This week on the show we’re discussing the surprisingly fascinating science of roadkill, wildlife crossings, and the impact of roads on deer and other wildlife, with author Ben Goldfarb.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to
the whitetail woods, presented by first Light, creating proven versatile
hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First Light
Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. This week on
the show, we are discussing the surprisingly fascinating science of roadkill,
wildlife crossings, and the impact of roads on deer and
other wildlife, and I'm joined by author Ben Goldfarb. All Right,
(00:39):
welcome back to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to
you by first Light, and today we are discussing the surprising,
the interesting, the fascinating intersection of roads and wildlife. And
there's a there's a little bit of a pun there,
but I'm joined today by Ben Goldfarb, the author of
(01:00):
a terrific book called Crossings. A road ecology is shaping
the future of our planet in this book and our
conversation today is all about this very interesting set of
ways that roads impact deer and other wildlife, and by
way of that, they impact us too as hunters. There
are the obvious ways you know, where roads actually kill
(01:23):
wildlife roadkill, of course, and the many ripple effects of that,
and then there's this kind of wider set of like
halo effects of roads and how they impact human behavior,
pressure on hunt you know, hunting pressure and other types
of pressures on wildlife. You know, the ways roads impact
pollinators and birds and all sorts of different habitat related things.
(01:47):
There's lots there's lots of stuff here that's surprising, that's
eye opening and very relevant to I think a lot
of folks in the hunting world. You know, impacts on
migration corridors, impacts on wildlife, travel, impacts on you know,
the genetic viability of certain species as roads are kind
of carving up and fragmenting wildlife habitat more and more.
(02:08):
So all that and more is what we cover today
with Ben. It's a it's a really interesting and unique
conversation that I'm excited for you guys to hear. Before
we get to that very quickly, I just want to
plug you know, leaving a review for this podcast and
subscribing if you haven't done yet, and then finally also
checking out the rest of the Meat Eater podcast network.
(02:30):
We've got shows like, you know, the Meat Eater flagship show.
But then Kels we can review God's Country, this uh,
This Country Life, Bear Grease, the American West with Dan Floores,
and several more. I think I'm forgetting something here, but
we've got lots to listen to after this chat with
(02:50):
Ben Goldfarm, so let's get into it all right. Joining
me now is Ben Goldfarb. Welcome to the show.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Ben, Thanks a loud mark. It's great to be here.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
I really appreciate it. I'm excited about this one. My pal,
Ben O'Brien. Maybe I don't know, you're not to fact
check me on the dates here, but seven or eight
years ago something like that first introduced me to you
through your first book, Eager about Beavers, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Thanks,
(03:31):
and I followed you and kind of your work ever
since from afar. And when your latest book, Crossings came
out a couple of years ago, now I feel like
it was isn't that right? It has been two years
now or a year and a half, yeah, three, okay,
So when that came out, I immediately put that on
my list of oh yeah, I have to read that
book because it's right up my alley, that kind of
(03:54):
intersection of kind of wildlife and conservation and ecology and
all those kinds of things, and both in line with
what I personally am into, and then also you know
my work life with hunting and writing about those things.
But I saw right away that it was a book
that would be very relevant to a book project of
(04:14):
my own that I'm writing right now, and so I
put it on a different like reading list. So rather
than just like the reading for fun list, it got
put on the oh, you need to read that while
taking notes list, and so because of that, it kept
getting pushed back and delayed and delayed and delayed. So
this is a very long and roundabout way of saying
(04:35):
Ben that as soon as your book came out, I
was like, I need to read that, but because of
my weird process, I didn't read it until just like
a month ago while on our family spring break trip.
So I finally got around to reading Crossings, and as
soon as I did, I realized that just as I thought,
it would be a very worthy read. So congrats on
(04:57):
a great book right out the gate, Ben just got
say that, well done.
Speaker 3 (05:01):
Thanks thanks for saying that, and I hope it checked
that fun to read box as well as the note
taking box.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
It did it did, and that's that's a sweet spot.
That's not easy to achieve. Being able to be able
to write something that's both really informative and a page
turner like and enjoyable compelling. That's no easy tasks. So
uh so, nicely done. You. You were able to survive
(05:28):
the sitting by the pool with a beer test and
I did not fall asleep.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
Oh man, it's it's me, John Grisham and Stephen King
in that in that category.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
That's quite the company to keep ben rights. But I
want to I want to quickly make this relevant to
people listening, because this book is about something that you
call road ecology, which to the average outdoors person might
sound kind of jargony and maybe not relevant to what
a hunter or angler might care about. But I guess
(06:02):
to open it, tell me this, what's rhodocology and why
should a hunter or angler or outdoors men care?
Speaker 3 (06:10):
Sure? So, you know, so RhoD ecology is basically this
relatively small, but I would say fast growing field of
science that looks at all of the different ways that
roads interacts with and connect with nature and often fragment nature. Right,
And you know, I think from a hunter's perspective, of course,
that dead deer by the side of the highways is
(06:31):
the most visceral obvious connection. You know, I mean a
couple million large animals at least are killed in wildlife
vehicle collisions every year, and that's a tremendous loss to hunters.
I mean from a fish perspective. You know, I'm not
a hunter, but I'm a pretty avid angler. And every
place that a stream goes under a road, you know,
(06:52):
there's a culvert, and often those culverts are too small
or defective, and that's a huge loss of fish and
fish aquatic connectivity and habitat. So rhad ecology basically looks
at all of these different points that roads and ecosystems
intersect and thinks about, okay, and what impacts are roads
(07:15):
pausing on nature? And I think, really importantly, what do
we do about those impacts? How do we start to
solve some of the ecological problems that are massive four
million mile transportation network here in the US creates.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
Yeah, in your book, you write about I think I
believe this is a quote, as long as I didn't
mess up my transcription. He wrote, the pavement itself blankets.
Less than one percent of the United states, yet its influence.
The road effect zone, to use ecological jargon, covers a
full twenty percent. So you mentioned the fact that there's
like a four million mile road network across the country. Well,
(07:53):
then here you talk about how the effective roads expands
beyond just that four million actual miles. But then there's
also this buffer or outside of that. Can you explain
a little more of what the road effect zone is
and what that means, because I kind of want to
lay the groundwork here for just how far reaching roads
really are.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
Yeah, you know, I think I think one of the
reasons that historically a lot of conservation groups and even
wildlife biologists to I think, overlooked roads as this ecological
problem is because, as you say, you know, they don't
actually cover a lot of land area. Right a road
it might only be you know, one hundred feet wide,
let's say, for talking about you know, a big highway
from shoulder to shoulder, And so you know, what's the
(08:33):
what's the big deal right there? You know, tens of
thousands of acres of habitat out there, but those roads
and the traffic that goes along them prevent animals from
reaching that habitat. Right there's a you know, a really
famous map. Maybe can you know, you can include in
the show notes or something, this great graphic of a
grizzly bear's attempt to cross I ninety in Montana, and
(08:56):
that that bear is just you know, bouncing and you
can basically see the satellite collar map of you know,
this bear's this bear's movements and the bear is just
bouncing off I'm ninety like a ping pong ball. Right.
He keeps trying to find places to cross the highway,
but the traffic is so dense that he's unable to do.
And so that bear attempts more than forty crossings over
(09:18):
the course of six months before he finally, you know,
finds his way across the highway somehow. So, you know,
from that bear's perspective, right, he's looking at the road,
the road is only you know, one hundred feet wide
from shoulder to shoulder or whatever, but it's denying him
access to hundreds of thousands of acres of habitat, you know,
throughout the Northern Rockies, right. So you know, I think
(09:40):
I think that's a really important concept that, yeah, you
have the the impact created at the level, at the
spatial extent of the road itself right again, that dead
you know, that dead buck by the side of the highway.
But you know what we what we don't see is
all of the animals who can't complete their migrations find food,
would find mates, you know, who are being genetically fragmented
(10:03):
by roads. So you know, that's another thing that rody
Kelogy tries to do, I think, is take this broader
perspective on the impacts of roads that kind of transcend
the relatively limited spatial area of the highway itself.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
And you know, another thing that you write about that
I've also seen personally is the you know, the tag
along with roads, which is people. So wherever you put people,
wherever you put roads, you add people to the landscape.
You create a human presence and pressure on wildlife, and
so you get you get animals avoiding roads because of
(10:39):
that typical you know, human activity there, So you get
you know, as a hunter, we see this all the time.
As we're trying to you know, as we're trying to
fire out, well where are we going to find the animals?
One of the first things you look at is, well,
where's the farthest I can get from a road? Yeah,
And that's the same thing that a deer or an
elk or a bear is thinking too, right, So every
time a new road is punched in and you lose
(11:01):
a little bit of that sweet spot. As you know.
I've seen maps like this that were they show all
the different all the different roads criss crossing and you
can find, you know, the actual area of area of
zones like you, I don't know what the actual number is,
but I know that the farthest you can get from
a road anywhere in the lower forty eight is not
that many miles from a road, and there are not
(11:23):
many places you can get more than five, ten, twelve
miles away from road in any direction. And that's in
the wildest places we have left most spots, you're always
within a mile or two miles, and critters react to that.
Critters behave differently because of that. Some species simply can't
exist because of that. So there's there's this far reaching
(11:47):
set of of weird things that come along with them,
poachers and top of hunters, on top of all the
other things that could possibly tag along too. So it's
invasive species. We bring all sorts of critters with us
along the roads too. Yeah, it's there's a lot that
I don't think many of us think about, but totally
(12:09):
it's present.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, And I think you know to your
point about you know, about about animals, especially ungulates, you know,
responding to those roads. I mean I was talking in
the course of working this book, you know, I talked
to a Forest Service biologist in eastern Oregon. She told
me this, you know, kind of amazing story in the
Forest Service. You know, of course, this incredible steward of
public lands, right, but also has the single largest road
(12:32):
network on earth. You know, something like three hundred and
seventy thousand miles of road on you know, in our
National forest. I mean there are you know, forests in
Idaho and Montana that have higher road densities than New
York City, right, and all of those wild It's crazy. Yeah,
And so all of those roads, of course, are you know,
how we access nature. And you know I love driving
on forest roads out here in Colorado, right, That's how
(12:54):
I you know, reach fishing holes and trailheads and all
kinds of great stuff. But you know, the animals are
smart and they know that. You know, hey, especially during
hunting season, you know, the roads bring the cars, the
cars bring the people, The people bring the you know,
the sticks that go bang and kill you. And you
know what this biolotist was telling me is that actually
in eastern Oregon, you know, what she's seen is a
(13:17):
lot of elk leaving public land and ending up on
private land where, you know, where hunters can't access them
at all, because you know, those elk recognize that, you know,
those really dense road networks on public land and the
people that come with them are a threat to them.
And so, you know, from a hunting standpoint, yeah, I
(13:37):
think it's you know, probably a double edged sword, and
that you know, roads permit access to an extent, but
as you say, you know, they also create tougher hunting
conditions in a you know a lot of respects and
you know, really provoke this kind of aversive response in
a lot of animals.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Yeah. Yeah, so roads have far reaching, surprise impacts on wildlife.
I feel like we've established that the obvious one of
those impacts is simply killing animals like roadkill, car deer collisions.
And in the introduction to your book, that first chapter
you kind of discuss how roadkills now the leading direct
(14:16):
cause of mortality in land based mammals, so that more
animals die from cars than do from any other direct
you know impact. They are also one of the most
dangerous animals or deer excuse me, are one of the
most dangerous animals to people because of road car vehicle collisions.
Can you can you discuss a little bit more that
(14:39):
direct impact roadkill with deer and other big critters, and
how that's both damaging our property, hurting deer in wildlife populations,
and also a lethal issue for humans. That's kind of
a double whammy across the boarder of problems.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
Yeah, for sure, Yeah, you're you're right that, you know,
the white tail deer is this single most dangerous wild
animal in North America. And that's obviously not the deer's fault, right,
that's automotive society's fault. But you know, I do think
that goes to show how how frequent and problematic these
collisions are. You know, more more than four hundred drivers
(15:16):
killed in deer crashes every every year in the US,
and that's you know, probably a dramatic underestimyre, right. I've
talked to state troopers who say, yeah, you know, oftentimes,
you know, you get a single car, a single vehicle
fatal accident where somebody hits a telephone poll or a tree.
Well that was probably swerving to avoid deer other wildlife, right,
(15:38):
the person didn't unfortunately survive to you know, explain the incident.
But you know, probably those four hundred collisions are you know,
dramatic underestimate if the real scale of the problem. And
then you've got you know, the the economic impact into
that property damage that you mentioned. You know, we know
that the average deer collision costs society more than nine
(16:00):
thousand dollars in hospital bills, vehicle repairs, insurance costs. The
loss to hunters is you know, is factored into that
equation as well. And you know, obviously deer aren't the
only big critters out there, right. You know, here in
Colorado we've got elk. You know, the average elk collision
costs something like twenty one thousand dollars per incident. You know,
(16:21):
the average moose collision is more than forty thousand dollars, right,
because moose are just so huge, of course, and have
much higher driver fatality rates. Collectively, all of these large
animal crashes are costing the US more than ten billion
dollars with a B every every year, and it's one
of the few crash types that's really increasing too. You know,
(16:43):
we're seeing these incidents become more common, you know, more
people driving around the landscape. You know, white tail populations
in many places are increasing, you know, causing more risk. Right. So, yeah,
it's this huge, i think relatively underdiscussed public health and
safety problem, as well as of course a big ecological problem.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
Yeah. So in the hunting world, there's always this rumor
that the car insurance lobby is working behind the scenes
trying to knock down the deer population. So there's people
in the state capital telling our fish and game departments like,
kill all the deer, kill all the deer, et cetera,
et cetera. That's like one of the old wives tales
(17:26):
within the hunting world. I've heard from your research and
in your experience as you were diving into this, did
you learn anything about how insurance companies are in any
kind of way dealing with the roadkill issue, addressing the
roadkill issue, advocating for solutions to it. Is that something
that ever came up in your explorations.
Speaker 3 (17:47):
Yeah, you know, it's funny if people people often ask that,
and it is this really intuitive logical connection, right and
and you know, in my experience, they haven't really gotten
involved in this in this shoe at all. You know,
I've seen an insurance company or to say the right
things about the importance of preventing this, but I've never
really seen any insurance company, you know, put their put
(18:10):
their money where their mouth is. You know. There was
unfortunately here in Colorado, there was a proposal of bill
that just that just failed at least for now, that
would have added I think something like three bucks to
UH annual insurance premiums, and that money would have gone
partially towards you know, funding wildlife crossings and fences and
other you know, ro kil mitigation systems. And I think
(18:32):
I think Triple A and maybe an insurance company or
two you know again said the right things about supporting
that bill, though it didn't ultimately pass. But yeah, I
would I would love to see UH the insurance industry
getting more involved in you know, funding those those wildlife
passages and solutions and fences and other other solutions, because
you know, they're the they're the beneficiaries. Right when those
(18:55):
those those deer collisions decreased so yeah, if there are
any insurance executives listening to this podcast, you know, you
should should get on that, right.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
Yeah. So something that was interesting you mentioned how we're
having more car deer collisions now than ever before. Uh.
