan Georgia Conservation Voters (GCV) at https://www.gcvoters.org/vote/ That GCV voter resource website includes a link to this nonpartisan tool https://gcv.branch.vote/summ...
Oct 05, 2024•47 min•Ep. 89
Elections are about more than just the current economy. We citizens must consider longterm effects of policies on our climate stability, wild animal livelihoods, community wellbeing, ecosystem health, and sustainable economic opportunities for future generations. But "Project 2025," the Heritage Foundation's extreme right-wing policy plan for a trump presidency forecasts a grim future of handing over more power to industries for oil and gas exploitation in ocean habitats, increasing not decreasi...
Sep 22, 2024•32 min•Ep. 88
The Marine Protection Atlas maps the global conservation of ocean areas that are supposed to legally protect aquatic animals and plant life from industrial activities like commercial fishing, mining, and drilling, but they have varying levels of protection and effectiveness so far. In this 33-minute podcast, we discuss the status of legally protected marine ocean areas worldwide, some of which are called “blue parks,” based on a report titled “Ocean protection quality is lagging behind quantity:...
Sep 10, 2024•34 min•Ep. 87
Water is essential to life, yet factory animal farms have polluted freshwater and river and wetland ecosystems and rural neighborhoods for decades. But we can work to protect water, wildlife, animals, and community health. To tell us how, is our guest Larry Baldwin. He’s with the nonprofit group Waterkeeper Alliance https://waterkeeper.org/ and serves as their Campaign Coordinator for the “Pure Farms, Pure Waters” program in North Carolina. He works with the 15 licensed Waterkeeper Alliance grou...
Aug 07, 2024•36 min•Ep. 86
I love hearing about "wildlife equity" for the wild animals who are often an integral focus of tourists. As ecotourists, we long to see amazing wild animals, but how can we ensure we aren’t endangering or harming them and putting ourselves or tourism profit before the lives and wellbeing of local humans and other animals in these tourism hotspots? To tell us about her (and co-authors') concept of wildlife equity and multispecies tourism justice is our guest Dr. Carol Kline , Appalachian State Un...
Jul 22, 2024•30 min•Ep. 85
We talk with Catherine Ridley, VP of One Hundred Miles , about wildlife protection efforts in coastal Georgia, focusing on the endangered North Atlantic Right Whale and Loggerhead Sea Turtles who breed here and are at risk due to fatal ship strikes, fishing gear entanglements, dredging, and noise and light pollution, as well as discussing ancient Horseshoe Crabs, who are especially under threat lately by pharmaceutical industries who are capturing (kidnapping) hundreds of thousands of them and d...
Jun 18, 2024•27 min•Ep. 84
Conservation Journalist Ben Goldfarb explains stories and lessons from his fantastic book "Crossings: How Road Ecology is Shaping the Future of Our Planet" It examines how our vast system of roads and all our car and truck traffic is dissecting landscapes and making life dangerous and often lethal for other animal species (to bypass the "moving fence" of traffic) – and what we can do about it to support biodiversity and to share our planet more equitably with other animal individuals striving to...
Jun 06, 2024•34 min•Ep. 83
A decade after the release of the 2014 award-winning documentary Cowspiracy , filmmakers Kip Anderson and Keegan Kuhn come together with Atlanta animal activists and scholars in a webinar on May 21st 2024 to discuss the impact of the film and the status/progress/strategies of the vegan movement today. Facilitated by host Dr. Natalie Khazaal, a critical animal studies scholar and Associate Professor at Georgia Tech (the webinar was funded by a grant from her department, the School of Modern Langu...
May 28, 2024•57 min•Ep. 82
Food justice activist and veganic farmer Eugene Cooke shares an aspirational vision for why he practices agro-ecology in urban ag at Grow Where You Are farms around Atlanta and how (and why) this can be scaled up for widespread regenerative agricultural practices that the U.S. needs to stay viable and sustainable to feed our human population and nurture our soil naturally not chemically. In this 25-minute podcast (from Sept 2022), Eugene explains his unconventional roots from artist to farmer an...
May 04, 2024•26 min•Ep. 81
To honor primatologist Dr. Jane Goodall's 90th birthday (April 3 2024) and her continuing conservation work, I am playing part of a recent Mongabay News interview with her, hosted by Rhett A. Butler, followed by a PBS News Hour interview from 2016 with the late biologist E.O. Wilson where he discussed his final book "Half Earth" which he wrote in his late eighties. He continued working until he passed at age 92 in 2021 and his legacy lives on with his many nature books and his Half Earth Project...
Apr 21, 2024•30 min•Ep. 80
Renowned animal ethologist Dr. Marc Bekoff shares insights from the newly revised edition of his classic book: “ The Emotional Lives of Animals: A leading scientist explores animal joy, sorrow, and empathy, -- and why they matter” with a foreword by famed primatologist Dr. Jane Goodall. In April 2024, with the release of the book near Dr. Goodall's 90th birthday, Dr. Bekoff spent 38 minutes with host Carrie Freeman discussing: what it's like working with Dr. Goodall, what has changed in the expl...
Apr 05, 2024•39 min•Ep. 79
We discuss the latest in the 2024 fight against environmental racism and stream water degradation as part of the "Save The Atlanta Forest" movement also knowns as the "Stop Cop City" movement, in Southeast Atlanta, comprised of many allied groups of citizens who over the last several years are working to stop/discontinue the building of a multi-million dollar mega law enforcement training center in a forested watershed area, where it is unwanted by the adjacent human community of many Black resi...
Feb 24, 2024•28 min•Ep. 78
In this double-show we explore problems and solutions for transforming America’s flawed model of wildlife management that is oddly human-centric (hunter-centric), undemocratic, and often cruel, by speaking with wildlife advocate and author Anja Heister, PhD, about her recent book “Beyond the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation: From Lethal to Compassionate Conservation,” published by the academic press Palgrave Macmillan as part of their Animal Ethics Series. Founder of Footloose Monta...
Jan 27, 2024•54 min•Ep. 77
