[on-hold music] Hey there, listener. It's Quinn, obviously. We launched private member podcast feeds for both of our shows, The Most Important Question with just me and guests, and Not Right Now, the show I co-host with Claire Zulkey. The member feeds are ad free, which is awesome if you hate ads, and they have some super fun bonus content, including weekly off-topic banter and some recommendations, and monthly Q and A's that you can't get anywhere else.
It'll be three dollars a month or thirty dollars a year, 'cause everything we make costs money to make, and we need more of your support. So head to importantnotimportant.com/upgrade to start your thirty-day free trial right now, and when you do, you'll get these member feeds and everything else members can get right now: stickers, your What Can I Do profile and personalized recommendations, access to my essays in the comments section, and so much other stuff.
That's importantnotimportant.com/upgrade. The link, of course, is right in your show notes. It takes one minute and will automatically send you everything you need to get going. Thank you, thank you, thank you truly for supporting our work here and for giving a shit. Have a great rest of the day.
[on-hold music] In every flood-scarred bend of an Appalachian River sits a chance to rebuild something stronger, cleaner water for people, and room for a one hundred and sixty million year salamander to thrive again. Hurricane-shaped chaos is unveiling a surprising truth. When we restore stream banks, fund green storm water projects, and protect keystone species like the eastern hellbender, we don't just rescue wildlife.
We buffer towns and farms and drinking water intakes against the next big storm. The same fixes that help a snot otter bounce back can future-proof entire communities like yours and mine. So what can I do to turn the washed-out creeks and budget cuts into a cleaner, more resilient future? Every week, thousands of people ask us the most important question in the world. What can I do?
So every week, I turn around and ask someone who actually knows what the hell they're talking about the very same question, someone who's already answered it for themselves, whether that's global health, climate change, creek beds, indigenous data, food stamps. I find out why they're doing the work they're doing and what we, you and I, can do to support it, to join their work, to fund their work, to find our own way into the front lines of the future.
I am your host, Quinn Emmett, and my guest today is Jackie Flynn Mogensen, senior reporter at Mother Jones. Jackie embedded with conservation biologists after Hurricane Helene and uncovered how saving an ancient salamander could safeguard our waterways and our towns for decades to come. Stick around, and you'll discover practical ways to turn today's river wreckage into tomorrow's resilience. As always, for questions or feedback, you can email us at questions@importantnotimportant.com.
[on-hold music] Jackie, welcome to this shit show. You're already probably regretting it. Thank you for joining us today. Not at all regretting it. Thank you for having me. Give me a little time. Jackie, I have this two-part question for you, and it sounds like it's the same question, but it's not. And I know you listen to other episodes. One, I'm sorry, not because of the guest, because of me.
Two, you might already have heard this. Okay. The first is, why do you have to do this job? So of everyone in the world who could do your kind of reporting, why you? And number two, why do you have to do this work? So of all the ways that you, little Jackie that grew up, could answer the call, why do you have to do this work in particular? Does that make sense? I, I think I'll try to tackle the second question first because- A lot of people do that, interestingly. Go ahead. I'm all ears.
Uh, so I am a science journalist at Mother Jones magazine, and since eighth grade, I knew I wanted to be a science reporter specifically. Hell yeah. Which is, I, I feel like n- the way most people do not come into this field, they sort of fall into it usually. But as a kid, I grew up reading National Geographic and Outside Magazine. Mm-hmm.
And I said, "Wow, I, I wonder what it would be like to be the person who is creating these stories for people." Mm. And, you know, it wasn't like I decided I'll be that and then only stuck to it. I actually considered maybe I'll go into science, be a scientist, but then I actually tried doing some field work and lab work.
I was an assistant for a PhD student collecting leaves in the Redwood Forest, so we'd- Okay... have tree climbers go up to the top of the trees, snip it, let the leaves fall down, and I'd bag it and put it into a cooler, and then kind of helped with the lab work assessing or looking at the chemical makeup of the leaves, essentially.
Mm. Which is all really cool, and I loved, like, talking about it, but actually doing the work itself, I was like, "I cannot do this." And I really enjoy the actual work of science writing and reporting, which is
just tinkering with words, talking to researchers. I call it momentarily borrowing their obsessions, so I can kind of, you know- Mm.... float around all these- Mm-hmm... different science areas, and then I get to write about it and tell people about it, and I just kind of get to pop into people's lives. Like, for the salamander story, I went out and met with Wally Smith, a salamander biologist, who showed me around some of his field sites. And so I really enjoy doing that.
And I guess you could say the reason that I'm the one doing it, I guess-As a kid, you know, you get positive reinforcement from your teachers and things like that, and I was always told, "You're very good at science and you're very good at writing." And so I feel like this field, I was made to be a journalist, a science journalist specifically, because I am just so intrigued by and fascinated by, and a fan of, honestly, science and the scientific process.
I feel like sometimes there's a tension as journalists to, you know, we're not here to promote science necessarily. We're not here to make people care about science always. Sometimes it's critiquing s- the scientific process or critiquing what scientists do. So I've [laughs] developed all of these kind of mixed feelings about doing journalism now.
But at the heart of it, I do really enjoy writing about these scientific topics and sharing them with people. That was amazing. That was fantastic. I love it. It's so great. I love people who... And we've had every kind of person, as we say, who kinda works on the front lines of the future, who has found their way to at least through their day job to, to give a shit most practically, and it really spans such an enormous spectrum.
A woman who started a women's health company to develop a blood test to help you find the right birth control for you so it's not an emotional nightmare, which it is for so many people, 'cause she almost took her own life. She was like, "This should not be the way it is," and it's just 'cause we ignore women's health. We had a young woman who, you know, a little more indirectly really into science, but instead is being like, "I'm gonna cure eyeballs."