But but at what point within the book you wrote
about the fact that, you know, there's a certain number
of like as as you were kind of writing about
the history, and as the road system was built out.
Simultaneous to that, the white tailed deer population was growing,
(19:28):
and so we were seeing car deer collisions rise and
rise and rise. But then at some point it actually
slowed down and we started having less collisions and fewer
crossings because there was like a a threshold pass where
there was so much traffic that it was actually keeping
animals from eve from trying to cross over the road.
Speaker 3 (19:47):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
And I know that there were some other interesting studies
in science that you had pointed to that kind of showcase,
like a certain number of cars per hour or during
a certain amount of time, you know, might allow certain
animals to cross, but others wouldn't. Can you just vibrate
a little bit on some of the things you found
when it came to that, you know, what degree of
traffic actually impacts animal crossings and things along those lines.
Speaker 3 (20:08):
Yeah, absolutely right. So you know, so I think I
think it's important first to think about how different species
understand traffic and what roads are.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Right.
Speaker 3 (20:18):
So, you know, they're guroty collegists to kind of classify
animals based on their their road response. Uh, and so
on one end of the spectrum, we've got animals who
are non responders to traffic, right, animals who don't really
understand what traffic is, and we'll just try to cross
the road no matter what, and they're you know, we've
got animals like frogs and salamanders and turtles you know,
(20:41):
maybe not like the smartest creators on Earth, don't really understand,
you know, what a car road is. And those animals
are just trying to cross the road to you know,
get to their breeding ponds and wetlands no matter what,
and they're just getting crushed and mass right, So those
are the non responders. Then we've got on the other
end of the spectrum the avoids, you know, animals who
(21:01):
really do understand that roads and vehicles are dangerous and
we'll just steer clear. So like grizzly bears are sort
of the classic avoid where even one car every ten minutes,
you know, a really rural road in some cases enough
to prevent a grizzly bear from crossing all together, and
that creates its own problems. Right, those animals are really
(21:22):
easily fragmented by by by traffic. And then deer are
somewhere in the middle, and they're what what scientists are
called speeders, which basically means that they're they're looking for
gaps in traffic that they can just run through. Right,
and you know humans are also speeders. You know, you
can imagine like standing by the side of a busy highway.
(21:43):
You know, you look in both ways waiting for that,
you know, that gap between vehicles that will let you
run through traffic to get to the other side. And
that's exactly what deer are doing. You know, they understand
the cars are dangerous, especially you know ones living in
relatively irb in places, and they're they're just trying to,
you know, get through that wall of vehicles. So you
(22:05):
can imagine right at at lower traffic volumes, you know,
a relatively rural road, you know they can the cars
are infrequent enough that they can run through those gaps
if you have a really busy interstate highway like I
eighty or something, the cars are so dense that there
are no gaps, right, and the deer don't even attempt
(22:25):
to cross. The highest roadkill rates that we see are
on moderately trafficked highways, you know, like typically we're talking
about you know, state highways that are getting you know,
let's say, you know, five thousand cars a day. That's
when there are enough cars for it to be dangerous,
but few enough cars that the deer are still trying
(22:47):
to run through those gaps, right, So, you know, along
that's kind of one of the ironies of the you know,
the interstate highway system is that along you know, some interstates,
you really don't see a lot of roadkill, right because
there's just so much traffic thick that the you know,
the deer and other animals aren't attempting to run from
one side of the highway to the other. And so
you might, you know, you might look at the at
(23:08):
the shoulder and not see too many carcasses and say, well, hey,
you know, what's the big deal, right, But then you know,
that's when you're getting that fragmentation issue, right, The fact
that the animals can't move from one habitat to another,
they can't find food, they can't find mates, they can't
complete those long distance migrations in places like you know,
Wyoming and Utah where animals really do have to move
(23:30):
a very long distance to survive. So yeah, that's the
that's one of the you know, one of the kind
of the ironies I think of roadkill is that, you know,
a relatively rural road and a relatively high volume interstate
highway can have kind of the same low amount of roadkill,
but they're you know, animals are experiencing them in very
different ways.
Speaker 2 (24:00):
So one of the interesting things when it comes to
the you brought deer a couple times in like white
tail deer versus maybe mule deer or other western ungulates.
And you can correct me if I'm wrong on this,
but my assumption would be that more white tail deer
get killed by cars on an annual basis than mule
deer or you know, pronghorn or elk. But I'm also
(24:22):
assuming that white tailed deer do not have as large
of a negative don't experience as large of a negative
impact as a mule deer does, because those roads act
as a different kind of blocker for them, despite the
fact that maybe ten white tails get killed to every
one mule deer. Is that true and if so, why
might that be?
Speaker 3 (24:42):
Yeah, I think you're definitely right. I mean, first of all,
they're just a lot more white tail deer in North
America than new Leader obviously. So you know, when you
look at you know, the states that have the highest
animal collision rates right there, they're generally eastern and Midwestern states.
You know, it's like West Virginia, Pennsylvania, you know, Michigan,
Montana off and kind of slips in there. But they've
got some white tails too, So you're, you know, you're
(25:05):
you're totally right that a lot more white tails are,
you know, just being hit hit by cars. But I
also think I would I would also certainly agree that
you know that cars are having a much bigger impact
on mule deer from a population perspective, because you know, again,
I mean in places like Wyoming, you know, in Colorado
where I live, you know, these animals are undertaking these
(25:27):
really long journeys, right, these these really long migrations. You know,
it's not like living in Pennsylvania, where you know, the
weather's not too harsh, and you know there aren't the
mountains aren't too huge, and there's kind of you know,
plenty of corn and other anthropogenic you know, human based
food resources out there for them, right. You know, a
white tail deer in Pennsylvania can be pretty sedentary, right
(25:50):
and find you know, find food year round and you know,
escape the weather. Whereas you know, a mule deer living
in Wyoming, you know, has to this really long journey.
You know, they're moving from their their winter range. You know,
these lower elevation valleys, uh that get super hot in
the summer up into the mountains. Right. They're kind of
surfing that green wave of of of new growth, and
(26:13):
then they're coming back. You know, they're deer in Wyoming
that are going three hundred miles round trip between these
really ephemeral seasonal resources in this you know, super harsh
Western environment. And and of course the problem is that
you know, if you're gonna walk three hundred miles anywhere
in the US, you know you're gonna end up crossing
a lot of roads, right.
Speaker 2 (26:33):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
And you know, in the in the book, I talk
about this very famous herd of mule deer in in
southwestern Wyoming in the Red Desert, you know, and these
are these are these long distance migrants uh and the
and you know there there winter range abuts I eighty right,
which is you know, again of course the highest the
highest volume road uh in in in Wyoming. Uh. And
(26:55):
you know some years, you know, during harsh during during
those those harshest winter, you know, those deer will just
pull up on the north side of A. Eighty looking
for an opportunity to cross, and they just can't find
one because the traffic volume is so high. And you know,
there have been winters where forty percent of that herd
will actually starve because all of the good forage is
south of A. Eighty and they can't they can't cross
(27:17):
that highway. Right. So from a population level standpoint, you know,
that's probably worse than roadkill, right that. You know that
a herd of a thousand deer, you know, they could
handle a few collisions on the highway. What they can't
handle is losing access to so much of their winter range, right.
I mean, historically, you know, those deer might have gone
as far south as Colorado, and you know, now they're
(27:39):
stuck up against the interstate. And you know from a
population level standpoint, that's a catastrophe for him.
Speaker 2 (27:47):
Yeah. Well, I was traveling traveling out to our cabin
in Idaho a few years back. I guess this would
have been two years ago. And our route takes us
long eighty until at Rock Springs, and then he hang
a north turn up one ninety one. I guess it'd
be heading up into uh like Pindale, going towards Pinedale. Yeah,
(28:09):
going right towards Pinedale, and along that route, I'm pretty
sure this is two springs ago or one spring ago.
All along the road, along all these fences, you would
see these white ovals on the ground, and you would
see dozens, at times hundreds of them scattered across the sagebrush.
And at first I thought it was patches of snow,
(28:31):
and then my son asked what it was, and then
I took a closer look, and I realized that what
I was seeing scattered all across the sage brush for
miles and miles and miles and miles, were the white
bellies of dead pronghorn Jesus. And what had happened is
some people might recall reading about and again I'm gonna
get my year wrong. It was either the last spring
(28:51):
or the spring before. But there was this mass die
off of pronghorn in that herd that just this year
came out exploring what exactly was to blame, and there
was there have been some disease issues, and then there
was also worries about starvation. And what the study came
back and showed was that the vast majority of the
(29:13):
deaths could be attributed to pronghorn being hung up by fences,
stalled out by not being able to cross the road,
not being able to get to the fences, and then
being stuck there, not able to finish their migrations, and
then ultimately starving. And so between that and the disease
pressures that had you know, catastrophic catastrophe for losses, I
(29:33):
mean the tens of thousands. And that was a very
eye opening recent example of exactly what you're talking about,
and that's happening, like you mentioned, not just with pronghorn,
but mule deer and other critters too. And I was
going to ask you which is worse, the direct roadkill
or the stalling of the migration, and you answered that,
(29:55):
But I'm curious if you could expand on that just
a little bit more when it comes to, you know,
how these migrations are impacted by roads, and in some
of the research around that, there's been such interesting stuff,
especially in Wyoming studying, you know, the the actual points
where these animals want to move through or have to
move through, and how there's kind of unique roadblocks built in.
(30:17):
Can you just elaborate a little bit more on what
migration research and studies now are showing us.
Speaker 3 (30:23):
Yeah, for sure. And you know this chapter of the books,
you know, really drawn from the work of the Wyoming
Migration Initiative. You know, guys like Matt Kaufman and Hal Sawyer,
you know, who are some of the best mule deer
biologists and migration ecologists on Earth. And you know, I
had the chance to go out and uh, you know,
collar collar deer with with with with Matt and his
crew for for a few days. And that was, you know,
(30:44):
really one of the great experiences of my of my life.
It was so much fun and it just you know,
just gave me so much appreciation for mule deer. You know, this,
these these animals that just you know, hang out in
my backyard here in Colorado, you know, and try to
trample my dog and you know we see them all
the time, and you know, but but we but we
see them during these really limited windows in some ways,
right we'd so you know, they show up in our
(31:06):
communities and then we don't see you know, the rest
of the migration. But these are animals that are undertaking
these you know, incredible journeys. They're doing it, you know,
with these amazing spatial memories. Right, they're great cartographers. You know,
they learn their migration routs. They don't you know, they
don't they're not instinctive migrators. And so you know, migration
is kind of this incredible cultural phenomenon that herds learn
(31:27):
together and that you know, dose teach their their fonds. Uh.
And that's a lot of the work that you know,
that that that Wilding Migration Eddiship has done is you know,
figuring out how these animals understand their migrations and how
they time their migrations, and that timing ends up being
a really important piece of the puzzle. Right. So you know,
the term that you know that the w m I
(31:49):
folks and you know other diologists use to describe what
you know, these deer are doing is they're they're surfing
the green wave. Right, there's this this there's this wave
of green up in the spring that kind of lines
up you know, the slopes, and those animals are following
that green up when the you know, when the plants
are the most nutritious and tender uh and uh and
(32:11):
and best for them because you know, of course a
lot of these you know, these migrating deer are pregnant
as well, which is just also mind blowing to think
about that. You know, these animals are undertaking these journeys,
you know O they're carrying uh, you know, carrying their
fons and so that's you know, that's really one of
the I think the underappreciated problems that you know that
roads create is not only do they not only do
(32:33):
it prevent animals from you know, from from crossing, but
they can just disrupt the timing of that green wave surfing, right.
I mean those you know, those prong horn you mentioned.
You know, this happens to deer too, you know where
if they're just delayed along along a busy highway. Uh,
you know, they can kind of fall out of sync
with that green wave surfing, as I understand it.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (32:54):
And you know, and that has these really significant sub
leathal effects.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Right.
Speaker 3 (32:59):
You know, maybe uh, you know, you don't get hit
by a car if you're you know, migrating dough meal deer,
but you know, maybe you don't feed quite as well,
and maybe you're you know, your fawn isn't quite as
quite as healthy and you know can't escape you know,
a bear or a wolf as as a consequence of that. Right,
So that's not you know, direct road mortality necessarily, but
(33:20):
you know it's this kind of subtler, sub lethal effect
that can result in that, you know, in deer really
having having problems. And you know, I mean there's been
you know, lots of lots of great research. You know,
meal deer are really declining dramatically, you know in Wyoming
and then here in here in Colorado, and uh you know,
I mean the biggest factor there, according to some studies,
(33:41):
is residential development. Right. It's all those all those roads, uh,
you know, going into places which are you know, worse
for deer uh than you know, other forms of development,
even like oil and gastril. You know, it's just it's
just the presence of roads and vehicles and subdivisions on
the landscape that you know, cut off those migration routes
or this up to their timing and ultimately lead to
(34:02):
uh to population decline.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
Yeah. Yeah, we're getting to a point where, you know,
the natural world has been so crisscrossed with roads and
development that not only do we have these like moving
fences as you call them, but we're creating islands. We're
creating metaphorical islands of even though they're not surrounded by water,
(34:27):
We're creating wildlife habitat that's surrounded by by an ocean
of development and roadways, and that has a whole other
set of sublethal factors, you know, on top of just
the direct mortality, on top of the delayed migrations, on
top of everything you just mentioned. You know, this isn't
as applicable to mule deer or prong horns, but with
grizzly bears or something like you know, panthers down in Florida, uh,
(34:51):
you start dealing with genetic issues right where some of
these species are so deterred by roads and development that,
like you said, they simply won't cross. So, for example,
with grizzly bears, you've got a subpopulation around the Greater
Yellowy ecosystem and a subpopulation up in the northern continental right,
and you've got you know, seventy miles between the two,
(35:13):
and they just won't cross that last seventy miles because
there's too large of roads, there's too much development there.
It's keeping genetics from passing between the two populations and
getting the diversity that you know, these species need to
maintain long term viability. Is that something that you learned
(35:33):
anything more about through this process too, the genetic implications
or any other implications of that kind of island effect
that we're seeing happening more and more, not just with
big mammals but other critters too.
Speaker 3 (35:45):
Yeah. Absolutely, And I mean you're look, you're exactly right.
You know, you could take you could take a you know,
a snippet of DNA from a grizzly bear and you know,
and say with unerring accuracy, which side of which highway
in the Northern Rockies that bear was born at? Because
you know, those those those highways, you know, I ninety
Highway to you know, all of those, all of those
(36:06):
those highways you know running east west, you know through
Montana are huge, you know, huge, huge barriers. And I
think that's you know, that's one interesting kind of geographic
piece too that I think about a lot, is that
you know, our are our mountain ranges in the west
tend to run north south, and so do our valleys,
which means that you know, animals are often moving north
(36:26):
to south, and so many of our big highways you
know I ninety, I eighty, I seventy are running east
west right, So we have this, you know, this kind
of this inherent conflict where a lot of our transportation
routes are at sort of perpendicular odds with our animal
movement corridors, which is you know, a huge, huge challenge.
