Go Forth and Science

In this concluding episode of Season 1 (we have seasons now!), I'm talking with someone who is literally an expert on ocean storytelling. Dr. Kelly Bushnell explains how she managed to combine scuba diving and Victorian literature, and takes us on a journey from Greenland to the Salish Sea to the Galapagos. We chat feminism, the connections between colonialism and natural resource exploitation, and the narrative of climate change. As Kelly says, “when problems are caused by humans, they have to be solved by humans from every discipline.”

This month, join me and my dad, a wetland scientist, as we explore wetlands from all over the world. We have forests that are wetlands, wetlands that are mountains, bogs that catch on fire, and seasonal puddles that host a wild amount of life. Oh, and wetlands with 10,000-year-old people stuck in them.

How are coral reefs, chemistry, and composting all connected? Tune in to find out! In this episode I chat with a new scientist friend who studies ocean acidification and coral reefs in the Florida Keys. From labs filled with experiments, to reefs of baby coral polyps, to a scuba dive trip, Amanda and I nerd out about one of the most diverse ecosystems on our planet.

This month we're jumping into a massive freshwater ecosystem: the Everglades. And yes, “jumping in” is a literal statement. My friend Bree and I talk about the unique environment that is southern Florida, alligators, “the Grand Dame of the Everglades,” and more, all while tromping through mud and shin-deep water.

Ever wonder what happened to that entangled whale you heard about in the news, or that harbor seal you saw on a beach in pretty rough shape? Well in this episode we're getting an inside look at a marine wildlife hospital. Casey Mclean is the executive director of Sealife Response + Rehabilitation + Research, a nonprofit dedicated to, yup you guessed it, the response, rehabilitation and research of marine wildlife in the Pacific Northwest. Her work with wildlife and veterinary medicine has taken her all over the country, saving injured animals, and this past spring she opened up a hospital in Washington to care for even more of them. We talk about harbor seal pups, sperm whales, oil spills, and the challenges of being a land mammal caring for ocean mammals.

It's time to get your binoculars out and your birding hats on, we're heading out into the field. In this episode, I'm in the San Juan Islands of Washington State, sailing through storms and looking for cool birds. Kevin, the resident birder of the trip, walks us through how to ID birds we're unfamiliar with, tells us fun facts about sea birds, and even whistles his best bird call: a chickadee asking for a cheeseburger.

Sea stars have been battling a disease outbreak for a decade on the western shores of the U.S. It effects many species, hits them quickly, and has even sent the sunflower star plummeting into “critically endangered” territory. And the way this disease works is a sea star's very own version of a zombie apocalypse, with otherwise healthy limbs strewn across beaches and populations gone in just a few short weeks. So, if you're a fan of zombie dramas, welcome to the real-life version of that. Whoever started the rumor that zombies are afraid of water clearly wasn't a marine biologist. The guest for this episode is Dr. Drew Harvell, an ocean disease scientist who has studied everything from corals, to sea grass to sea stars. She walks us through what we know about this sea star epidemic and what things might look like in the future.

This episode we're talking about science communication, and more specifically, climate change art. Jill Pelto is a watercolor artist that takes data about wildfires, melting glaciers, or ocean temperature changes and incorporates them into beautiful watercolor landscapes of the subject. She also moonlights as a climate scientist and has regularly found herself in places like Antarctica and the glaciers of Northern Washington. So if you've ever wanted to know what it's like to paint in below-freezing temperatures, this is your episode.

More sharks! More sharks! This episode we switch coasts over to Florida and chat with a shark scientist about the research she does on sharks big and small. We talk about how Abby got hooked on sharks when she saw one demolish a sea turtle, how shark embryos have superpowers, how rare shark bites actually are, and of course, about her awesome research relating to light pollution in our ocean.

Imagine you are out surfing on some great waves in the Pacific Ocean. The day is beautiful, the company is wonderful… and then you see a shark. What would you do? In this episode, we hear from Ben Furbee, a friend of mine who essentially slipped out of the womb and onto a surfboard. He's seen lots of sharks in the wild, and has some epic stories about encounters he's had with these often-misunderstood creatures. Ever wondered how fast a shark swims? Or which species is the Baby Yoda of the sea? Tune in to find out.

Heads up, the correct response is definitely “to bee.” With Spring in full swing, bees are starting to come back into our lives after their winter hiatus and I figured I'd bring in some people to get us hyped on these little creatures. In this episode we have Paul, a beekeeper, and Penny, a master gardener, and they'll share a ton of rad information about the lives of bees and the gardens that make them happy.

We're journeying into the small parts of our planet for this episode. Jesse Walters is a geologist studying sulfur, and he walks us through what it's like to be a sulfur atom, from the oceans to the mantle, to the inside of our noses. We talk about rocks, bacteria, history, and traveling the world to get a glimpse of the inside of it.

March 2020 is when I finally admitted that this podcast was actually happening, so Happy 1st Birthday to Go Forth and Science. I've had an amazing group of guests here with me over the past year, and there have been quality moments that haven't made the editing cut in the final episodes. But don't you worry, this is the episode where you'll get to hear some of those. Get ready for bloopers, tangents, fun facts and many, many laughs.

In this episode I interview Heather Clifford, a scientist who studies glaciers, climate change, and the climates that existed on our planet in the past. She's traveled all over the world, and most recently went to Mt. Everest to help a team of scientists and explorers discover just how people and climate change are impacting the mountain. We talk about mountains, pollution, 2.7 MILLION YEAR OLD ICE, and the wonders of wool clothing.