She said, "I'm going to build robots that, during the night, flip over and shake pipettes, because humans are bad at it, and it costs humans a lot of money to do it, and that's a bottleneck in every kind of science." And then we've also had a gentleman a few years ago whose father had a specific kind of muscle dystrophy, and he and his brother were like eight, and he said, "I'm gonna grow up and fix that."
And then he fucking grew up and fixed it, and not in time to help his dad, but you're like how does someone will themselves to do that? And then there's people like me who have no real transferable skills, especially with flashcards and things like this. No one ever said, "You're good at science and you're a journalist." They were just like, "Please stop talking." But I can find other ways to help, like talking to people like you. So yeah, I love that description.
Again, like, we have so many listeners who are already doing it, or like how do I find my way in? Do I just follow this person and donate to them? Or does hearing you tell that story make something click for them and them go, "Oh, shit, I could maybe do this thing, 'cause I hate this and this, but I do like this, and what if it was my job?" Mm-hmm. Thank you. No, that's part of the reason I was excited to come onto this podcast.
I feel like you have a very clear purpose of why you want to talk to your guests, and I really appreciated how deep you go with the guests in their own interests. I've never had anyone really ask me about that before. And I, I've done, you know, probably dozens of radio- Wow... interviews, and no one's ever asked me these types of questions, so I do appreciate it. Well, you're very kind. My children don't answer my questions anymore.
[laughs] So this is all I got. Also, I'm like a introvert, and this checks my social box for the day, so it's really great. So it's a little selfish. Before we get into this fantastic article and all of your work and what you learned from it on top of all of your other reporting, translating science for the masses, I wanna set the stage a little bit.
And describe exactly what an eastern hellbender is, and I'm gonna pull it directly from your text. May I read it, or would you like to? Absolutely. Go for it. Okay. And I'm in Virginia. I'm above a candy shop in Colonial Williamsburg, so this really hit home for me. [gentle music] "Although you wouldn't know it by looking at their sheer bulk, up to about two feet in length and weighing it at more than three pounds, eastern hellbenders are sensitive creatures.
As the largest amphibian on the continent," again, little nugget, blew my mind, "they're endearingly ugly, with slimy brownish-gray skin, wrinkled like lasagna, [laughs] and wide-set lidless eyes. Legend has it they slithered here straight from hell and are known among locals across Appalachia as mud devils, snot otters, or grampus, among other less than flattering nicknames."
The conservation biologist you hung out with, the, one of the main characters of your piece, Wally Smith, said, "A lot of other people see them and freak out. I think they're really cute, personally." Amen. But more widely, it says, "They keep crayfish populations in check and serve as food for creatures like snapping turtles and otters.
The hellbender species is at least 160 million years old and has evolved to breathe almost exclusively through its skin," which sounds amazing and really cool, and then you keep reading. 'Cause in your next lines, you describe the problem. "In the age of humans, that evolutionary asset is now a liability. As skin breathers, hellbenders require excellent water quality to survive."
They're the canary in the coal mine for this ecosystem, aren't they? Yeah, exactly, and it's funny because going back to the cute/ugly thing, I think they're kind of both. I'm a huge believer that ugly species deserve, uh, attention and our care as well. Of course. But yes, basically because they're breathing through their skin, they kind of are, yeah, this indicator species is what scientists call it.
And there's a bunch of species like that, but the eastern hellbender is kind of your classic indicator species. And because it's so sensitive, it's also been declining. Its populations have been declining. Last year, the federal government proposed to list the eastern hellbender as endangered under the Endangered Species Act and wrote that of the known documented 626 populations, so that's, like,
groups living in one area- Mm... of this species, it's declined by 41%. And so now there's only about 371 populations left, and of that, about half of the remaining populations are in decline. [upbeat music] So we're on a big cleaning streak right now. As you can imagine, I'm very annoying about it to my children, but we're trying to dial it down to the essentials at home. So whether you're an appliance, a piece of furniture, or clothing, whatever, you gotta earn your spot.
Everything's got a place, everything has utility, which is hard with kids who constantly bring things into the house and all their stuff, and it's really hard when you're trying to feed them constantly. And there are various appliances that are advertised to you that can literally do one thing that honestly can't justify the counter space.
But I'll tell you what does, it's the Mill Food Recycler, and holy cow, does it ever. It doesn't even go on the counter, by the way. It goes on the floor like a sexy trash can. It plugs into a standard outlet, and voila. No more food waste. Got peels, bones, stalks, whatever, leftovers? Put 'em in there, and then while you sleep, the Mill automatically turns on, dries, and grinds them, and it doesn't smell at all. It's crazy. Again, let's rehash.
Not only does it not stink up the house, or two, cause leaky trash bags, which are disgusting, and three, send leftover food to the landfill to turn into waste, and then methane, and then rising oceans. It actually makes you feel good because it grinds up all of your food waste into these adorable grounds you can use in the garden, you can give to a local farm, you can put 'em right in the green bin.
You can even ship back to Mill via postal service pickups like it's Netflix in 2003. Anyways, a delight, a game changer. You guys can get $75 off right now when you go to our special site. I'm gonna read it to you, but you should know the link is right in the show notes, and you can just smash your finger against it. It's mill.com/lp/important-not-important. Can I remember that? No. That's why we put the link right in the show notes.
So anyways, huge thanks to Mill for doing the right thing and trying to cut down on food waste, most of which comes from our homes, for sponsoring our work, and of course, thanks to you listeners for always supporting our partners.