And certainly that you know that genetic fragmentation you mentioned,
(36:48):
I mean, that's a gigantic issue. You know. One of
the the the poster populations for that, right are these
very famous mountain lions who live in southern California just
west of Los Angeles. You know, I bet of listeners
have heard of P twenty two, you know, probably the
most famous mountain lion on Earth while he was alive,
and he was part of this little population in the
(37:09):
southern Santa Monica is near Los Angeles, where you know,
as you say, they're basically this there's this island of
habitat in this ocean of freeways. You know, you've got
the one O one, the four oh five, and the five,
you know, the biggest freeways on Earth, you know, running
through that landscape or sorry, let me take it against
I know actually actually don't think the five goes through there.
(37:29):
But you know you've got you've got the one O one,
you've got the four H five, you know, some of
the some of the busiest freeways on Earth, basically fragmenting
that landscape and preventing those mountain lions from dispersing out
to find mates. And so you know, in that little population,
scientists have seen individual mountain lions, male mountain lions who
have mate it with their own daughters, granddaughters and great
(37:53):
granddaughters because they just can't find an unrelated animal to
mate with. And you know the other thing that uh,
you know, biologist see in that population is lots of
fighting between nound lions, right, lots of mortality. And you know,
these these lion conflicts because you know, those those younger
male cats especially of course, they want to disperse out right,
(38:14):
they want to get away from their their fathers and
the other big males, uh, to go find their own territory.
But you know, if if the one O one, which
has three hundred thousand cars a day, is in your way, right,
you can't go find your own territory. And so you're
you know, stuck on this island with all of these uh,
you know, these big dominant males, and you know, you
end up in conflicts. So you know, they see, yeah,
(38:36):
they see that that genetic fragmentation, but also you know,
the squeezing of territories and all of this lethal conflict
between you know, between individual mountain lions because of that
that fragmentation. So that island effect that you're you're describing
marks is exactly right, and it's a huge problem. You've turned,
you know, we've turned all of our terrestrial landscapes into
(38:57):
a series of islands.
Speaker 2 (39:01):
I've done a good bit of reading about that same
thing happening down in southern Florida and the Everglades and
how that's led to serious inbreeding effects that have led
to you know, reduced to rival rates of kittens and
all sorts of wild things happening down there too. So
it's a pathway to slow but certain demise unless something's
(39:22):
done about it. So we've talked about the direct impacts
of road killed, like white tailed deer smashing up cars
and getting killed. We've talked about migrations being impacted. We've
talked about genetic diversity being hampered. A lot of these
things have all been about large mammals, which are the
most obvious of animals to be impacted by roadways and
(39:46):
our roads. But you spend a good amount of time
talking about something much much smaller, but equally important to
a lot of the more charismatic things that we focus on,
like deer and the wild places they inhabit, and that
being dollinators in insects and butterflies and things like that.
Can you can you speak a little bit about that
how roads might be impacting our insects and why that
(40:09):
might be something we should pay attention to as well.
Speaker 3 (40:11):
Yeah, you know, that's it's an interesting it's a it's
kind of a double edged sword in a lot of ways,
because in a sense, you know, roads are habitat for insects, right. Uh.
You know you think about states like uh, you know, Iowa,
Illinois or Kansas. You know these these these aren't states, uh,
you know that unlike states in the West. You know,
they're not blessed with a huge amount of public land, right. Uh.
(40:34):
And so you know, in many Midwestern states, roadsides are
actually the largest form of public land. You know, there
are these these strips of of in many cases, you know,
native prairie plants that follow highways.
Speaker 2 (40:45):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (40:45):
And they're these you know, these these corridors of habitat
in this monoculture of corn and soy and and and lawns. Right. So, uh,
you know, there is this potential resource there. You know there,
I mean, if you're a monarch butterfly, you know, has
to lay your eggs on milk weed. Well there are
you know, hundreds of millions of milk weed stems along roadsides.
Speaker 2 (41:07):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (41:08):
In in in the Midwest. You know that the monarch
butterfly migration uh. You know that runs through the Midwest,
you know, basically follows I thirty five right from from
Minnesota to Texas. So there's you know, there's a great
resource there potentially, but it's also it's a it's a
dangerous resource, right you know, of course the road is
a dangerous place.
Speaker 2 (41:28):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (41:28):
And you know millions of migrating monarch butterflies are killed
by cars every year. We don't really think about insects
being road kill, right, but it is this enormous source
of mortality for migrating monarchs and you know all kinds
of other insects. And then there are all of those
those chemical effects as well, you know, all of the
you know, the road salts being added to highways. What
does that do uh to you know, to the the
(41:51):
nutritional value of the plants that those butterflies are feeding on.
What about you know, the cadmium and the zinc and
the copper, uh you know, coming off our vehicles and
ending up in soils. You know, what does that do
uh to? Uh to to pollinators? So there, you know,
there's there's the direct mortality of cars, and then there's
the you know, the kind of the potentially problematic sub
(42:11):
lethal effects again along roads. So you know that's not
to say that that you know, we shouldn't have native
wildflowers and milkweed along our roads, right. I mean I've
you know, talked to biologists too calculated that you know,
roadsides are producing more monarch butterflies than they're than they're killing,
(42:32):
and that you know, roadsides are ultimately uh you know,
a valuable form of habitat, but again, you know they're
they're not the best habitat.
Speaker 1 (42:39):
Right.
Speaker 3 (42:39):
If you said, you know, here's a million dollars you
can restore, uh, the side of an interstate highway, or
you can restore a cornfield far from the highway. I
restore the cornfield, right, So, uh, yeah, roads are habitat,
but they're you know, they're a dangerous resource for these
creators too.
Speaker 2 (42:58):
Yeah, it's uh, it is really interesting. You've got like
an attract and repel effect in that, like you're attracting
a lot of these species there with you know, it's
I think there's something called is it the Monarch Highway?
Is that a stretch that you're ready, I think right
where they're trying to actively plant more milkweed and trying
to produce habitat. But then there's this debate about whether
(43:21):
or not you're killing more than you're helping but zooming out. Now,
I feel like there's three kind of hot buzzwords these
days related to the solution side, the now what part
of this whole conversation, and these three buzzwords that you
hear a lot these days, and that seem to have
(43:41):
a lot of support even across the political spectrum would
be corridors, connectivity, and migration routes. If there was if
you wanted to like do like a game where you
would take various environmental buzzwords and put them into a
ven diagram where there'd be some people on the left,
(44:03):
some people on the right, and then there's like the
intersection in the middle. I think those three things will
probably meet in the middle of that Ven diagram is
something that both sides can generally support. I think as
evidence by the fact that during the first Trump administration,
one of the good things that happened for the environment
during that period was some progress on wildlife migration, conservation,
(44:27):
and some corridor work and things like that. So why
do you think that is? Why is there bipartisan support
for addressing the issues you're talking about right now?
Speaker 3 (44:37):
Yeah, it's a really good question, and I mean it
is kind of amazing just how bipartisan that support is
and how and how universal that support is. Right and
there you know, there's been public polling around wildlife crossings,
you know, overpasses and underpasses for big game and other critters.
And you know here in Colorado, I think eighty five
(44:58):
percent of residents support more wildlife crossings. You know, you
see the same numbers in Oregon and Nevada and all,
you know, a bunch of Western states. And you know
you couldn't get eighty five percent of Colorad's degree. The
sky is blue, right, it's it's you know, it's it's
just a mind blowing you know how how universal the
desire to reconnect these these habitats is. And you know,
(45:20):
I mean I do think that a lot of that
actually comes from hunters.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (45:23):
You know, you think about Wyoming as a great case study.
You know, Wyoming has some of the some of the
most and the best wildlife crossings, uh in in the country.
You know, when you drove up I ninety or one
ninety one past Pinedale, you know you would have you
would have driven under some a couple of wildlife overpasses
and over I think five underpasses for for mule deer
(45:45):
and prong horn. Uh. You know, there are some great
underpasses on Highway thirty in in Wyoming in a place
called Nugget Canyon, famous field deer migration corder. So there's
lots of great examples of of you know, of of
animal infrastructure in Wyoming and you know, so much of
that is is because it's a state with a really
(46:05):
powerful hunting culture and politically powerful hunters as well. You know,
one of the great groups who I wrote about in
the book is the the muly Fanatics Foundation, you know,
a mule deer advocacy group, and you know, they were
responsible for the creation of a license plate, you know,
a special license plate, the revenues from which go to
(46:26):
to wildlife crossing infrastructure. So yeah, I do think you know,
that's the that's the reason that you see you know,
people like Ryan Zinky right in that first Trump administration,
you know authoring was it thirty three sixty two? Was
this the secretarial order that required states to identify winter
range and migration corridors? So yeah, there's this, you know,
(46:47):
this great bipartisan, really nonpartisan relationship there. You know John Barrasso,
Republican senator from Wyoming, you know, he wrote some of
the language that ended up being this big wildlife crossings
grant program. Who's the first to introduce it in a
in a bill? And now that you know that program exists,
(47:08):
So yeah, you know, we live in this hyper polarized
society obviously, and and you know, I think that wildlife
crossings are one of the few issues that you know,
the hunting lobby and the humane society you know, both
vociferously agree upon.
Speaker 2 (47:24):
Yeah, I'd love to see it. Yeah, just seek some
kind of common ground. It also seems like it's one
of those interesting sweet spots and that it's it's most
of these migration or connectivity type initiatives, legislation or executive
orders whatnot. They tend to advocate for targeted protections or
(47:46):
targeted crossings, which viewed from one side, are like better
than like a very far reaching, wide ranging set of
protections that you know, some people might be worried about
impeding development. And then from like the other side, the
more protectionist side, which wants to see lots and lots
of protection, this is well, at least we cover the
(48:07):
very most important points right where we're able to find
where these key crossing points are and protect those. So
it's a some people would view it as the minimum
amount they can handle, and some would view it as,
you know, better than nothing, But one way or another,
it is better than nothing. So let's let's let's get
(48:27):
a little more into the crossing side of things. As
you alluded to, like, just right there on one ninety one,
there's several different forms of crossings being utilized by mule
deer and pronghorn. But can you can you talk us
through a little bit of you know, what kinds of
solutions have been found for wildlife crossings and it's it's
kind of pretty wild how many different versions of this
(48:48):
there exist, everything from something that's made to get amphibians
across the road to something that says, you know, a
suitable for a grizzly bear, mountain lion too. So could
you kind of expand and explore on what all those
things might look like?
Speaker 3 (49:03):
Yeah, definitely, And I think, you know, I think that
whenever you're talking about wildlife crossings, right, it's important to
start with a kind of a fundamental understanding of the
biology and ecology of the animal that you're trying to
get across the highway, right, so that you know, those
those one ninety one crossings by Pinedale at a place
called Trapper's Point, you know, that's a really a really
good example of that because there, you know, you have
(49:25):
this ancient migration route for both mule deer and pronghorn,
and you know, it's it's just kind of cool from
a hunting standpoint. Briefly, to think about how long that
migration route has existed and how long humans have understood
that migration route right there, you know, amazing archaeological finds
of you know, of pronghorn, uh you know that were
(49:46):
that were killed with stone tools, you know, six thousand
years ago in that in that spot, right.
Speaker 2 (49:52):
So I just love that idea.
Speaker 3 (49:54):
Yeah, yeah, so, you know, I just love the idea
of you know, humans and and and angulates kind of
moving through the landscape together there, you know, from this
deep time perspective. So anyway, so you've got these you know,
these two iconic species both hit in the highway, you know,
in the same in the same place. You know, mule
deer are pretty easy animals to get across highways, right
(50:14):
They'll you know, they'll they'll use lots of different crossing types,
you know, lots of data that they're you know, pretty
happy going through uh, you know, concrete box culverts as
long as they're large enough. But pronghorn really don't do that.
You know, prong horn don't like underpasses, and and you know,
to understand what it is, and it's important to think
again about the biology and the ecology of the prong horn. Right.
(50:37):
The prong horn is this incredibly fast animal. Of course,
it's the you know, the fastest terrestrial animal in North America.
It was you know, chased by American cheetahs during the
place to scene. Right. They also have incredible eyesight, uh,
you know, one of the farthest seeing uh mammals on Earth.
(50:57):
And so that's an animal that doesn't want to be
in a little box culver. Right, That's an animal that
evolved to outrun and to detect and outrun its predators
in open space. That's an animal that wants to be
up on the deck of a bridge of an overpass
that it can you know, scan the horizon for threats
and run away if it has to. So they're at
a trapper's point. You know, you've got two types of crossings, right,
(51:21):
You've got those underpasses that the mule deer readily use,
and you've got the overpasses that the prong horn have
a really strong preference for. You know, you see the
same kind of dichotomy or division in in bears. You know,
black bears are you know, historically kind of forest dwellers
who are more comfortable and confined closed spaces, and they're
(51:44):
you know, they'll use underpasses pretty readily, whereas grizzly bears
are you know, these big powerful planes animals. You know
Lewis and Clark famously saw them in North Dakota. Right.
These are prairie critters. They don't want to be in
a little underpass. They want to be again in an
open space, especially those sows with cubs because you know,
(52:05):
sometimes the the bores, the males will kill those cubs
to put the females back into heat. Right, so the
females are looking out for uh, you know, for for
males to protect their cubs from them. So you know,
so so grizzly bears, you know, have a strong preference
for overpasses, whereas black bears will happily use underpasses. Right.
So you know, whatever crossing you're creating, you know, you
have to begin with that understanding of you know, what
(52:26):
your target species is, what what sorts of of crossings,
what kinds of structures will appeal to those animals, And
also you know where those animals are moving through the landscape, right,
And that's where the satellite collar data being collected by
groups like the Wyoming Migration Initiative can really help because
you know, they tell you that that data tells you, Okay,
(52:48):
here's where the animals are approaching the highway and would
use a wildlife crossing if the opportunity presented itself.
Speaker 2 (53:07):
Now, a lot of the examples discussed when it comes
to wildlife crossings come from the west or the north. Right.
They talk about the parks up in Canada, they talk about,
you know, they're west of West of Glacier National Park.
They talk about, you know, the things there in Wyoming.
There's the more recent example down there with the mountain
(53:30):
lions in southern California. But is any of this happening
on the east side of the country. Are there wildlife
crossings unbeknownst to those of us in the Midwest or
the East coast where critters of some type are getting
across the road in ways that maybe we're just not
noticing because because I'm not seeing big sexy overpasses in
Michigan or New York or North Carolina. But is there
(53:53):
something happening there as well?
Speaker 3 (53:54):
Yeah, it's a really important question. I think that you're
you're right that historically, you know, West Stern states really
the leaders on this stuff, right, And again, I mean
that's just because that's just because of the migratory nature
of the wildlife. Right. If you have a herd of
a thousand mule deer crossing the same highway in Wyoming
year after year, you know, pretty soon there's this big
(54:14):
pile of carcasses saying, hey, put a wildlife crossing right here,
right where Whereas you know, in the Midwest and the Northeast,
you know, those those white tails aren't really migrating in
the same way, and it just kind of feels like
they're everywhere all the time, right. There aren't hot spots
in the same way. And so I think that you know,
historically Eastern states have kind of thrown their hands up
(54:36):
and said, yeah, you know, there's really nothing we can
do about this.