If you ever wanted to know why the sky is blue, this is the episode to listen to. I talk with Dr. Brad Moser, a physics professor and fellow podcaster, about light. That's a pretty broad topic, but we try to touch on as many fun facts and explanations as we can in 20 minutes. We also talk about aliens and glaciers, because it wouldn't be Go Forth and Science if we didn't throw in some weird tangents as well. To see pictures of Dr. Moser's adventures mentioned in this episode, head on over to my Instagram @goforthandscience or my Twitter @goforth_science. There will be lots of pretty views of rainbows, sunrises, and turquoise glacial lakes.

Sea otters. They're cute, they're cuddly... they're also wild animals so please don't actually cuddle them... and they've spent the last hundred years bouncing back from a near extinction. In this episode, I talk with Pam, a scientist and science communicator that has spent years knee-deep in their conservation efforts. 

Are you ready for a winter of social distancing and hibernation? Well, North American bears are! Tune into this episode for tales of brown bears, black bears and polar bears from Jessie, a marine scientist and fan of genetics who now guides people around the bear paradise of Southeast Alaska.

Straying from the usual science-and-adventure theme of this podcast (because, let's be real, the election is coming up and who can't talk about it), in this episode we're going to hash out the big concept of environmental policy. My guest Tori worked with environmental laws in Congress for a year and describes what it was like to be a scientist in our government, how we can protect the natural places we love, and weighs in on some of her favorite outcomes of our country's political history. 

Aka that time we extracted dead fish from a butte. Tune in to learn about fossils with my adventure buds Katie and Matt! We chat about 50 million year old fish, their lives and deaths (and now rocky immortality), and the journey we had into the hills of Wyoming to find them. 

In honor of Comet NEOWISE making its presence known this July, and the current Perseid meteor shower happening in the middle of August (you should definitely go check it out), this episode's topic is comets! Dr. Martha Hanner is an astronomer who has spent time in Australia, Germany, and California. What do all those places have in common? Well, in each one she could be found with her eyes gazing up at the stars and her brain tapped into the technology we were sending into them.

Right whales are mysterious animals, even for those of us who know about them. In this episode, my right-whale-enthusiast-friend Kevin comes on to share that mystery with all of you. Tune in to learn about these massive whales, their history, and the adventures Kevin has had while searching for the North Pacific right whale, the rarest whale in the world.

To get us all psyched for summer campfires, but also wary of this year's wildfire season, we're here to talk about the red-orange flames that we love and hate. In this episode I bring on my firefighting bro-in-law and we chat about fire science, the history of fires, and both urban and wildfires. 

Ants. They're everywhere. They bite. They eat our food. Do they even do any good for the world? The answer is yes. Ants are an important part of our ecosystems, even if they always get on our nerves. And they're insanely intelligent creatures. So sit back as my friend Angela and I talk about ants from our U.S. gardens to the jungles of Panama. 

What lives out in the open ocean? Besides sea monsters of course. Tune in to hear the answer from my crewmate Briana, a fish biologist who studied animal behavior out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, hundreds of miles from land. 

In this episode, my friend Ryan and I talk about how low pressure zones can create high pressure scenarios... aka storms. We discuss different kinds of storms, how we categorize them, and what it's like to be out in them. There's also a mention of pirates and sea robots, because why not.

Join me and my captain friend Kelly as we discuss shipwrecks, pool toys, salty lakes, love and the force that ties them all together: buoyancy.

It's spring, so we're going to talk about baby animals. And plants. And tiny humans. All those awww-inspiring things. But I've never been pregnant, so I'm joined by my sister, who popped out a kiddo just a few months ago and can tell us all about what it's like to produce one of those cutesy spring things.

Would you rather live in a treehouse at the top of a redwood tree or a hobbit hole under an oak tree? In this episode, my friend Gaia and I discuss this important question along with the benefits of hugging trees and how trees play giant games of telephone through fungi at their roots. We of course talk about science too.

Ocean water moves around the planet, cycling from the surface to the ocean floor and back again. Sometimes, things are caught up in these currents... things like plastic. In this episode, I talk about ocean dynamics and plastic pollution, and bring on my adventurous friend Breezy to talk about our plastic problem and what we can do about it.

Kelp. It's everywhere, even if you're far away from the ocean. It gives us the air we breathe and the chocolate milk we drink. It may even lend us a helping hand with coronavirus. Let's be real, it's basically magic. Join me and my friend Ren as we look at the wonders of kelp and reminisce on our times spent with it.

What is the difference between weather and climate? Find out as our awesome climate scientist guest, Erin, takes us on a journey up into the mountains of northwestern Canada. We also chat about maple syrup, downhill skiing with cross-country skis, and time travel. Because why not?

In this episode we discuss plate tectonics, hot springs, and three people whose friendship was forged in the fiery landscape of mantle hotspots and a cramped car.

Pod... podcast... get it? In this episode I talk about different orca types of the Pacific Northwest, threats to their population and current conservation efforts, and we get to know a special whale that was swimming around Washington State last summer, an all-white orca baby!

If you couldn't get enough of ice in the last episode, never fear, because I could talk about it for ages! In this episode I'll discuss different forms of ice besides just glaciers with my friend Mariama Dryak, who has spent years looking at Antarctica through satellite images and led expeditions on the Juneau Icefield in Alaska last summer.

Take a trip with us to Antarctica, Alaska and Washington as we talk about glaciers, computer modeling, and most importantly, bagels. This episode's guest is Clara Deck, my grad school roommate on and off the ice.

Before I got into the meaty episodes, I figured I'd let y'all know who I am and what this podcast is. It was also a good excuse for me to spend a few minutes figuring how to podcast, so buckle in, get ready for fun stories, and I promise the audio gets better.