[upbeat music] And so to me, I mean, obviously this is bad for us if we lose the species that tells us whether streams are healthy or not, but there's almost kind of like a philosophical loss as well that I think a lot about when I'm writing stories like this, which is this species has been around for 160 million years, as you said. If it were to go away, you know, just blink out of existence is what scientists describe it as, that would be such a huge tragedy i- in my view.
I don't actually get into that much in this article, but it's something I do think about a lot when I'm writing about endangered and threatened species. It's easy to glorify sharks that have been around. They are basically dinosaurs, right? And some of these turtles that live so long on their own, but have also survived a lot. The climate, like has been real on and off for those 160 million years.
They haven't not faced hard things, and if they're in such steep decline now, that should say something about what they've been through, right? And where we are now. And not just where we are now, but also our ability to do something about it. Mm-hmm. It's... This story is not just about the eastern hellbender, it's also about policy- Mm-hmm, mm-hmm...
and eco-grief, and all these other things. But one thing I've written a, a lot about is the Endangered Species Act, which was created, it was signed into law in 1973 to protect- By... species from going... By Richard Nixon. Um- Thank you. Uh, y- everybody's- Everybody... got a role to play here. I mean, yeah, Richard Nixon, despite all of his obvious shortcomings, was somewhat of an environmental [chuckles] like advocate somehow. It was just a totally different time.
I mean, there was a river in Ohio that basically caught fire- Mm-hmm... because of all the pollution in it. Mm-hmm. Species like the alligator and the condor were disappearing, and so we actually as a society feel like came to a realization that, oh shit, we- Yeah... might need to do something about this. And so that's the Endangered Species Act. But in the age of climate change, I wonder, and experts that I've spoke to wonder, is the Endangered Species Act enough?
You know, what does it mean to protect a species from climate change- Mm... when the act itself was signed before the terms climate change or global warming gains popular use. It's just kind of a really sad conundrum that we're in, that, that the eastern hellbender is in, and other species too. All right. Well, we're gonna get to all that stuff. Take me, 'cause you went on a field trip with Wally here, and again, I wanna make this more personal for both you and Wally for a minute.
So you actually walked into the Holston River, I believe, with Wally Smith, who, again, little nugget in your piece, am I getting this wrong, has only ever seen two of these live in the wild, and that's his entire fucking life? Right. Incredible. What was it like to walk into that river with him and all of his, as you paint so vividly in the first third of the article, his anxieties about
what is this storm gonna do, not just to the humans I know and love in this area, which was tragic, but also his precious hellbenders. And then you were with him when that was realized. What did you see and smell and feel when his, as you described it, his boulder map, which is crazy, had basically vanished? So it was really interesting to see it through his eyes, because I'd never been to this field site before. He's probably spent, I don't know, dozens if not hundreds of hours there.
And as I write in the piece, he's a salamander biologist, but he primarily studies habitat, and so that's part of the reason he hasn't seen them. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. You know, he spent doing this for 16 years, has only seen two hellbenders in the wild before.In part because he is focused on the habitat, which is obviously very important for their survival.
And at this site, he had mapped out where every single boulder was in this stretch of river, every riffle, run in the stream. He knew it like the back of his hand.
And so when we went down there, my job was try to get him to describe, you know, what's different, what stuck out to you. And for one thing, the most immediate effect of the storm, so this is after Hurricane Helene, was that these boulders that he had known so well, you know, six-foot-tall boulders, hundreds of pounds, just either completely covered by sediment, launched downstream, just nowhere in sight.
So one of my favorite quotes from him is something like, "Where did my rocks go?" basically. I love that. Yeah. No, I love that. And so in addition to all of the debris, I mean, we saw a full rusted out car down there, door, diapers, tires, railroad ties. It looked almost like a dumping ground from all the debris of the storm, but it also... The whole shape of the river was different. It was wider, and all of the boulders, as I said, that he had known about were just gone.
And so that was really concerning for him as a salamander biologist because the hellbenders nest in cavities below these river boulders, and they spend their entire lives in water. And so for him, at first, he was like, "I don't know if there are, A, any hellbenders left in this river at all, and B, if they have a, a place to go at this point." And, you know, I, I don't wanna be a spoiler alert.
At the end of the story, I reveal that he actually tracked, in that stretch of river, the number of boulders suited for hellbenders actually increased, which is actually a good sign, but he doesn't know if there are any even hellbenders left in that river. Sure. And as a very long ago liberal arts major, I love to appreciate things like geology and rocks, like enormous boulders that have clearly been in one place for a bazillion fucking years, and shaped there by the weather.
But what could possibly move these things? And like you said, because he studies the habitats, which I think is so specific and so interesting, those are his indicators, right? Is there a place for them? He doesn't just study the water quality, doesn't just study them, are they healthy? It's do they have a place to go? And one, to see like, "Where are my rocks?" It's two things.
It's panic because going, "I knew exactly how many habitats there were for these," right? Two, not having a count of the new ones or where they relocated. But three, like, the power of these storms to do that, you know, is something that again, I mean, we all saw the devastation there and elsewhere with the LA fires, whatever, pick your poison. We keep discounting what they can do, and I felt like we can laugh at like, "Where are my rocks?" But yeah, it's crazy.
And so if they can do that to this little species, you can see how someone as knowledgeable as him or you could have eco-grief. You can see the if this, then what else. On the one hand, I mean, we saw the devastation of all the photos, and I think it was, you know, something like 250 people died from Hurricane Helene. It was nearly $80 billion of damage. I actually...
When I put that in the story, I was like, "80 billion with a B?" I was like, "Is that right?" I had to triple-check that number. And so on one hand, you're like, "Okay, this is just an immense storm."