Speaker 2 (54:39):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (54:39):
You know, wildlife crossings are great for those those western guys,
but they don't make sense for you know, for our
our ungulits here. And you know, fortunately that mindset is changing.
You're right that you don't really see you know, big
sexy overpasses yet in those those Eastern states, but you
know you do see underpasses. You know, Florida has built
lots of underpasses for Florida panthers that that you you mentioned.
(55:03):
You know, A great example, uh, that I talk about
in the book comes out of out of Virginia on
I sixty four where basically, you know that that identified
this you know, this frequent uh you know, white tail
deer collision hotspot. But in that in that stretch of
highway and I sixty four, there were a couple of culverts.
Speaker 2 (55:22):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (55:22):
You know, these these kind of concrete sided, you know,
dirt floored underpasses that beneath the highway, and those you know,
those weren't built for wildlife, right, you know, I think
one was built for a seasonal stream to flow under
the highway. One was built for a dairy farmer I believe,
who wanted to you know, run his cows back and
forth under under the interstate. So those weren't wildlife crossings
(55:46):
per se. But you know what some some folks at
the Virginia Department of Transportation realized is that, hey, if
we just built fences on either side of the underpass
of these culverts, we could make deer and other animals
used them. Right, Deer'd be trying to cross the highway
they'd hit that fence line, they'd follow the fence line,
and they'd find that that culvert and they'd go underneath it.
(56:09):
And sure enough, you know, that was exactly what happened.
You know, So they managed to reduce collisions by more
than ninety percent, and they you know saw I mean hundreds,
if not thousands, of deer and black bears and foxes
and the possums and all kinds of critters going back
and forth under that highway. And you know, I think
really importantly for the Transportation Department, that project paid for
(56:30):
itself really quickly. Right because we're talking earlier about how
expensive and dangerous all of these animal crashes are. Well,
if you put some fencing in that reduces crashes by
more than ninety percent, you know, you can recoup your
own costs really quickly, which is you know, we see
frequently with wildlife crossing. So I think that example and
a couple of others have helped other Eastern states say,
(56:52):
you know, wait a second, wildlife crossings are not just
for Wyoming, in Utah and Montana, you know, we can
build them here. And so if you look at you know,
the Byparts of Infrastructure law which had three hundred and
fifty million dollars for wildlife crossings in the form of
competitive grants going to states and native tribes and other entities.
You know, yeah, a lot of that money has gone
(57:12):
to Wyoming in Colorado and Utah, but you know a
lot of it's also gone to Vermont and Maine and Massachusetts,
which you know, got funding to you know, build a
crossing and overpass over the mass Pike, which was pretty cool.
And you know, we're seeing Eastern states and Midwestern states
like South Dakota and Missouri and Pennsylvania, you know, getting
(57:34):
money to begin the planning process for wildlife crossings. Right
here in the West, you know, we've got lots of
shovel ready projects. You know, we have all this data.
We know where the migration corridors are, where the collision
hot spots are. We're you know, ready to build you know,
fifteen million dollar overpasses today, whereas a lot of the
Eastern states are you know, a few years behind. And
(57:55):
they're saying, Okay, now we have a desire to do this.
We want to build wildlife crossings and let's figure out
where to where to put them, because you know there
are it turns out that there are hot spots out there.
It's not just you know, a white tail free for all.
Speaker 2 (58:10):
Yeah, So so zooming out a little bit more. If
crossings get an animal across one road from habitat A
to habitat B, you might be able to zoom a
little bit further out and look at something that a
lot of folks referred to as corridors, which would be
these larger protected zones to some degree that connect habitat
to habitat to habitat, allowing you know, wildlife species to
(58:33):
do something like we talked about earlier, which might be
connect one genetic subpopulation to another, or to be able
to migrate, or to be able to adjust to a
changing climate or adjust to new development pressures. And there
have been discussions around these in different parts of the country,
Like there is a corridor type project in Florida where
(58:54):
they are trying to connect habitat from the southern tip
of the state towards more towards the Panhandle, try to
protect places along that route along with crossings. And then
there's you know, some big, more well known ones out west.
You talked about this a little bit in the book
You You you led towards the beginning with with how
the Yellowstone to Yukon Corridor kind of opened your eyes
(59:16):
to this whole idea of crossings. Can you can you
elaborate a little bit on this idea of corridors, the
importance of it today and and maybe speak a little
bit about why do I since that one is so
well known and compelling.
Speaker 3 (59:30):
Yeah, for sure, and you know that, I mean that
was really the project that got me excited about this topic,
you know, twelve twelve years ago now, So yeah, I
think it's I think it's important to remember, of course,
that roads don't occur in isolation, right, as you say,
as you allude to, they're part of this much larger landscape.
And you know, you have to think about habitat protection
(59:51):
and wildlife crossings going hand in hand, right And then
you know, I know, I know you're a big public
lands guide mark which I really appreciate. You have to
have public lands or some other form of protected habitat
on either side of the road, right if you know,
if you and look, we see that you know here
in the west all the time where you know, if
you have a wildlife crossing and you can you can
(01:00:12):
build a great overpass over a highway. But you know,
if the if the open space on either side of
that overpass gets turned into condos tomorrow, you know you've
got to You've got a bridge to nowhere, right, And
so you know, conservation easements and other forms of land
protection have to go hand in hand with the construction
of those those wildlife passages, and so that's we start
(01:00:34):
talking about, right, those larger corridors, uh, you know, those
those larger connected and protected spaces. And you know that
doesn't necessarily mean uh, you know, public land. It could
mean you know, a big ranch with the conservation easeman
on it, right that you know that that prevents that
open space, uh, you know from turning into uh you know,
into into subdivisions.
Speaker 2 (01:00:55):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (01:00:55):
You know, in many places it means fencer.
Speaker 1 (01:00:57):
Right.
Speaker 3 (01:00:57):
You talked about those you know, those prong horner earlier,
which are a great example of a species that has
a really hard time crossing fences. You know, they don't
jump as well as elk and deer do, and so
they you know, they really get hung up by those
those those fences. And so you know, if you have
a wildlife overpass, but you know, a whole crapload of
barbed wire on either side. You know, that's that's gonna
(01:01:19):
be a bit a big problem for for proborn you know.
The I mean another another big piece of all of this,
especially when you're talking about you know about large carnivores,
is conflict mitigation, right, Uh, you know, figuring out uh
you know, how to protect livestock and you know, other
forms of agriculture from you know, from wolves and bears
(01:01:39):
and cougars and coyotes. Right, I mean again, same same principle.
You know, a grizzly bear can cross an overpass over
the highway, but you know if if on the other
side he you know, ends up killing a few sheep
and getting shot for it. Uh, you know, you haven't
really achieved connectivity. Right. So you know, these broader corridors
like the Yellowstone to uk On Conservation initiative, you know
(01:02:02):
they should they take this really holistic perspective on all
of the different barriers to to movement that are out
there on the landscape. So you know, wildlife crossings are
part of the story, but you know, certainly not the
entire story. And you know why do why is a
great example of that, because they do take that bigger,
you know, synergistic vision. I mean really their goal, uh,
(01:02:24):
you know, is to create ideally a connected wildlife corridor
that runs from the Yukon all the way to Yellowstone
National Park, so that you know, really far ranging animals
like brislies and wolverines and wolves and cariboo you know,
can can move through this connected landscape. And again, you
know that doesn't certainly those big protected areas, those big
(01:02:46):
blocks of public land like Glacier National Park, like Banff
and Jasper in Canada. You know, that's that's part of
the story. But you know that corridor also goes through yeah,
ranches and farms and you know, and and industrial timber
lands and all sorts of you know of quote unquote
working lands, and you know, conflict mitigation in those spaces
(01:03:08):
is part of it too. So again, just thinking about
all of those different barriers on the landscape and how
we can address them synergistically, I think is really where
this corridor movement is gone.
Speaker 2 (01:03:21):
So I'm curious, Ben, as you have well, let me
take let me take some different approach. As I have
learned more and more about the various topics that are
related to conservation and public lands, and the future of wildlife.
As I've worked on various projects on my own, I
(01:03:42):
find myself having two parallel energy kind of sources, or
maybe you can think about like a devil on one
side and an angel on the other shoulder. And the
more I learn, I will have this devil on one
shoulder that's saying, look at how screwed everything is, look
at all the bad stuff that's happening, and look at
all these depressing statistics and all of this bad news
(01:04:06):
and dire straits for this critter or this place. And
then on the other hand, on the other shoulder, the
more I learned, the more I also find out about
or hear from, you know, encouraging examples of good people
doing great work helping out in specific locations, or discovering
(01:04:26):
new ideas, or you know, banding together and achieving important
progress and protecting wildlife or installing some kind of new
conservation practice or whatever it might be. So I'm constantly
kind of oscillating between those two things. The deeper and
deeper I get into all this. So my question for
you is, as you worked on this project Crossings, as
(01:04:47):
you dove into the world of rhode ecology and wildlife
corridors and crossings. Where do you stand today on those
parallel tracks of good energy and bad energy? The devil
in the aim, angel on the shoulder? Are you are
you hopeful? Are you disheartened? What's your view for the future?
Speaker 3 (01:05:08):
Dude? Did you just described exactly my internal conflict? The
the oscillation, the oscillation between hope and despair is it's
so it's so real. And I think that, you know,
like any thinking, feeling, ecologically minded person can probably relate
to that. I mean, on one hand, out you know,
I do feel a lot of hope. As we were
saying earlier, you know this this is truly a bipartisan issue,
(01:05:30):
the need for you know, wildlife crossings and poor doors.
And there are I mean so many fantastic projects uh
springing up all over the place. You know, I mentioned
those mountain lions in California earlier as kind of the
poster population for the genetic fragmentation that res can create. Well,
guess what, there's uh you know, the largest wildlife overpass
uh in in the US is being built right now
(01:05:52):
that will cross the one oh one and you know,
let those those cats move back and forth and not
just not just mountain lions, but also mule deer and
and bobcats and coyotes and all kinds of creators. So
you know, there are projects like that provide me uh
lots of lots of hope and are you know, are
really sustaining. But you know, then of course we we
know as you know, as you know all too well,
and are writing writing a book about you know, we're
(01:06:14):
in the middle of this uh six mass extinction event
and our our planet's history, and not just extinction, but
also you know, common animals or once common animals like
mule deer becoming uh you know, increasingly scarce. You know,
prong horn another another great, great example of you know this,
animals just you know, sort of like terminally afflicted by
fragmentation all all across the the American West, right, and
(01:06:36):
and you know, it's it's hard to feel like the
you know this, the solutions such as they are, are
keeping up with the pace of those declines, right, they're
not really And you know, and now, uh, you know,
unfortunately we're entering this you know, this political period that
I think is going to be really hostile to conservation.
And I mean I don't think that we can you know,
we we know that from you know, what this administration
(01:06:57):
is all already doing. And you know, I'm sure you've
got listeners you know, on all sides of the political spectrum.
But you know, but I you know, I look at
you know, this administration's desire to sell off public land
and and you know, and and develop you know, housing
on a lot of it, and and uh, you know,
roll back so many of the protections under the Endangered
(01:07:18):
Species Act. And it's you know, it's it's whatever, whatever
you think about you know about about the Trump administration,
it's hard to imagine a world in which it's going
to be positive for wildlife.
Speaker 2 (01:07:28):
Right.
Speaker 3 (01:07:28):
So, yes, there are these these points of of of
political consensus and bipartisanship in the world of of of
wildlife crossings and habitat corridors, but you know, ultimately it's
it's hard to look at the next few years and
feel really optimistic about where we're going from a conservation standpoint.
Speaker 2 (01:07:49):
So all that said, what do we do what what
What kinds of things did you find coming out of
this project that you felt that you could take as
an individual to make any kind of positive progress? What
can we as listeners do if if any of this
intrigued usin we thought to ourselves, Man, I would love
to somehow support this kind of work getting done, more
(01:08:11):
crossings being created, more corridors being protected with the ease
mints or or whatever other tool. What's your take on
what individuals can do to to be a part of
these solutions.
Speaker 3 (01:08:24):
Yeah, you know, I think I think this is one
of those great issues where doing the classic good citizen
of a democracy thing, you know, writing to your elected officials,
your representatives, you know, supporting groups that support this stuff,
you know groups, I mean, and that's one of the
great things about and one of the reasons I was,
(01:08:45):
you know, really excited to uh, you know, to talk
to a kind of a you know, a hunting audience.
Is that. I mean again, hunters have just been a
fantastic community for this, for this issue, right and you
know I mentioned I mentioned Wyoming, but also groups like
you know, back country hunters and anglers. You know, it's
creating this issue, you know, the National Wildlife Federation, uh
and so on. You know, there are so many organizations
(01:09:06):
now you know that that work on this stuff. And
and you know, again because this is relatively it's relatively nonpartisan.
And it's also it's a thing that politicians and transportation
agencies like doing. Right. There's like, you know, you build
a wildlife crossing and there's a ribbon cut. You know,
it's a fun media friendly that you know, transportation agencies
(01:09:26):
can you know, get fantastic you know, trailcan footage of
animals using their new wildlife crossings and you know, have
a go viral on social media, right and to about
you know, I feel kind of cynical about about you know,
those transportation agencies at times. Right, that's it's like, okay,
you're you know, you love talking about the wildlife crossings
you've built, but not about all of the ones you
(01:09:46):
should have built. But you know, but but it is
it is true that you know that this is this
is one of those you know, multi win issues that uh,
you know that agencies and politicians want to be part of.
And so you know, writing and calling your your legislators,
you know, really does make a difference. And again, supporting
those groups that are working on this issue at a
(01:10:08):
state or federal policy level is also a big win too,
because you know, we do see lots of states, uh,
you know, states like uh, you know, Utah and Oregon
and New Mexico, you know, states on every side of
the political spectrum, right, passing bills that allocate new funding
towards the construction of wildlife crossing and crossings and the
conservation of corridors, so you know, and those those states
(01:10:32):
were all influenced, you know by groups like the newly
Fanatics Foundation, right, you know, hunting groups and other other stakeholders.
So yeah, do you know, just do the do the
good citizen of a democracy thing?
Speaker 2 (01:10:44):
Yeah? Yeah, it's one of those things that never gets old.
I mean, it's it's it's going to be one of
those deals. You hear about it, but you just have
to keep on working on You just have to keep
pushing that, uh sisspician, boulder up the mountain and keep
on keep on making the phone and send the emails
and uh and slowly but surely that stuff builds up
(01:11:05):
into into something that decision makers can't ignore.
Speaker 3 (01:11:09):
Yeah, so that's the that's the hope for sure.
Speaker 2 (01:11:13):
What Uh, I guess two things here to wrap things up.
Number one, can you preview for us anything coming in
the future, any fun new projects, anything we can look
forward to? And then uh, well I'll guess answer me
that is there anything you can tell us about the
future yet or is that still hush hush?
Speaker 3 (01:11:31):
Yeah, no, for sure. I'm writing a book right now
about about phish movement, kind of the aquatic counterpart to
to crossings. In some ways, fish movement as this kind
of keystone ecological and cultural force that you know, like
with ungulate migration, we've screwed up in a million ways
and are now called upon to protect and restore and understand. So,
(01:11:54):
you know, projects like the famous Climateth dam removal, Uh,
you know, where four damns are just taken out to
you know, emit salmon salmon migration into four hundred miles
of newly open river habitat. Projects like that are gonna
going to feature prominently in this book. But it's also
mostly an excuse to go fishing and and see fish
(01:12:14):
and lots of cool places. So it's it's my it's
my finly veiled angling.
Speaker 2 (01:12:18):
Project, smart man. As I as I mentioned before we
started recording, the last portion of my book that I'm
wrapping up now is about salmon and uh. And so
I've spent a lot of time over over recent months
reading about uh, you know, Columbia River Basin and Snake
River Salmon and all that. And then last year I
(01:12:39):
got to go up to Alaska and spend time in
the Tongus where there's also to talk about culvert issues there,
and then of course getting to go to a place
that doesn't have these connectivity issues yet like Bristol Bay.
So yeah, you're gonna have a lot of fun with
that project. I can't wait to uh, I can't wait
to read that one. Yeah, but we've got to wait
a while for that one. But there are two books.
(01:13:01):
People can rate it right now? Where would you like
to send folks to pick up a copy of any
of your previous books?
Speaker 3 (01:13:07):
You know, I always love when people support their local
independent bookseller, So you know, see if they if they
have crossings, your eager instack there and if not, order
them through through your your local indie. But you know,
if not there, they're available and every online retailer where
books are sold. So yeah, thank you, thank you in
advance to all you out there for supporting I really
(01:13:27):
appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (01:13:29):
Yeah, and do you do you like people to connect
with you on social media or a website or anything
else like that?
Speaker 3 (01:13:35):
Yeah? Sure, but my website is just ben gooldfarb dot
com and I'm you know, active on on Instagram and
Twitter and increasingly Blue Sky and all the all the
other places where writers are now obligated to have social
media presences.
Speaker 2 (01:13:50):
Awesome, all right, Ben, Well, I will be impatiently waiting
for the third book. Can't wait for that. And in
the meantime, I will just send you my thanks one
more time for doing some really important work.
Speaker 3 (01:14:02):
Thank you, Thank you Mark, thanks for having me, and
congrats on your own next book. I'm really stop to
read it.
Speaker 2 (01:14:07):
Thanks. If I can survive this next month, we'll hopefully
have something to show for us.
Speaker 3 (01:14:10):
Good good luck.
Speaker 2 (01:14:12):
Thank you. All right, and that's going to wrap it
up for us today. Thank you for joining me. I
appreciate you being here for this conversation, and until next time,
stay wired to Hunt.
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to
the whitetail woods, presented by first Light, creating proven versatile
hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First Light
Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. This week on
the show, we are discussing the surprisingly fascinating science of roadkill,
wildlife crossings, and the impact of roads on deer and
other wildlife, and I'm joined by author Ben Goldfarb. All Right,
(00:39):
welcome back to the Wired to Hunt podcast, brought to
you by first Light, and today we are discussing the surprising,
the interesting, the fascinating intersection of roads and wildlife. And
there's a there's a little bit of a pun there,
but I'm joined today by Ben Goldfarb, the author of
(01:00):
a terrific book called Crossings. A road ecology is shaping
the future of our planet in this book and our
conversation today is all about this very interesting set of
ways that roads impact deer and other wildlife, and by
way of that, they impact us too as hunters. There
are the obvious ways you know, where roads actually kill
(01:23):
wildlife roadkill, of course, and the many ripple effects of that,
and then there's this kind of wider set of like
halo effects of roads and how they impact human behavior,
pressure on hunt you know, hunting pressure and other types
of pressures on wildlife. You know, the ways roads impact
pollinators and birds and all sorts of different habitat related things.
(01:47):
There's lots there's lots of stuff here that's surprising, that's
eye opening and very relevant to I think a lot
of folks in the hunting world. You know, impacts on
migration corridors, impacts on wildlife, travel, impacts on you know,
the genetic viability of certain species as roads are kind
of carving up and fragmenting wildlife habitat more and more.
(02:08):
So all that and more is what we cover today
with Ben. It's a it's a really interesting and unique
conversation that I'm excited for you guys to hear. Before
we get to that very quickly, I just want to
plug you know, leaving a review for this podcast and
subscribing if you haven't done yet, and then finally also
checking out the rest of the Meat Eater podcast network.
(02:30):
We've got shows like, you know, the Meat Eater flagship show.
But then Kels we can review God's Country, this uh,
This Country Life, Bear Grease, the American West with Dan Floores,
and several more. I think I'm forgetting something here, but
we've got lots to listen to after this chat with
(02:50):
Ben Goldfarm, so let's get into it all right. Joining
me now is Ben Goldfarb. Welcome to the show.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Ben, Thanks a loud mark. It's great to be here.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
I really appreciate it. I'm excited about this one. My pal,
Ben O'Brien. Maybe I don't know, you're not to fact
check me on the dates here, but seven or eight
years ago something like that first introduced me to you
through your first book, Eager about Beavers, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Thanks,
(03:31):
and I followed you and kind of your work ever
since from afar. And when your latest book, Crossings came
out a couple of years ago, now I feel like
it was isn't that right? It has been two years
now or a year and a half, yeah, three, okay,
So when that came out, I immediately put that on
my list of oh yeah, I have to read that
book because it's right up my alley, that kind of
(03:54):
intersection of kind of wildlife and conservation and ecology and
all those kinds of things, and both in line with
what I personally am into, and then also you know
my work life with hunting and writing about those things.
But I saw right away that it was a book
that would be very relevant to a book project of
(04:14):
my own that I'm writing right now, and so I
put it on a different like reading list. So rather
than just like the reading for fun list, it got
put on the oh, you need to read that while
taking notes list, and so because of that, it kept
getting pushed back and delayed and delayed and delayed. So
this is a very long and roundabout way of saying
(04:35):
Ben that as soon as your book came out, I
was like, I need to read that, but because of
my weird process, I didn't read it until just like
a month ago while on our family spring break trip.
So I finally got around to reading Crossings, and as
soon as I did, I realized that just as I thought,
it would be a very worthy read. So congrats on
(04:57):
a great book right out the gate, Ben just got
say that, well done.
Speaker 3 (05:01):
Thanks thanks for saying that, and I hope it checked
that fun to read box as well as the note
taking box.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
It did it did, and that's that's a sweet spot.
That's not easy to achieve. Being able to be able
to write something that's both really informative and a page
turner like and enjoyable compelling. That's no easy tasks. So
uh so, nicely done. You. You were able to survive
(05:28):
the sitting by the pool with a beer test and
I did not fall asleep.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
Oh man, it's it's me, John Grisham and Stephen King
in that in that category.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
That's quite the company to keep ben rights. But I
want to I want to quickly make this relevant to
people listening, because this book is about something that you
call road ecology, which to the average outdoors person might
sound kind of jargony and maybe not relevant to what
a hunter or angler might care about. But I guess
(06:02):
to open it, tell me this, what's rhodocology and why
should a hunter or angler or outdoors men care?
Speaker 3 (06:10):
Sure? So, you know, so RhoD ecology is basically this
relatively small, but I would say fast growing field of
science that looks at all of the different ways that
roads interacts with and connect with nature and often fragment nature. Right,
And you know, I think from a hunter's perspective, of course,
that dead deer by the side of the highways is
(06:31):
the most visceral obvious connection. You know, I mean a
couple million large animals at least are killed in wildlife
vehicle collisions every year, and that's a tremendous loss to hunters.
I mean from a fish perspective. You know, I'm not
a hunter, but I'm a pretty avid angler. And every
place that a stream goes under a road, you know,
(06:52):
there's a culvert, and often those culverts are too small
or defective, and that's a huge loss of fish and
fish aquatic connectivity and habitat. So rhad ecology basically looks
at all of these different points that roads and ecosystems
intersect and thinks about, okay, and what impacts are roads
(07:15):
pausing on nature? And I think, really importantly, what do
we do about those impacts? How do we start to
solve some of the ecological problems that are massive four
million mile transportation network here in the US creates.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
Yeah, in your book, you write about I think I
believe this is a quote, as long as I didn't
mess up my transcription. He wrote, the pavement itself blankets.
Less than one percent of the United states, yet its influence.
The road effect zone, to use ecological jargon, covers a
full twenty percent. So you mentioned the fact that there's
like a four million mile road network across the country. Well,
(07:53):
then here you talk about how the effective roads expands
beyond just that four million actual miles. But then there's
also this buffer or outside of that. Can you explain
a little more of what the road effect zone is
and what that means, because I kind of want to
lay the groundwork here for just how far reaching roads
really are.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
Yeah, you know, I think I think one of the
reasons that historically a lot of conservation groups and even
wildlife biologists to I think, overlooked roads as this ecological
problem is because, as you say, you know, they don't
actually cover a lot of land area. Right a road
it might only be you know, one hundred feet wide,
let's say, for talking about you know, a big highway
from shoulder to shoulder, And so you know, what's the
(08:33):
what's the big deal right there? You know, tens of
thousands of acres of habitat out there, but those roads
and the traffic that goes along them prevent animals from
reaching that habitat. Right there's a you know, a really
famous map. Maybe can you know, you can include in
the show notes or something, this great graphic of a
grizzly bear's attempt to cross I ninety in Montana, and
(08:56):
that that bear is just you know, bouncing and you
can basically see the satellite collar map of you know,
this bear's this bear's movements and the bear is just
bouncing off I'm ninety like a ping pong ball. Right.
He keeps trying to find places to cross the highway,
but the traffic is so dense that he's unable to do.
And so that bear attempts more than forty crossings over
(09:18):
the course of six months before he finally, you know,
finds his way across the highway somehow. So, you know,
from that bear's perspective, right, he's looking at the road,
the road is only you know, one hundred feet wide
from shoulder to shoulder or whatever, but it's denying him
access to hundreds of thousands of acres of habitat, you know,
throughout the Northern Rockies, right. So you know, I think
(09:40):
I think that's a really important concept that, yeah, you
have the the impact created at the level, at the
spatial extent of the road itself right again, that dead
you know, that dead buck by the side of the highway.
But you know what we what we don't see is
all of the animals who can't complete their migrations find food,
would find mates, you know, who are being genetically fragmented
(10:03):
by roads. So you know, that's another thing that rody
Kelogy tries to do, I think, is take this broader
perspective on the impacts of roads that kind of transcend
the relatively limited spatial area of the highway itself.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
And you know, another thing that you write about that
I've also seen personally is the you know, the tag
along with roads, which is people. So wherever you put people,
wherever you put roads, you add people to the landscape.
You create a human presence and pressure on wildlife, and
so you get you get animals avoiding roads because of
(10:39):
that typical you know, human activity there, So you get
you know, as a hunter, we see this all the time.
As we're trying to you know, as we're trying to
fire out, well where are we going to find the animals?
One of the first things you look at is, well,
where's the farthest I can get from a road? Yeah,
And that's the same thing that a deer or an
elk or a bear is thinking too, right, So every
time a new road is punched in and you lose
(11:01):
a little bit of that sweet spot. As you know.
I've seen maps like this that were they show all
the different all the different roads criss crossing and you
can find, you know, the actual area of area of
zones like you, I don't know what the actual number is,
but I know that the farthest you can get from
a road anywhere in the lower forty eight is not
that many miles from a road, and there are not
(11:23):
many places you can get more than five, ten, twelve
miles away from road in any direction. And that's in
the wildest places we have left most spots, you're always
within a mile or two miles, and critters react to that.
Critters behave differently because of that. Some species simply can't
exist because of that. So there's there's this far reaching
(11:47):
set of of weird things that come along with them,
poachers and top of hunters, on top of all the
other things that could possibly tag along too. So it's
invasive species. We bring all sorts of critters with us
along the roads too. Yeah, it's there's a lot that
I don't think many of us think about, but totally
(12:09):
it's present.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, And I think you know to your
point about you know, about about animals, especially ungulates, you know,
responding to those roads. I mean I was talking in
the course of working this book, you know, I talked
to a Forest Service biologist in eastern Oregon. She told
me this, you know, kind of amazing story in the
Forest Service. You know, of course, this incredible steward of
public lands, right, but also has the single largest road
(12:32):
network on earth. You know, something like three hundred and
seventy thousand miles of road on you know, in our
National forest. I mean there are you know, forests in
Idaho and Montana that have higher road densities than New
York City, right, and all of those wild It's crazy. Yeah,
And so all of those roads, of course, are you know,
how we access nature. And you know I love driving
on forest roads out here in Colorado, right, That's how
(12:54):
I you know, reach fishing holes and trailheads and all
kinds of great stuff. But you know, the animals are
smart and they know that. You know, hey, especially during
hunting season, you know, the roads bring the cars, the
cars bring the people, The people bring the you know,
the sticks that go bang and kill you. And you
know what this biolotist was telling me is that actually
in eastern Oregon, you know, what she's seen is a
(13:17):
lot of elk leaving public land and ending up on
private land where, you know, where hunters can't access them
at all, because you know, those elk recognize that, you know,
those really dense road networks on public land and the
people that come with them are a threat to them.
And so, you know, from a hunting standpoint, yeah, I
(13:37):
think it's you know, probably a double edged sword, and
that you know, roads permit access to an extent, but
as you say, you know, they also create tougher hunting
conditions in a you know a lot of respects and
you know, really provoke this kind of aversive response in
a lot of animals.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Yeah. Yeah, so roads have far reaching, surprise impacts on wildlife.
I feel like we've established that the obvious one of
those impacts is simply killing animals like roadkill, car deer collisions.
And in the introduction to your book, that first chapter
you kind of discuss how roadkills now the leading direct
(14:16):
cause of mortality in land based mammals, so that more
animals die from cars than do from any other direct
you know impact. They are also one of the most
dangerous animals or deer excuse me, are one of the
most dangerous animals to people because of road car vehicle collisions.
Can you can you discuss a little bit more that
(14:39):
direct impact roadkill with deer and other big critters, and
how that's both damaging our property, hurting deer in wildlife populations,
and also a lethal issue for humans. That's kind of
a double whammy across the boarder of problems.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
Yeah, for sure, Yeah, you're you're right that, you know,
the white tail deer is this single most dangerous wild
animal in North America. And that's obviously not the deer's fault, right,
that's automotive society's fault. But you know, I do think
that goes to show how how frequent and problematic these
collisions are. You know, more more than four hundred drivers
(15:16):
killed in deer crashes every every year in the US,
and that's you know, probably a dramatic underestimyre, right. I've
talked to state troopers who say, yeah, you know, oftentimes,
you know, you get a single car, a single vehicle
fatal accident where somebody hits a telephone poll or a tree.
Well that was probably swerving to avoid deer other wildlife, right,
(15:38):
the person didn't unfortunately survive to you know, explain the incident.