And on the other hand, when you look at just, you know, one stretch of river, the impact on one species, looking for, you know, your few boulders that you know of in that stretch of river, it was really different, I think, to look at the impacts of the storm from the perspective of just one species. So I, I hope, you know, that the larger picture isn't lost or that... You know, I don't wanna downplay the damage to all of the people that live in- Of course not...
uh, you know, southwestern Virginia or anything like that. But it was just-- For me, it was a new way of looking at hurricanes, and I grew up in Florida, so I've lived through several of these. Yeah. And that's, you know, what I was hoping to get across to readers is- Well, you did a wonderful job because
equally important, and I really used that word intentionally, you know, we've had conversations here, and most of my offline conversations, not most, many of them are about manage or treat or insurance markets or reinsurance markets in various parts of California or Florida, the Gulf Coast, whatever it may be, or the interior flood maps that haven't been updated, and we build there, and people can't leave or they don't wanna leave because of a sense of place or it's their biggest investment, all this shit.
But it is so important we keep coming back to, again, you know, it's like good, better, best to say, "Oh, well, we should talk more about nature." Well, w- we are in relationship with nature. It's like, no, well, we're of it, and if they don't have habitats and the water is not clean, that says a lot about everything else, but it also says a lot about them, right?
And like you said, at the same time, we have had these, and I'm gonna get into the policy stuff in a second, but just to set the stage, like again, we've had people like Richard Nixon pre-climate change as we knew it, not before Exxon knew it, but as we knew it. These moments of intervention, the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, like you said, acid rain, a river caught on fire, the ozone layer, where we stopped and said, "I think that's enough.
Look at what we can do, and look what we've done, and how do we flip that on its head and say, 'What can we do here?'" And, you know, when folks read headlines that are kind of the antithesis to this piece where they're like, "Well, I read the jet stream's slowing down. What do I do?" And I'm like, "Not much." But climate change, of our many issues, you know, public health, whatever it might be, if you wanna frame it in a constructive way, it really is the heat on your back locally, right?
The water you drink that your ecosystems survive in, the trees you do or do not have, whatever it may be. So let's now talk a little bit about, before we get to what specific people can do, you layered in quite a bit about the Endangered Species Act.Whether it's gonna be here in a few years, which seems insane to ask, doesn't seem insane anymore.
But there are gonna be some listeners who say, "Hey, why did we weave so many politics into a story about salamanders? Why did you have to do that?" Hello, hello, Malcolm Gladwell here. On this season of Revisionist History, we're going where no podcast has ever gone before. In combination with my three-year-old, we defend the show that everyone else hates. I'm talking, of course, about Paw Patrol.
There's some things that really piss me off when it comes to Paw Patrol. It's pretty simple. It sucks. My son watches Paw Patrol. I hate it. Everyone hates it, except for me. Plus, we investigate everything from why American sirens are so unbearably loud, to the impact of face blindness on social connection, to the secret behind Thomas' English muffins' perfect nooks and crannies.
And also, we go after Joe Rogan. Are you ready, Joe? I'm coming for you. You won't wanna miss it. Listen to Revisionist History wherever you get your podcasts. I think partly it was because of the time we're in right now. I worried that a story just simply about salamanders would come off as kind of tone deaf when- Mm.... you know, so much of our scientific infrastructure is
been subject to cuts and thousands of job losses of f- federal employees. And I, I truly believe that we don't exist in a bubble. All these plants and animals are subject to our laws and policies. And so, you know, partly it was not to make this feel tone deaf, but also because that's just the situation that we're in. You know, not talking about politics would- Mm.... almost be a bit of a...
Like, that would go against my duty as a journalist, essentially, [chuckles] because it's all part of the, the bigger picture. So yeah, as I write in the article, the grants to prevent against flooding- Mm-hmm... in Virginia have been- Mm-hmm... cut.
Employees at Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Science Foundation, National Park Service, all of these agencies are tasked with helping preserve threatened and endangered species in some way or another. And all of those cuts will have impact down the line for species heading towards extinction. So obviously, there's 50 different versions of this. There's federal, there's local, and again, RGGI i- is a multi-state thing.
Let's use that as an example, though, just as far as what state policy can actually mean. You talk about how the RGGI and the funds there doubled as habitat and flood protection, not just for humans. So practically, what does losing that pipeline mean on the ground, sort of as far as you understand it? So what...
You know, this concern actually was brought to me by Wally Smith, who's again, a salamander biologist- Hell yeah, Wally... who also, who also sees how all of these policies impact the species that he studies. So the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative is a kind of collective sort of law that Virginia has opted into. It helps fund flood prevention measures.
So what Smith's concern was that this recent executive order from Donald Trump, which was last month, so in April, it was this executive order signed to prevent, quote, "state overreach on energy policy." And so it basically went after kind of very broad brush, very broad language. It's intended to go after state and local laws that address climate change or greenhouse gas emissions or have the term environmental justice somehow. It's unclear whether or not this will hold up in court.
You know, legal experts say there's no way a president can do this. But Smith was concerned that, you know, without this regional climate change law, that will mean fewer flood prevention measures, and therefore worse outcomes for his salamander species that he studies. You know, he also lives in Virginia, so a big theme of the story was about how humans and plants and animals are all on this ride together, and we're all having these parallel experiences.
And that was kind of a big, like, aha moment for me with our policies, the salamander, like it's all connected. Yeah. It is all connected. It's like the It's Always Sunny conspiracy thing, except it's correct. And just for people who are not aware, you know, Virginia used to be fairly red, and then it was kinda purple, and then we went pretty blue in 2019, and we did some really awesome things.
We gave 400,000 people health insurance overnight when we started to finally take the free Medicaid money, people who mostly never had it, and just in time. We joined the RGGI. We, at one point, were part of something else that went after last month, California's tailpipe emissions, which I can't remember what the law was that let them set it, now they're trying to take it back. Something like 11, 12 states were in it.