But you know, probably those four hundred collisions are you know,
dramatic underestimate if the real scale of the problem. And
then you've got you know, the the economic impact into
that property damage that you mentioned. You know, we know
that the average deer collision costs society more than nine
(16:00):
thousand dollars in hospital bills, vehicle repairs, insurance costs. The
loss to hunters is you know, is factored into that
equation as well. And you know, obviously deer aren't the
only big critters out there, right. You know, here in
Colorado we've got elk. You know, the average elk collision
costs something like twenty one thousand dollars per incident. You know,
(16:21):
the average moose collision is more than forty thousand dollars, right,
because moose are just so huge, of course, and have
much higher driver fatality rates. Collectively, all of these large
animal crashes are costing the US more than ten billion
dollars with a B every every year, and it's one
of the few crash types that's really increasing too. You know,
(16:43):
we're seeing these incidents become more common, you know, more
people driving around the landscape. You know, white tail populations
in many places are increasing, you know, causing more risk. Right. So, yeah,
it's this huge, i think relatively underdiscussed public health and
safety problem, as well as of course a big ecological problem.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
Yeah. So in the hunting world, there's always this rumor
that the car insurance lobby is working behind the scenes
trying to knock down the deer population. So there's people
in the state capital telling our fish and game departments like,
kill all the deer, kill all the deer, et cetera,
et cetera. That's like one of the old wives tales
(17:26):
within the hunting world. I've heard from your research and
in your experience as you were diving into this, did
you learn anything about how insurance companies are in any
kind of way dealing with the roadkill issue, addressing the
roadkill issue, advocating for solutions to it. Is that something
that ever came up in your explorations.
Speaker 3 (17:47):
Yeah, you know, it's funny if people people often ask that,
and it is this really intuitive logical connection, right and
and you know, in my experience, they haven't really gotten
involved in this in this shoe at all. You know,
I've seen an insurance company or to say the right
things about the importance of preventing this, but I've never
really seen any insurance company, you know, put their put
(18:10):
their money where their mouth is. You know. There was
unfortunately here in Colorado, there was a proposal of bill
that just that just failed at least for now, that
would have added I think something like three bucks to
UH annual insurance premiums, and that money would have gone
partially towards you know, funding wildlife crossings and fences and
other you know, ro kil mitigation systems. And I think
(18:32):
I think Triple A and maybe an insurance company or
two you know again said the right things about supporting
that bill, though it didn't ultimately pass. But yeah, I
would I would love to see UH the insurance industry
getting more involved in you know, funding those those wildlife
passages and solutions and fences and other other solutions, because
you know, they're the they're the beneficiaries. Right when those
(18:55):
those those deer collisions decreased so yeah, if there are
any insurance executives listening to this podcast, you know, you
should should get on that, right.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
Yeah. So something that was interesting you mentioned how we're
having more car deer collisions now than ever before. Uh.
But but at what point within the book you wrote
about the fact that, you know, there's a certain number
of like as as you were kind of writing about
the history, and as the road system was built out.
Simultaneous to that, the white tailed deer population was growing,
(19:28):
and so we were seeing car deer collisions rise and
rise and rise. But then at some point it actually
slowed down and we started having less collisions and fewer
crossings because there was like a a threshold pass where
there was so much traffic that it was actually keeping
animals from eve from trying to cross over the road.
Speaker 3 (19:47):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
And I know that there were some other interesting studies
in science that you had pointed to that kind of showcase,
like a certain number of cars per hour or during
a certain amount of time, you know, might allow certain
animals to cross, but others wouldn't. Can you just vibrate
a little bit on some of the things you found
when it came to that, you know, what degree of
traffic actually impacts animal crossings and things along those lines.
Speaker 3 (20:08):
Yeah, absolutely right. So you know, so I think I
think it's important first to think about how different species
understand traffic and what roads are.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Right.
Speaker 3 (20:18):
So, you know, they're guroty collegists to kind of classify
animals based on their their road response. Uh, and so
on one end of the spectrum, we've got animals who
are non responders to traffic, right, animals who don't really
understand what traffic is, and we'll just try to cross
the road no matter what, and they're you know, we've
got animals like frogs and salamanders and turtles you know,
(20:41):
maybe not like the smartest creators on Earth, don't really understand,
you know, what a car road is. And those animals
are just trying to cross the road to you know,
get to their breeding ponds and wetlands no matter what,
and they're just getting crushed and mass right, So those
are the non responders. Then we've got on the other
end of the spectrum the avoids, you know, animals who
(21:01):
really do understand that roads and vehicles are dangerous and
we'll just steer clear. So like grizzly bears are sort
of the classic avoid where even one car every ten minutes,
you know, a really rural road in some cases enough
to prevent a grizzly bear from crossing all together, and
that creates its own problems. Right, those animals are really
(21:22):
easily fragmented by by by traffic. And then deer are
somewhere in the middle, and they're what what scientists are
called speeders, which basically means that they're they're looking for
gaps in traffic that they can just run through. Right,
and you know humans are also speeders. You know, you
can imagine like standing by the side of a busy highway.
(21:43):
You know, you look in both ways waiting for that,
you know, that gap between vehicles that will let you
run through traffic to get to the other side. And
that's exactly what deer are doing. You know, they understand
the cars are dangerous, especially you know ones living in
relatively irb in places, and they're they're just trying to,
you know, get through that wall of vehicles. So you
(22:05):
can imagine right at at lower traffic volumes, you know,
a relatively rural road, you know they can the cars
are infrequent enough that they can run through those gaps
if you have a really busy interstate highway like I
eighty or something, the cars are so dense that there
are no gaps, right, and the deer don't even attempt
(22:25):
to cross. The highest roadkill rates that we see are
on moderately trafficked highways, you know, like typically we're talking
about you know, state highways that are getting you know,
let's say, you know, five thousand cars a day. That's
when there are enough cars for it to be dangerous,
but few enough cars that the deer are still trying
(22:47):
to run through those gaps, right, So, you know, along
that's kind of one of the ironies of the you know,
the interstate highway system is that along you know, some interstates,
you really don't see a lot of roadkill, right because
there's just so much traffic thick that the you know,
the deer and other animals aren't attempting to run from
one side of the highway to the other. And so
you might, you know, you might look at the at
(23:08):
the shoulder and not see too many carcasses and say, well, hey,
you know, what's the big deal, right, But then you know,
that's when you're getting that fragmentation issue, right, The fact
that the animals can't move from one habitat to another,
they can't find food, they can't find mates, they can't
complete those long distance migrations in places like you know,
Wyoming and Utah where animals really do have to move
(23:30):
a very long distance to survive. So yeah, that's the
that's one of the you know, one of the kind
of the ironies I think of roadkill is that, you know,
a relatively rural road and a relatively high volume interstate
highway can have kind of the same low amount of roadkill,
but they're you know, animals are experiencing them in very
different ways.
Speaker 2 (24:00):
So one of the interesting things when it comes to
the you brought deer a couple times in like white
tail deer versus maybe mule deer or other western ungulates.
And you can correct me if I'm wrong on this,
but my assumption would be that more white tail deer
get killed by cars on an annual basis than mule
deer or you know, pronghorn or elk. But I'm also
(24:22):
assuming that white tailed deer do not have as large
of a negative don't experience as large of a negative
impact as a mule deer does, because those roads act
as a different kind of blocker for them, despite the
fact that maybe ten white tails get killed to every
one mule deer. Is that true and if so, why
might that be?
Speaker 3 (24:42):
Yeah, I think you're definitely right. I mean, first of all,
they're just a lot more white tail deer in North
America than new Leader obviously. So you know, when you
look at you know, the states that have the highest
animal collision rates right there, they're generally eastern and Midwestern states.
You know, it's like West Virginia, Pennsylvania, you know, Michigan,
Montana off and kind of slips in there. But they've
got some white tails too, So you're, you know, you're
(25:05):
you're totally right that a lot more white tails are,
you know, just being hit hit by cars. But I
also think I would I would also certainly agree that
you know that cars are having a much bigger impact
on mule deer from a population perspective, because you know, again,
I mean in places like Wyoming, you know, in Colorado
where I live, you know, these animals are undertaking these
(25:27):
really long journeys, right, these these really long migrations. You know,
it's not like living in Pennsylvania, where you know, the
weather's not too harsh, and you know there aren't the
mountains aren't too huge, and there's kind of you know,
plenty of corn and other anthropogenic you know, human based
food resources out there for them, right. You know, a
white tail deer in Pennsylvania can be pretty sedentary, right
(25:50):
and find you know, find food year round and you know,
escape the weather. Whereas you know, a mule deer living
in Wyoming, you know, has to this really long journey.
You know, they're moving from their their winter range. You know,
these lower elevation valleys, uh that get super hot in
the summer up into the mountains. Right. They're kind of
surfing that green wave of of of new growth, and
(26:13):
then they're coming back. You know, they're deer in Wyoming
that are going three hundred miles round trip between these
really ephemeral seasonal resources in this you know, super harsh
Western environment. And and of course the problem is that
you know, if you're gonna walk three hundred miles anywhere
in the US, you know you're gonna end up crossing
a lot of roads, right.
Speaker 2 (26:33):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
And you know, in the in the book, I talk
about this very famous herd of mule deer in in
southwestern Wyoming in the Red Desert, you know, and these
are these are these long distance migrants uh and the
and you know there there winter range abuts I eighty right,
which is you know, again of course the highest the
highest volume road uh in in in Wyoming. Uh. And
(26:55):
you know some years, you know, during harsh during during
those those harshest winter, you know, those deer will just
pull up on the north side of A. Eighty looking
for an opportunity to cross, and they just can't find
one because the traffic volume is so high. And you know,
there have been winters where forty percent of that herd
will actually starve because all of the good forage is
south of A. Eighty and they can't they can't cross
(27:17):
that highway. Right. So from a population level standpoint, you know,
that's probably worse than roadkill, right that. You know that
a herd of a thousand deer, you know, they could
handle a few collisions on the highway. What they can't
handle is losing access to so much of their winter range, right.
I mean, historically, you know, those deer might have gone
as far south as Colorado, and you know, now they're
(27:39):
stuck up against the interstate. And you know from a
population level standpoint, that's a catastrophe for him.
Speaker 2 (27:47):
Yeah. Well, I was traveling traveling out to our cabin
in Idaho a few years back. I guess this would
have been two years ago. And our route takes us
long eighty until at Rock Springs, and then he hang
a north turn up one ninety one. I guess it'd
be heading up into uh like Pindale, going towards Pinedale. Yeah,
(28:09):
going right towards Pinedale, and along that route, I'm pretty
sure this is two springs ago or one spring ago.
All along the road, along all these fences, you would
see these white ovals on the ground, and you would
see dozens, at times hundreds of them scattered across the sagebrush.
And at first I thought it was patches of snow,
(28:31):
and then my son asked what it was, and then
I took a closer look, and I realized that what
I was seeing scattered all across the sage brush for
miles and miles and miles and miles, were the white
bellies of dead pronghorn Jesus. And what had happened is
some people might recall reading about and again I'm gonna
get my year wrong. It was either the last spring
(28:51):
or the spring before. But there was this mass die
off of pronghorn in that herd that just this year
came out exploring what exactly was to blame, and there
was there have been some disease issues, and then there
was also worries about starvation. And what the study came
back and showed was that the vast majority of the
(29:13):
deaths could be attributed to pronghorn being hung up by fences,
stalled out by not being able to cross the road,
not being able to get to the fences, and then
being stuck there, not able to finish their migrations, and
then ultimately starving. And so between that and the disease
pressures that had you know, catastrophic catastrophe for losses, I
(29:33):
mean the tens of thousands. And that was a very
eye opening recent example of exactly what you're talking about,
and that's happening, like you mentioned, not just with pronghorn,
but mule deer and other critters too. And I was
going to ask you which is worse, the direct roadkill
or the stalling of the migration, and you answered that,
(29:55):
But I'm curious if you could expand on that just
a little bit more when it comes to, you know,
how these migrations are impacted by roads, and in some
of the research around that, there's been such interesting stuff,
especially in Wyoming studying, you know, the the actual points
where these animals want to move through or have to
move through, and how there's kind of unique roadblocks built in.
(30:17):
Can you just elaborate a little bit more on what
migration research and studies now are showing us.
Speaker 3 (30:23):
Yeah, for sure. And you know this chapter of the books,
you know, really drawn from the work of the Wyoming
Migration Initiative. You know, guys like Matt Kaufman and Hal Sawyer,
you know, who are some of the best mule deer
biologists and migration ecologists on Earth. And you know, I
had the chance to go out and uh, you know,
collar collar deer with with with with Matt and his
crew for for a few days. And that was, you know,
(30:44):
really one of the great experiences of my of my life.
It was so much fun and it just you know,
just gave me so much appreciation for mule deer. You know, this,
these these animals that just you know, hang out in
my backyard here in Colorado, you know, and try to
trample my dog and you know we see them all
the time, and you know, but but we but we
see them during these really limited windows in some ways,
right we'd so you know, they show up in our
(31:06):
communities and then we don't see you know, the rest
of the migration. But these are animals that are undertaking
these you know, incredible journeys. They're doing it, you know,
with these amazing spatial memories. Right, they're great cartographers. You know,
they learn their migration routs. They don't you know, they
don't they're not instinctive migrators. And so you know, migration
is kind of this incredible cultural phenomenon that herds learn
(31:27):
together and that you know, dose teach their their fonds. Uh.
And that's a lot of the work that you know,
that that that Wilding Migration Eddiship has done is you know,
figuring out how these animals understand their migrations and how
they time their migrations, and that timing ends up being
a really important piece of the puzzle. Right. So you know,
the term that you know that the w m I
(31:49):
folks and you know other diologists use to describe what
you know, these deer are doing is they're they're surfing
the green wave. Right, there's this this there's this wave
of green up in the spring that kind of lines
up you know, the slopes, and those animals are following
that green up when the you know, when the plants
are the most nutritious and tender uh and uh and
(32:11):
and best for them because you know, of course a
lot of these you know, these migrating deer are pregnant
as well, which is just also mind blowing to think
about that. You know, these animals are undertaking these journeys,
you know O they're carrying uh, you know, carrying their
fons and so that's you know, that's really one of
the I think the underappreciated problems that you know that
roads create is not only do they not only do
(32:33):
it prevent animals from you know, from from crossing, but
they can just disrupt the timing of that green wave surfing, right.
I mean those you know, those prong horn you mentioned.
You know, this happens to deer too, you know where
if they're just delayed along along a busy highway. Uh,
you know, they can kind of fall out of sync
with that green wave surfing, as I understand it.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (32:54):
And you know, and that has these really significant sub
leathal effects.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Right.
Speaker 3 (32:59):
You know, maybe uh, you know, you don't get hit
by a car if you're you know, migrating dough meal deer,
but you know, maybe you don't feed quite as well,
and maybe you're you know, your fawn isn't quite as
quite as healthy and you know can't escape you know,
a bear or a wolf as as a consequence of that. Right,
So that's not you know, direct road mortality necessarily, but
(33:20):
you know it's this kind of subtler, sub lethal effect
that can result in that, you know, in deer really
having having problems. And you know, I mean there's been
you know, lots of lots of great research. You know,
meal deer are really declining dramatically, you know in Wyoming
and then here in here in Colorado, and uh you know,
I mean the biggest factor there, according to some studies,
(33:41):
is residential development. Right. It's all those all those roads, uh,
you know, going into places which are you know, worse
for deer uh than you know, other forms of development,
even like oil and gastril. You know, it's just it's
just the presence of roads and vehicles and subdivisions on
the landscape that you know, cut off those migration routes
or this up to their timing and ultimately lead to
(34:02):
uh to population decline.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
Yeah. Yeah, we're getting to a point where, you know,
the natural world has been so crisscrossed with roads and
development that not only do we have these like moving
fences as you call them, but we're creating islands. We're
creating metaphorical islands of even though they're not surrounded by water,
(34:27):
We're creating wildlife habitat that's surrounded by by an ocean
of development and roadways, and that has a whole other
set of sublethal factors, you know, on top of just
the direct mortality, on top of the delayed migrations, on
top of everything you just mentioned. You know, this isn't
as applicable to mule deer or prong horns, but with
grizzly bears or something like you know, panthers down in Florida, uh,
(34:51):
you start dealing with genetic issues right where some of
these species are so deterred by roads and development that,
like you said, they simply won't cross. So, for example,
with grizzly bears, you've got a subpopulation around the Greater
Yellowy ecosystem and a subpopulation up in the northern continental right,
and you've got you know, seventy miles between the two,
(35:13):
and they just won't cross that last seventy miles because
there's too large of roads, there's too much development there.