But even before Donald Trump became president again, Governor Youngkin was very happy to start pulling us out of as many of those things as he could, again, in possibly flimsy ways that won't hold up what has happened with the RGGI here. Obviously, we're working to not let him do that, or let the state house and legislator do that in a few months, but damage really can be done on the state level. It's not just the federal level. I mean, we see this with the reproductive rights stuff.
Like, it's one thing to s- see, you know, these essential federal laws go away, but you have to understand how federalism works to know that there were 20 state laws waiting for that to go away, to basically turn those states back to the 1800s, and that's where every election really does matter on the local and the state and the federal level, right?
We can't just take a big swing for the fences on one level and assume that's gonna do anything or, you know, not make it more complicated everywhere. So, all right. I wanna get into the practicalities of what people can actually do, 'cause again, whether we're talking about coral reefs, which is a conversation we had a few years ago, another canary in the coal mine-Or our sweet salamanders.
It's very easy to be like, "Well, fuck." Right? And, and I get that with anything. But what we do is we help people in cities and governments answer, what can I do? It is my favorite part of this. You actually go into this quite a bit here. We usually operate, and with our app we use the verbs donate, organize, volunteer, learn, teach, all these different things. However you wanna show up.
But, uh, practically we're gonna talk a little bit about the local and sort of the state and nationally. So if hellbenders can make it, the rest of us might be okay. Not to rely on them, but as an indicator positively. So for someone who's listening who lives near an eastern stream, or any stream, what practical steps do you feel like they could take today with their kids, by themselves, with their friends, whatever, to make that water a little more hellbender friendly?
Well, the first thing is, and I, I wish I could have put this into the article, but because we have a national audience and not a regional one- Sure... it didn't quite fit. But one of the state biologists I spoke to, Lori Williams, you know, really insisted and was pushing for me to include something in there is if you see a hellbender in the wild, take a picture of it, take a video, get in touch with your local wildlife office.
Give the, you know, longitude and latitude if you can of where you saw it, your name, what it looked like, what you saw, dead or alive. You know, a lot of scientists rely on this sort of citizen science now more than ever, as Lori told me. And so that was the first thing I was hoping to emphasize for people is you can help directly.
C- you can help biologists track th- this population. Do you know if there's any specific kind of app for that or specific service for that? Like, some of these bird apps, holy shit man, they're so cool. Sit on my back deck, I'm like recording them, I'm like, "That's this kind of finch." And it, it's crazy. It's crazy. So is there a version of reporting for that? Not that I know of.
I mean, [laughs] typically these state wildlife offices are not that high-tech. What do you mean? Um, but- Yeah... but, uh, and because it, you know, the hellbender's habitat spans 15 different states- Mm-hmm... you know, there's not just one central hellbender office. It's more of local and state- Should be [laughs] wildlife offices that people should get in touch with.
The other thing I wanted to plug is I've written, uh, it was a while ago now, about rain gardens. Do you know much about rain gardens? I know a little about rain gardens, but I'm gonna g- just do whatever you tell me to do. All right. So let's do this. So obviously in the news we see all these headlines, storms, flooding- Mm-hmm... climate change.
Like, how do you as an individual do anything about that? One thing that you can do is build a rain garden, and obviously look into local laws, whether or not that's allowed in your neighborhood. But there's actually some funding through public works offices l- locally. The EPA has a- Okay... a, a website you could go to, if actually if it's still there. It was- I was gonna say, did you check today?
Because [laughs] I hope, I hope rain gardens aren't too politicized, but basically they're kind of like a glorified ditch in a way. It's, it's essentially like a ditch where you put native plants in it, and it soaks up a, a lot of rainwater. San Francisco- Mm-hmm... where I used to live- Mm-hmm... had this as part of their storm water flood prevention policy, and actually made a really big difference in the Outer Sunset.
And I wrote an article about this, and wrote a side article that's gave people real tips on how to build a rain garden. So I know that's kind of out of left field for this story. Fuck no, that's, it's all part of it though. Um. You know? Flooding is a big risk for hellbenders, se- sedimentation in the water, so agriculture runoff, urban runoff, all of it. So i- i- know it's just a small thing, but collectively these rain gardens can really make a big difference. Don't diminish it.
It is such a struggle for people to feel like they have done something with their hands that they can see. Even I close my laptop at night, I'm like, "Where is the evidence that I contributed today?" You know? That's why I like doing the dishes, 'cause I have a pile of dishes and I do them, and then they go away, and I go, "Aha, I did that." Like, a rain garden you can make with your community.
It's like the free little libraries, right? I built one with my kid when we were in LA. It matters and you can see it every day. And yes, it's not gonna save the hellbenders or slow the jet stream or whatever, but it does count. We know that. We try really hard not to point you towards things that aren't measurable and reputable.
But it does matter. And also we're a very social species, and the more we do those the more we can inspire other people to do it. Get your city council to fund 'em, get your state to fund 'em- Mm-hmm... et cetera, et cetera. So it's awesome, and we're gonna put the link to your piece on how to make a rain garden. Cornell University I believe has a how to build a rain garden app. The, I think they're the same ones that do one of the bird ones too. Yeah. Okay.
So again, we've talked about, you know, how Virginia's kind of blown it the past couple years, and, you know, you fuck around and find out, elections have consequences. But all, using this broadly, state capitals see, you know, wildlife bills as low priority, and that's for a multitude of very annoying reasons. But
from your reporting and your experience here, are there talking points that you feel like reach and maybe even move some legislators? Clean water, economics, public health angles, right? Or just bird nerds, biodiversity value? One thing that I find to be very persuasive is the economic case for preserving- Okay... endangered species. I have some numbers here actually about this specifically, because I was reading up on some of my past coverage on the Endangered Species Act.
The original authors of the Endangered Species Act wrote back in I think the '70s or '80s about, you know, why are we cr- creating this act? Why preserve endangered species? One of the reasons was the kind of economic benefit, and he wrote that at least at the time, 40% of all medicines are on the market are naturally derived. 75% of all of the food we eat, you know, coffee, legumes, fruits, rely on pollinatorsSo without these ecological networks, you know, we're shooting ourselves in the foot.
And you might say, "Oh, well, what's the use of some random snail?" You know? Like, that some endangered snail... This is a talking point that you hear a lot from conservatives in Congress of like, "Why would we care about this tiny fish or this, you know, mussel," or whatever it is. And part of the reason is we may not know their ecological benefit.
You know, Lee Talbot, the author who I was just was citing, wrote that if you were an astronaut in space, and you threw away the life support equipment because you saw it had no use, you know, and that would be- We never use it. You know, what would we use this for? [laughs] We're astronauts in space. And so I think that's the case for many species.
On top of that, in the last 50 years we've lost 70% of wild animals, and more than a million species are nearing extinction. So we're facing a crisis that affects us, and it will affect our economy. And so I feel like emphasizing that point, if you care about money, you should care about endangered species. And who doesn't care about money? But you know, I do a fair amount of offline stuff, whether it's policy or philanthropy or whatever it might be, or just corporate stuff.
Don't be afraid to take that angle, whether it's on a local or state policy side, because it is often what people listen to the most. Try to bring receipts as much as you can. Whatever it takes, 'cause again, it's never just about that snail, you know?
It's very revealing, whether it's ignorance or illiteracy around how an ecosystem could possibly work, even if you just do the most basic thinking on it, to think that snail's probably part of something, and there's a very good chance we rely on it, 'cause we rely on all of it, again, whether it's for medicines or ecosystems or whatever it might be, right?
In all the rewilding efforts that are going on or how we're reintroducing wolves to Yellowstone and things like this, it's like, well, we fucked up, and we found out what happens, and it's not great. You know, or... Oh, God. Who... All the sea urchins eating the kelp. Who eats the sea urchins? Fish. Thank you. Yeah. Right.
And you're just like, now divers go into East Coast or West Coast, and they go, "Where'd all the, where'd all the kelp go?" And it's just sea urchins just demolishing everything 'cause there's no predator. So do the math. It's kinda just how it always [laughs] works, right? And like you said, the medicines all are antibiotics, you know? But that's good. That's good to hear. Just wanna clarify, I guess.
As a journalist, I, I'm in a tough position sometimes because I'm not an advocate. You know, I'm not an environmental advocate, although obviously I care about this stuff. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. My job is to simply inform people. And so I sometimes I wonder about the actual line of is my job to get people to care about climate change and do something, or is it just to communicate what is happening?
And so I do feel like with environmental journalism, it's a question we all need to have. I was just at the conference for Society for Environmental Journalists, and I spoke to someone who had that same thought. They were coming at it from the environmental advocate side of we need to work more with journalists. And so I wasn't so sure about that, to be honest. It's a struggle.
But- But, you know, I really on that front come back a lot to, you know, someone who really went through it, and very intentionally with great burden carried the cross on that question for the past five years, which is Ed Yong in his reporting for The Atlantic, which- Love Ed Yong... won him the awards, and got a lot of people through this, and basically broke him, and now he's just writing a book and birding, basically. And it was how and when and where do you expand
afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted to advocacy? What does that mean in your day-to-day work, in how you see yourself and how you see your job? And a lot of scientists have felt the same way, obviously, for 1,000 different reasons. People go, "It's science." Well, science is never settled. You know, the whole point is to prove yourself wrong over and over again.
But at the same time, we can be a hell of a lot better at communicating what is somewhat settled, what is real, as opposed to the wellness industry. You know, because otherwise th- the wrong stuff gets flooded out there, and we have to find ways. Again, like, it's where are you communicating versus where you're going like, "No, do, just do this.
You know, help this way." That's a struggle. I don't have that struggle. This is the beauty of it. Peop- I get emails all the time. People are like, "You're a journalist." I'm like, "Obviously not, clearly. I don't even have an editor." It's a nightmare. But that's on purpose, you know? 'Cause I'm like, uh, my job is to stand on the shoulders of the great work you all do, and just yell at people.
What is funny that you brought up Ed Yong. He's one of my favorite journalists. Honestly, like, a hero of mine. And I actually interviewed him when his... It was his second book came out, An Immense World, which is all about animal senses. Just incredible. Amazing book. It's so good. But I remember I asked him, 'cause I- we did a Q&A with him, and the- When was this?
This would've been 2021 or 2022. Okay. I think 2022. So after he had won the Pulitzer and had done all this amazing COVID reporting, I was like, "Why write this book about animal senses- Mm-hmm... when you clearly just won this in- you know, major award for your COVID reporting?" Yeah. "Is what your Twitter following, they've flocked to you for, for this reason." Mm-hmm. And obviously before the pandemic, he was a science reporter as well, but...
And he said the book is all about putting yourself in the shoes of another creature, and he felt that built empathy, and he said this is a time where we need empathy for others more than ever. And so the connection between thinking about the natural world and thinking about the other people that you inhabit the natural world with was very clear for him.
And I just really respect the hell out of that [laughs] and really appreciated that perspective. Because, you know, I come to this field because I'm just intrinsically interested in biodiversity, and I know lots of people aren't. You know, some of my colleagues are, like, more interested in the human aspect of things, which is so, so important, but I think-These are stories for everyone.