It's keeping genetics from passing between the two populations and
getting the diversity that you know, these species need to
maintain long term viability. Is that something that you learned
(35:33):
anything more about through this process too, the genetic implications
or any other implications of that kind of island effect
that we're seeing happening more and more, not just with
big mammals but other critters too.
Speaker 3 (35:45):
Yeah. Absolutely, And I mean you're look, you're exactly right.
You know, you could take you could take a you know,
a snippet of DNA from a grizzly bear and you know,
and say with unerring accuracy, which side of which highway
in the Northern Rockies that bear was born at? Because
you know, those those those highways, you know, I ninety
Highway to you know, all of those, all of those
(36:06):
those highways you know running east west, you know through
Montana are huge, you know, huge, huge barriers. And I
think that's you know, that's one interesting kind of geographic
piece too that I think about a lot, is that
you know, our are our mountain ranges in the west
tend to run north south, and so do our valleys,
which means that you know, animals are often moving north
(36:26):
to south, and so many of our big highways you
know I ninety, I eighty, I seventy are running east
west right, So we have this, you know, this kind
of this inherent conflict where a lot of our transportation
routes are at sort of perpendicular odds with our animal
movement corridors, which is you know, a huge, huge challenge.
And certainly that you know that genetic fragmentation you mentioned,
(36:48):
I mean, that's a gigantic issue. You know. One of
the the the poster populations for that, right are these
very famous mountain lions who live in southern California just
west of Los Angeles. You know, I bet of listeners
have heard of P twenty two, you know, probably the
most famous mountain lion on Earth while he was alive,
and he was part of this little population in the
(37:09):
southern Santa Monica is near Los Angeles, where you know,
as you say, they're basically this there's this island of
habitat in this ocean of freeways. You know, you've got
the one O one, the four oh five, and the five,
you know, the biggest freeways on Earth, you know, running
through that landscape or sorry, let me take it against
I know actually actually don't think the five goes through there.
(37:29):
But you know you've got you've got the one O one,
you've got the four H five, you know, some of
the some of the busiest freeways on Earth, basically fragmenting
that landscape and preventing those mountain lions from dispersing out
to find mates. And so you know, in that little population,
scientists have seen individual mountain lions, male mountain lions who
have mate it with their own daughters, granddaughters and great
(37:53):
granddaughters because they just can't find an unrelated animal to
mate with. And you know the other thing that uh,
you know, biologist see in that population is lots of
fighting between nound lions, right, lots of mortality. And you know,
these these lion conflicts because you know, those those younger
male cats especially of course, they want to disperse out right,
(38:14):
they want to get away from their their fathers and
the other big males, uh, to go find their own territory.
But you know, if if the one O one, which
has three hundred thousand cars a day, is in your way, right,
you can't go find your own territory. And so you're
you know, stuck on this island with all of these uh,
you know, these big dominant males, and you know, you
end up in conflicts. So you know, they see, yeah,
(38:36):
they see that that genetic fragmentation, but also you know,
the squeezing of territories and all of this lethal conflict
between you know, between individual mountain lions because of that
that fragmentation. So that island effect that you're you're describing
marks is exactly right, and it's a huge problem. You've turned,
you know, we've turned all of our terrestrial landscapes into
(38:57):
a series of islands.
Speaker 2 (39:01):
I've done a good bit of reading about that same
thing happening down in southern Florida and the Everglades and
how that's led to serious inbreeding effects that have led
to you know, reduced to rival rates of kittens and
all sorts of wild things happening down there too. So
it's a pathway to slow but certain demise unless something's
(39:22):
done about it. So we've talked about the direct impacts
of road killed, like white tailed deer smashing up cars
and getting killed. We've talked about migrations being impacted. We've
talked about genetic diversity being hampered. A lot of these
things have all been about large mammals, which are the
most obvious of animals to be impacted by roadways and
(39:46):
our roads. But you spend a good amount of time
talking about something much much smaller, but equally important to
a lot of the more charismatic things that we focus on,
like deer and the wild places they inhabit, and that
being dollinators in insects and butterflies and things like that.
Can you can you speak a little bit about that
how roads might be impacting our insects and why that
(40:09):
might be something we should pay attention to as well.
Speaker 3 (40:11):
Yeah, you know, that's it's an interesting it's a it's
kind of a double edged sword in a lot of ways,
because in a sense, you know, roads are habitat for insects, right. Uh.
You know you think about states like uh, you know, Iowa,
Illinois or Kansas. You know these these these aren't states, uh,
you know that unlike states in the West. You know,
they're not blessed with a huge amount of public land, right. Uh.
(40:34):
And so you know, in many Midwestern states, roadsides are
actually the largest form of public land. You know, there
are these these strips of of in many cases, you know,
native prairie plants that follow highways.
Speaker 2 (40:45):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (40:45):
And they're these you know, these these corridors of habitat
in this monoculture of corn and soy and and and lawns. Right. So, uh,
you know, there is this potential resource there. You know there,
I mean, if you're a monarch butterfly, you know, has
to lay your eggs on milk weed. Well there are
you know, hundreds of millions of milk weed stems along roadsides.
Speaker 2 (41:07):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (41:08):
In in in the Midwest. You know that the monarch
butterfly migration uh. You know that runs through the Midwest,
you know, basically follows I thirty five right from from
Minnesota to Texas. So there's you know, there's a great
resource there potentially, but it's also it's a it's a
dangerous resource, right you know, of course the road is
a dangerous place.
Speaker 2 (41:28):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (41:28):
And you know millions of migrating monarch butterflies are killed
by cars every year. We don't really think about insects
being road kill, right, but it is this enormous source
of mortality for migrating monarchs and you know all kinds
of other insects. And then there are all of those
those chemical effects as well, you know, all of the
you know, the road salts being added to highways. What
does that do uh to you know, to the the
(41:51):
nutritional value of the plants that those butterflies are feeding on.
What about you know, the cadmium and the zinc and
the copper, uh you know, coming off our vehicles and
ending up in soils. You know, what does that do
uh to? Uh to to pollinators? So there, you know,
there's there's the direct mortality of cars, and then there's
the you know, the kind of the potentially problematic sub
(42:11):
lethal effects again along roads. So you know that's not
to say that that you know, we shouldn't have native
wildflowers and milkweed along our roads, right. I mean I've
you know, talked to biologists too calculated that you know,
roadsides are producing more monarch butterflies than they're than they're killing,
(42:32):
and that you know, roadsides are ultimately uh you know,
a valuable form of habitat, but again, you know they're
they're not the best habitat.
Speaker 1 (42:39):
Right.
Speaker 3 (42:39):
If you said, you know, here's a million dollars you
can restore, uh, the side of an interstate highway, or
you can restore a cornfield far from the highway. I
restore the cornfield, right, So, uh, yeah, roads are habitat,
but they're you know, they're a dangerous resource for these
creators too.
Speaker 2 (42:58):
Yeah, it's uh, it is really interesting. You've got like
an attract and repel effect in that, like you're attracting
a lot of these species there with you know, it's
I think there's something called is it the Monarch Highway?
Is that a stretch that you're ready, I think right
where they're trying to actively plant more milkweed and trying
to produce habitat. But then there's this debate about whether
(43:21):
or not you're killing more than you're helping but zooming out. Now,
I feel like there's three kind of hot buzzwords these
days related to the solution side, the now what part
of this whole conversation, and these three buzzwords that you
hear a lot these days, and that seem to have
(43:41):
a lot of support even across the political spectrum would
be corridors, connectivity, and migration routes. If there was if
you wanted to like do like a game where you
would take various environmental buzzwords and put them into a
ven diagram where there'd be some people on the left,
(44:03):
some people on the right, and then there's like the
intersection in the middle. I think those three things will
probably meet in the middle of that Ven diagram is
something that both sides can generally support. I think as
evidence by the fact that during the first Trump administration,
one of the good things that happened for the environment
during that period was some progress on wildlife migration, conservation,
(44:27):
and some corridor work and things like that. So why
do you think that is? Why is there bipartisan support
for addressing the issues you're talking about right now?
Speaker 3 (44:37):
Yeah, it's a really good question, and I mean it
is kind of amazing just how bipartisan that support is
and how and how universal that support is. Right and
there you know, there's been public polling around wildlife crossings,
you know, overpasses and underpasses for big game and other critters.
And you know here in Colorado, I think eighty five
(44:58):
percent of residents support more wildlife crossings. You know, you
see the same numbers in Oregon and Nevada and all,
you know, a bunch of Western states. And you know
you couldn't get eighty five percent of Colorad's degree. The
sky is blue, right, it's it's you know, it's it's
just a mind blowing you know how how universal the
desire to reconnect these these habitats is. And you know,
(45:20):
I mean I do think that a lot of that
actually comes from hunters.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (45:23):
You know, you think about Wyoming as a great case study.
You know, Wyoming has some of the some of the
most and the best wildlife crossings, uh in in the country.
You know, when you drove up I ninety or one
ninety one past Pinedale, you know you would have you
would have driven under some a couple of wildlife overpasses
and over I think five underpasses for for mule deer
(45:45):
and prong horn. Uh. You know, there are some great
underpasses on Highway thirty in in Wyoming in a place
called Nugget Canyon, famous field deer migration corder. So there's
lots of great examples of of you know, of of
animal infrastructure in Wyoming and you know, so much of
that is is because it's a state with a really
(46:05):
powerful hunting culture and politically powerful hunters as well. You know,
one of the great groups who I wrote about in
the book is the the muly Fanatics Foundation, you know,
a mule deer advocacy group, and you know, they were
responsible for the creation of a license plate, you know,
a special license plate, the revenues from which go to
(46:26):
to wildlife crossing infrastructure. So yeah, I do think you know,
that's the that's the reason that you see you know,
people like Ryan Zinky right in that first Trump administration,
you know authoring was it thirty three sixty two? Was
this the secretarial order that required states to identify winter
range and migration corridors? So yeah, there's this, you know,
(46:47):
this great bipartisan, really nonpartisan relationship there. You know John Barrasso,
Republican senator from Wyoming, you know, he wrote some of
the language that ended up being this big wildlife crossings
grant program. Who's the first to introduce it in a
in a bill? And now that you know that program exists,
(47:08):
So yeah, you know, we live in this hyper polarized
society obviously, and and you know, I think that wildlife
crossings are one of the few issues that you know,
the hunting lobby and the humane society you know, both
vociferously agree upon.
Speaker 2 (47:24):
Yeah, I'd love to see it. Yeah, just seek some
kind of common ground. It also seems like it's one
of those interesting sweet spots and that it's it's most
of these migration or connectivity type initiatives, legislation or executive
orders whatnot. They tend to advocate for targeted protections or
(47:46):
targeted crossings, which viewed from one side, are like better
than like a very far reaching, wide ranging set of
protections that you know, some people might be worried about
impeding development. And then from like the other side, the
more protectionist side, which wants to see lots and lots
of protection, this is well, at least we cover the
(48:07):
very most important points right where we're able to find
where these key crossing points are and protect those. So
it's a some people would view it as the minimum
amount they can handle, and some would view it as,
you know, better than nothing, But one way or another,
it is better than nothing. So let's let's let's get
(48:27):
a little more into the crossing side of things. As
you alluded to, like, just right there on one ninety one,
there's several different forms of crossings being utilized by mule
deer and pronghorn. But can you can you talk us
through a little bit of you know, what kinds of
solutions have been found for wildlife crossings and it's it's
kind of pretty wild how many different versions of this
(48:48):
there exist, everything from something that's made to get amphibians
across the road to something that says, you know, a
suitable for a grizzly bear, mountain lion too. So could
you kind of expand and explore on what all those
things might look like?
Speaker 3 (49:03):
Yeah, definitely, And I think, you know, I think that
whenever you're talking about wildlife crossings, right, it's important to
start with a kind of a fundamental understanding of the
biology and ecology of the animal that you're trying to
get across the highway, right, so that you know, those
those one ninety one crossings by Pinedale at a place
called Trapper's Point, you know, that's a really a really
good example of that because there, you know, you have
(49:25):
this ancient migration route for both mule deer and pronghorn,
and you know, it's it's just kind of cool from
a hunting standpoint. Briefly, to think about how long that
migration route has existed and how long humans have understood
that migration route right there, you know, amazing archaeological finds
of you know, of pronghorn, uh you know that were
(49:46):
that were killed with stone tools, you know, six thousand
years ago in that in that spot, right.
Speaker 2 (49:52):
So I just love that idea.
Speaker 3 (49:54):
Yeah, yeah, so, you know, I just love the idea
of you know, humans and and and angulates kind of
moving through the landscape together there, you know, from this
deep time perspective. So anyway, so you've got these you know,
these two iconic species both hit in the highway, you know,
in the same in the same place. You know, mule
deer are pretty easy animals to get across highways, right
(50:14):
They'll you know, they'll they'll use lots of different crossing types,
you know, lots of data that they're you know, pretty
happy going through uh, you know, concrete box culverts as
long as they're large enough. But pronghorn really don't do that.
You know, prong horn don't like underpasses, and and you know,
to understand what it is, and it's important to think
again about the biology and the ecology of the prong horn. Right.
(50:37):
The prong horn is this incredibly fast animal. Of course,
it's the you know, the fastest terrestrial animal in North America.
It was you know, chased by American cheetahs during the
place to scene. Right. They also have incredible eyesight, uh,
you know, one of the farthest seeing uh mammals on Earth.
(50:57):
And so that's an animal that doesn't want to be
in a little box culver. Right, That's an animal that
evolved to outrun and to detect and outrun its predators
in open space. That's an animal that wants to be
up on the deck of a bridge of an overpass
that it can you know, scan the horizon for threats
and run away if it has to. So they're at
a trapper's point. You know, you've got two types of crossings, right,
(51:21):
You've got those underpasses that the mule deer readily use,
and you've got the overpasses that the prong horn have
a really strong preference for. You know, you see the
same kind of dichotomy or division in in bears. You know,
black bears are you know, historically kind of forest dwellers
who are more comfortable and confined closed spaces, and they're
(51:44):
you know, they'll use underpasses pretty readily, whereas grizzly bears
are you know, these big powerful planes animals. You know
Lewis and Clark famously saw them in North Dakota. Right.