Whoever reads my stories, great. If they don't wanna read my story but they find meaning in other journalism, great. You know, let- Mm-hmm... a thousand flowers bloom. Sure. So this is just what I'm, you know, naturally interested in, and want to share that with others. And so I, I appreciated the connection that Ed made in our conversation about that. It's profound. And again, like,
great power, great responsibility. It'll hurt you. I mean, obviously he did all of that with just standing there, showing and saying, "No, we have to have more empathy for what's going on right now." And in general, again, like, if COVID didn't exist, again, you have to put yourself in the shoes of these salamanders, right? They've been here a hell of a lot longer than us, you know? Mm-hmm. And they need a place to stand.
Side note, I think this will probably come out about the same time, there's a young readers edition of Immense World coming out next week, which is very exciting and really cool, because the more we can get that kinda stuff into young readers' hands, the better. Yeah, the empathy piece, right? That's all of it. But don't be afraid to use the economics 'cause it is, for better or worse, the language, right, of, of how this all works.
Finish this sentence for me, and then we're gonna get to the last little bit here, and for our audience. If eastern hellbenders rebound by 2045, it will be because ordinary folks did what? I would say vote. [laughs] I say that because when it comes to endangered species that span multiple states, cross state lines, in rivers that cross state lines, this is so much of a federal issue that as we spoke about, there are lots of things individual people can do.
Another thing is just get informed of what endangered species are in your area. Actually, before this call, looked up mine, and in my county, which the Center for Biological Diversity has a map where you can search it, and it tells you the endangered species in your county. So first know what's there, and also vote. So in my county, there's the monarch butterfly, the leatherback sea turtle, and long-eared bat. And so there's lots of stuff I could do to help those species. Mm-hmm.
Plant milkweed, for instance, for the monarch butterfly. So again, like of course there's things people can do, but when it comes to protecting an endangered species from the threats of climate change, that's such a big federal issue that it's... If you care about that, the best way to do something, I would say, is vote.
And- Vote for people who also share those interests. And again, we're a 501[c][3]. I can't endorse- No, no. It doesn't matter. You can say, "People give a shit about the environment." I mean, that's why we do so much work with the Environmental Voter Project, one of my favorite organizations. They're incredible. They just use basically peer pressure to turn out environmental voters.
They're like, "We don't mention a candidate. We don't mention anything. We're just like, 'Oh, you said you're a good voter. You care about the environment. Are you gonna show up?'" And it's incredible how many people it turns out. It's great. Whatever works. And that kind of action obviously matters. Also, again, vote down ballot and run down ballot. There's- Of course, yes.
The answer is you can just go do that. You can be angry and go do it, and go to our friends at Run for Something and sign up, and it's fantastic. That's really helpful. Okay, I just have a last couple questions I'm gonna get you outta here. Is that okay? Before the electricity- Great... kicks out again, and I have to ride a horse home. Jackie, when's the first time in your life
when you realized you had the power of change or the power to do something meaningful? And that could be solo, with family, with a group. We have people who talk about running for office in second grade, or it could be last week, experienced a natural disaster or got a vacci- I, I mean, it could be anything. But a moment where you stood back and were like, "Oh, that's interesting."
Good question. A lot of people just feel impotent with everything, and it's important for other- Yeah... people to go, like, "You may have missed the moment you think is out there, or look for it." All right. This one's gonna sound kinda weird maybe, but when I was a student journalist in, in college, I, I was at Stanford, wrote for the Stanford Daily. I was not a very good member of the newspaper.
I was super inconsistent, but I had one scoop that I learned that the social dance teacher had also invented the tampon applicator and a bunch of other gadgets, basically. What? And he had an incredible career as an inventor and patenter. Presumably made enough money to retire on that, and pursue a life of social dance. So he taught ballroom dance, which was an incredibly popular class.
The fucking dream, right? And I remember I interviewed him, and it was kind of like a little profile of him, and I was just a student, you know. And for one, a lot of people read that article, and was like, "I had no idea about this." So I, I felt the power of, you know, sharing knowledge. Sure. The social dance teacher also, once I shared it with him, he wrote back and said, "No one has ever quite captured me the way that you did."
So I know that's just a small random [laughs] example, but it really kind of gave me this energy for journalism specifically of, like, you uncovered something new that other people widely didn't know about, and you made a difference in this one guy's life. He really appreciated having that profile.
I think he was maybe trying to fly under the radar a little bit, but [laughs] and not have his past known by everybody, but he also appreciated the way I approached the article, which was about why he had chosen to leave this inventor life- Sure... life for social dance, and following his passions. And by the way, like, you wanna just do social dance or whatever, and f- purposely fade into the limelight, great, man. Totally get it.
But at the same time, if they will allow it, these are the type of people we should build statues for. It's a tampon applicator. It's 50% of the population of the planet, you know. Especially in a world where we ignore women's health so much in all this. So to have a, you know, a young journalist say, "Can I explain this to people?"
You know, without turning it into a tickertape parade.That they don't want. I mean, clearly it felt good. That's so amazing. That's so cool. I love that. My wife went to Stanford a million years ago. We're very old. Oh. We're very old. Go trees. [laughs] Go- go trees. Okay. What's a book you've read in the past year that you just fucking loved, whether it's work-related or not work-related? That's always really important as well.
Changed your mind, opened your mind to something you hadn't thought about. We put them all up on Bookshop. The people, they love them. Ugh. Okay. This one, I think it wasn't, it maybe it wasn't in the last year. It's a little bit longer than that, is that okay? Sure. I don't know what year is anymore, to be clear.
But I, I think about it all the time, and also the author of this book, Ben Goldfarb, read the salamander article and recently tweeted it out, and I was like, "Yes, Ben, love you." His name's Ben Goldfarb. Okay. He's famous for his book about beavers. So he wrote Eager Beavers. Yes. The book that I read is called Crossings: How Road Ecology is Shaping the Future of Our Planet. I wish they had gone with a better name because it's all about roadkill.
It's about roads and the ecological damage they cause basically to insects, to amphibians, to bears, to humans, and what we can do about it, which is build road crossings essentially, was kind of one big takeaway. So I think about that book so much because it just completely changed how I thought about roads- Mm-hmm... I obviously interact with all the time. Mm-hmm.
And Ben is also just an amazing journalist, like super well-written, very... You know, if you like kind of going on these little journeys with scientists where you, you sort of, like I said, borrow their obsessions, he's a great journalist to check out too. His book's amazing. That's awesome. My first experience with the crossings, my wife and I have twice been up to Banff National Park up in Canada. It just incredible.
It's so beautiful, that whole park, that whole area, and there's a few of those up there, and I remember seeing them and just immediately you're like, "Of course. Like, of course, we should have a million of these things. It makes so much sense," right? Yeah, I'm all for that. I just think we should build them everywhere. That's great. I love that.
I'm trying to think if I have anything else before I get you out of here. If, if there's one thing I wanted to share with you actually, if it's okay. Yeah. You're in charge. Uh, it doesn't matter. I was thinking of reflecting on that kind of first question you ask people and how I've felt for so long. I, you know, I love doing science journalism. I was meant for this.
There was a moment after the election when I was like, "I don't know if I can do this for another four years," because I went into this field to share m- my interest in science and communicate and explain scientific topics for a general audience. That's my passion. But so much, and, you know, since the inauguration, this is kind of borne out, is watching all the stuff that I love and talking to sources who also love science, defending that, losing their funding.
You know, it's gone from being excited to share about science to becoming a necessary, urgent moment to talk about science. And so there was a moment where I was like, "I don't know if I can do this. It's just not my dream anymore," when my whole beat has been kind of crumpled to a focus on- Eulogies. Right... and I was like, "Maybe I should just quit journalism and go get a PhD in something."
And this story about salamanders actually saved me a little bit because it was a return to the type of stories I love writing, and of course, it had, you know, the component about the Trump administration in there, but it reminded me of why I got into this field.
And so thank you for taking the time to read it and- Oh, yeah... you know, being interested in talking to me about it, but it actually had for me kind of this behind the scenes, like pulling me back, reminding me why I got into this field. I think anyone who gives a shit for whatever reason about whatever, which is, as I tell folks, fortunately and unfortunately, a lot more people than ever, have had some whiplash,
and have, in a lot of ways, had their worst fears realized, if not expounded on. But also have had to really do some resiliency work and some questions about how they spend their time and their days, what's healthy for them and their families. Is this what they'd signed up for, whatever it may be. We were certainly part of that.
You know, go from fighting the fight to fighting to get people to help understand. Not that there aren't ever bad guys. There's always bad guys. We're firm believers in that. You know, we firmly believe in, what do we, what is our little quote? We don't categorically support any particular person, party, company, whatever, just good people doing the right thing and bad people standing in the way.
And it feels like six months ago, my biggest worry was like, how do I get states to explain better which clean energy rebates are available to people? Ugh. And it seems so sweet, and it takes some time to be like, "Do I have to yell at people? Uh, do I have to yell about things again today? What did we miss?" We didn't do a good enough job of a lot of things, clearly, and it's a hard one.
I remember 15 years ago, my wife going, "You like to exercise. You should just be a trainer." And now I'm like, "Goddammit, that would've been great. This is just much worse." But it's not, and you don't get to shy away from it, so I really do appreciate, again, the way you made me love these bizarre little creatures, but also go, "Oh, they're part of this bigger thing." And it always is.
That's the way it works, you know? That's the way it works, or we end up like Venus. So thank you. Anything else? Any other thoughts, dreams, visions before I let you get out of here? The only other thing, my editors would... I can hear them in the back of my head. They'd say, "If you like reading these types of stories, support journalism." 100%. You know, it doesn't have to be Mother Jones.
We're a nonprofit newsroom, but support the journalism you want to read. So much of it is free online, but it is not free to do. It's not free. Turns out, it's so weird. I mean, I say to people all the time, I'm like, "That's weird. Do you get paid for your work? Because the fuck does this look like?" Yes, please pay for good journalism, whether it's a nonprofit or not.
If you're like, "Oh, God, it's December and I need some write-offs," I don't care. I'll tell you the best places to throw it to. Like, whatever, however you wanna fund it, but read it and pay for it. It goes a long way. It really does. Yeah. This could be a local newspaper, anything. And this is not, don't, you know... I'm not trying to fundraise for Mother Jones, just news in general. We really need it.
Journalists need it a lot at the moment. Yeah. It's one of my favorite and one of sort of the first successful independent blogger, writer people. This guy named Ben Thompson, he writes a business of tech blog called Stratechery, and so he's been this sort of proving model for, like, how to make it work a little bit, which is he's got a niche, and he had a background to stand on, but when he asks people to subscribe and pay for it, his quote is, "Don't...
You're not paying for the work I've already done. You're, when you pay, you're saying, 'I wanna see more of this, and I wanna make sure there's more of this.'" Yes. And that's what you're doing. Well, thank you so much. This has been wonderful. I feel like I could talk to you forever about all this stuff. So write whatever your next thing is, and then we'll do it again. It'll be great. Sounds great.
[outro jingle] That's it for this week's conversation. For more conversations, scroll back in the feed or visit podcast.importantnotimportant.com to search by name, topic, whatever. Thanks for sharing. Thanks for leaving a review, and thanks for giving a shit. [outro jingle]