These are prairie critters. They don't want to be in
a little underpass. They want to be again in an
open space, especially those sows with cubs because you know,
(52:05):
sometimes the the bores, the males will kill those cubs
to put the females back into heat. Right, so the
females are looking out for uh, you know, for for
males to protect their cubs from them. So you know,
so so grizzly bears, you know, have a strong preference
for overpasses, whereas black bears will happily use underpasses. Right.
So you know, whatever crossing you're creating, you know, you
have to begin with that understanding of you know, what
(52:26):
your target species is, what what sorts of of crossings,
what kinds of structures will appeal to those animals, And
also you know where those animals are moving through the landscape, right,
And that's where the satellite collar data being collected by
groups like the Wyoming Migration Initiative can really help because
you know, they tell you that that data tells you, Okay,
(52:48):
here's where the animals are approaching the highway and would
use a wildlife crossing if the opportunity presented itself.
Speaker 2 (53:07):
Now, a lot of the examples discussed when it comes
to wildlife crossings come from the west or the north. Right.
They talk about the parks up in Canada, they talk about,
you know, they're west of West of Glacier National Park.
They talk about, you know, the things there in Wyoming.
There's the more recent example down there with the mountain
(53:30):
lions in southern California. But is any of this happening
on the east side of the country. Are there wildlife
crossings unbeknownst to those of us in the Midwest or
the East coast where critters of some type are getting
across the road in ways that maybe we're just not
noticing because because I'm not seeing big sexy overpasses in
Michigan or New York or North Carolina. But is there
(53:53):
something happening there as well?
Speaker 3 (53:54):
Yeah, it's a really important question. I think that you're
you're right that historically, you know, West Stern states really
the leaders on this stuff, right, And again, I mean
that's just because that's just because of the migratory nature
of the wildlife. Right. If you have a herd of
a thousand mule deer crossing the same highway in Wyoming
year after year, you know, pretty soon there's this big
(54:14):
pile of carcasses saying, hey, put a wildlife crossing right here,
right where Whereas you know, in the Midwest and the Northeast,
you know, those those white tails aren't really migrating in
the same way, and it just kind of feels like
they're everywhere all the time, right. There aren't hot spots
in the same way. And so I think that you know,
historically Eastern states have kind of thrown their hands up
(54:36):
and said, yeah, you know, there's really nothing we can
do about this.
Speaker 2 (54:39):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (54:39):
You know, wildlife crossings are great for those those western guys,
but they don't make sense for you know, for our
our ungulits here. And you know, fortunately that mindset is changing.
You're right that you don't really see you know, big
sexy overpasses yet in those those Eastern states, but you
know you do see underpasses. You know, Florida has built
lots of underpasses for Florida panthers that that you you mentioned.
(55:03):
You know, A great example, uh, that I talk about
in the book comes out of out of Virginia on
I sixty four where basically, you know that that identified
this you know, this frequent uh you know, white tail
deer collision hotspot. But in that in that stretch of
highway and I sixty four, there were a couple of culverts.
Speaker 2 (55:22):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (55:22):
You know, these these kind of concrete sided, you know,
dirt floored underpasses that beneath the highway, and those you know,
those weren't built for wildlife, right, you know, I think
one was built for a seasonal stream to flow under
the highway. One was built for a dairy farmer I believe,
who wanted to you know, run his cows back and
forth under under the interstate. So those weren't wildlife crossings
(55:46):
per se. But you know what some some folks at
the Virginia Department of Transportation realized is that, hey, if
we just built fences on either side of the underpass
of these culverts, we could make deer and other animals
used them. Right, Deer'd be trying to cross the highway
they'd hit that fence line, they'd follow the fence line,
and they'd find that that culvert and they'd go underneath it.
(56:09):
And sure enough, you know, that was exactly what happened.
You know, So they managed to reduce collisions by more
than ninety percent, and they you know saw I mean hundreds,
if not thousands, of deer and black bears and foxes
and the possums and all kinds of critters going back
and forth under that highway. And you know, I think
really importantly for the Transportation Department, that project paid for
(56:30):
itself really quickly. Right because we're talking earlier about how
expensive and dangerous all of these animal crashes are. Well,
if you put some fencing in that reduces crashes by
more than ninety percent, you know, you can recoup your
own costs really quickly, which is you know, we see
frequently with wildlife crossing. So I think that example and
a couple of others have helped other Eastern states say,
(56:52):
you know, wait a second, wildlife crossings are not just
for Wyoming, in Utah and Montana, you know, we can
build them here. And so if you look at you know,
the Byparts of Infrastructure law which had three hundred and
fifty million dollars for wildlife crossings in the form of
competitive grants going to states and native tribes and other entities.
You know, yeah, a lot of that money has gone
(57:12):
to Wyoming in Colorado and Utah, but you know a
lot of it's also gone to Vermont and Maine and Massachusetts,
which you know, got funding to you know, build a
crossing and overpass over the mass Pike, which was pretty cool.
And you know, we're seeing Eastern states and Midwestern states
like South Dakota and Missouri and Pennsylvania, you know, getting
(57:34):
money to begin the planning process for wildlife crossings. Right
here in the West, you know, we've got lots of
shovel ready projects. You know, we have all this data.
We know where the migration corridors are, where the collision
hot spots are. We're you know, ready to build you know,
fifteen million dollar overpasses today, whereas a lot of the
Eastern states are you know, a few years behind. And
(57:55):
they're saying, Okay, now we have a desire to do this.
We want to build wildlife crossings and let's figure out
where to where to put them, because you know there
are it turns out that there are hot spots out there.
It's not just you know, a white tail free for all.
Speaker 2 (58:10):
Yeah, So so zooming out a little bit more. If
crossings get an animal across one road from habitat A
to habitat B, you might be able to zoom a
little bit further out and look at something that a
lot of folks referred to as corridors, which would be
these larger protected zones to some degree that connect habitat
to habitat to habitat, allowing you know, wildlife species to
(58:33):
do something like we talked about earlier, which might be
connect one genetic subpopulation to another, or to be able
to migrate, or to be able to adjust to a
changing climate or adjust to new development pressures. And there
have been discussions around these in different parts of the country,
Like there is a corridor type project in Florida where
(58:54):
they are trying to connect habitat from the southern tip
of the state towards more towards the Panhandle, try to
protect places along that route along with crossings. And then
there's you know, some big, more well known ones out west.
You talked about this a little bit in the book
You You you led towards the beginning with with how
the Yellowstone to Yukon Corridor kind of opened your eyes
(59:16):
to this whole idea of crossings. Can you can you
elaborate a little bit on this idea of corridors, the
importance of it today and and maybe speak a little
bit about why do I since that one is so
well known and compelling.
Speaker 3 (59:30):
Yeah, for sure, and you know that, I mean that
was really the project that got me excited about this topic,
you know, twelve twelve years ago now, So yeah, I
think it's I think it's important to remember, of course,
that roads don't occur in isolation, right, as you say,
as you allude to, they're part of this much larger landscape.
And you know, you have to think about habitat protection
(59:51):
and wildlife crossings going hand in hand, right And then
you know, I know, I know you're a big public
lands guide mark which I really appreciate. You have to
have public lands or some other form of protected habitat
on either side of the road, right if you know,
if you and look, we see that you know here
in the west all the time where you know, if
you have a wildlife crossing and you can you can
(01:00:12):
build a great overpass over a highway. But you know,
if the if the open space on either side of
that overpass gets turned into condos tomorrow, you know you've
got to You've got a bridge to nowhere, right, And
so you know, conservation easements and other forms of land
protection have to go hand in hand with the construction
of those those wildlife passages, and so that's we start
(01:00:34):
talking about, right, those larger corridors, uh, you know, those
those larger connected and protected spaces. And you know that
doesn't necessarily mean uh, you know, public land. It could
mean you know, a big ranch with the conservation easeman
on it, right that you know that that prevents that
open space, uh, you know from turning into uh you know,
into into subdivisions.
Speaker 2 (01:00:55):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (01:00:55):
You know, in many places it means fencer.
Speaker 1 (01:00:57):
Right.
Speaker 3 (01:00:57):
You talked about those you know, those prong horner earlier,
which are a great example of a species that has
a really hard time crossing fences. You know, they don't
jump as well as elk and deer do, and so
they you know, they really get hung up by those
those those fences. And so you know, if you have
a wildlife overpass, but you know, a whole crapload of
barbed wire on either side. You know, that's that's gonna
(01:01:19):
be a bit a big problem for for proborn you know.
The I mean another another big piece of all of this,
especially when you're talking about you know about large carnivores,
is conflict mitigation, right, Uh, you know, figuring out uh
you know, how to protect livestock and you know, other
forms of agriculture from you know, from wolves and bears
(01:01:39):
and cougars and coyotes. Right, I mean again, same same principle.
You know, a grizzly bear can cross an overpass over
the highway, but you know if if on the other
side he you know, ends up killing a few sheep
and getting shot for it. Uh, you know, you haven't
really achieved connectivity. Right. So you know, these broader corridors
like the Yellowstone to uk On Conservation initiative, you know
(01:02:02):
they should they take this really holistic perspective on all
of the different barriers to to movement that are out
there on the landscape. So you know, wildlife crossings are
part of the story, but you know, certainly not the
entire story. And you know why do why is a
great example of that, because they do take that bigger,
you know, synergistic vision. I mean really their goal, uh,
(01:02:24):
you know, is to create ideally a connected wildlife corridor
that runs from the Yukon all the way to Yellowstone
National Park, so that you know, really far ranging animals
like brislies and wolverines and wolves and cariboo you know,
can can move through this connected landscape. And again, you
know that doesn't certainly those big protected areas, those big
(01:02:46):
blocks of public land like Glacier National Park, like Banff
and Jasper in Canada. You know, that's that's part of
the story. But you know that corridor also goes through yeah,
ranches and farms and you know, and and industrial timber
lands and all sorts of you know of quote unquote
working lands, and you know, conflict mitigation in those spaces
(01:03:08):
is part of it too. So again, just thinking about
all of those different barriers on the landscape and how
we can address them synergistically, I think is really where
this corridor movement is gone.
Speaker 2 (01:03:21):
So I'm curious, Ben, as you have well, let me
take let me take some different approach. As I have
learned more and more about the various topics that are
related to conservation and public lands, and the future of wildlife.
As I've worked on various projects on my own, I
(01:03:42):
find myself having two parallel energy kind of sources, or
maybe you can think about like a devil on one
side and an angel on the other shoulder. And the
more I learn, I will have this devil on one
shoulder that's saying, look at how screwed everything is, look
at all the bad stuff that's happening, and look at
all these depressing statistics and all of this bad news
(01:04:06):
and dire straits for this critter or this place. And
then on the other hand, on the other shoulder, the
more I learned, the more I also find out about
or hear from, you know, encouraging examples of good people
doing great work helping out in specific locations, or discovering
(01:04:26):
new ideas, or you know, banding together and achieving important
progress and protecting wildlife or installing some kind of new
conservation practice or whatever it might be. So I'm constantly
kind of oscillating between those two things. The deeper and
deeper I get into all this. So my question for
you is, as you worked on this project Crossings, as
(01:04:47):
you dove into the world of rhode ecology and wildlife
corridors and crossings. Where do you stand today on those
parallel tracks of good energy and bad energy? The devil
in the aim, angel on the shoulder? Are you are
you hopeful? Are you disheartened? What's your view for the future?
Speaker 3 (01:05:08):
Dude? Did you just described exactly my internal conflict? The
the oscillation, the oscillation between hope and despair is it's
so it's so real. And I think that, you know,
like any thinking, feeling, ecologically minded person can probably relate
to that. I mean, on one hand, out you know,
I do feel a lot of hope. As we were
saying earlier, you know this this is truly a bipartisan issue,
(01:05:30):
the need for you know, wildlife crossings and poor doors.
And there are I mean so many fantastic projects uh
springing up all over the place. You know, I mentioned
those mountain lions in California earlier as kind of the
poster population for the genetic fragmentation that res can create. Well,
guess what, there's uh you know, the largest wildlife overpass
uh in in the US is being built right now
(01:05:52):
that will cross the one oh one and you know,
let those those cats move back and forth and not
just not just mountain lions, but also mule deer and
and bobcats and coyotes and all kinds of creators. So
you know, there are projects like that provide me uh
lots of lots of hope and are you know, are
really sustaining. But you know, then of course we we
know as you know, as you know all too well,
and are writing writing a book about you know, we're
(01:06:14):
in the middle of this uh six mass extinction event
and our our planet's history, and not just extinction, but
also you know, common animals or once common animals like
mule deer becoming uh you know, increasingly scarce. You know,
prong horn another another great, great example of you know this,
animals just you know, sort of like terminally afflicted by
fragmentation all all across the the American West, right, and
(01:06:36):
and you know, it's it's hard to feel like the
you know this, the solutions such as they are, are
keeping up with the pace of those declines, right, they're
not really And you know, and now, uh, you know,
unfortunately we're entering this you know, this political period that
I think is going to be really hostile to conservation.
And I mean I don't think that we can you know,
we we know that from you know, what this administration
(01:06:57):
is all already doing. And you know, I'm sure you've
got listeners you know, on all sides of the political spectrum.
But you know, but I you know, I look at
you know, this administration's desire to sell off public land
and and you know, and and develop you know, housing
on a lot of it, and and uh, you know,
roll back so many of the protections under the Endangered
(01:07:18):
Species Act. And it's you know, it's it's whatever, whatever
you think about you know about about the Trump administration,
it's hard to imagine a world in which it's going
to be positive for wildlife.
Speaker 2 (01:07:28):
Right.
Speaker 3 (01:07:28):
So, yes, there are these these points of of of
political consensus and bipartisanship in the world of of of
wildlife crossings and habitat corridors, but you know, ultimately it's
it's hard to look at the next few years and
feel really optimistic about where we're going from a conservation standpoint.
Speaker 2 (01:07:49):
So all that said, what do we do what what
What kinds of things did you find coming out of
this project that you felt that you could take as
an individual to make any kind of positive progress? What
can we as listeners do if if any of this
intrigued usin we thought to ourselves, Man, I would love
to somehow support this kind of work getting done, more
(01:08:11):
crossings being created, more corridors being protected with the ease
mints or or whatever other tool. What's your take on
what individuals can do to to be a part of
these solutions.
Speaker 3 (01:08:24):
Yeah, you know, I think I think this is one
of those great issues where doing the classic good citizen
of a democracy thing, you know, writing to your elected officials,
your representatives, you know, supporting groups that support this stuff,
you know groups, I mean, and that's one of the
great things about and one of the reasons I was,
(01:08:45):
you know, really excited to uh, you know, to talk
to a kind of a you know, a hunting audience.
Is that. I mean again, hunters have just been a
fantastic community for this, for this issue, right and you
know I mentioned I mentioned Wyoming, but also groups like
you know, back country hunters and anglers. You know, it's
creating this issue, you know, the National Wildlife Federation, uh
and so on. You know, there are so many organizations
(01:09:06):
now you know that that work on this stuff. And
and you know, again because this is relatively it's relatively nonpartisan.
And it's also it's a thing that politicians and transportation
agencies like doing. Right. There's like, you know, you build
a wildlife crossing and there's a ribbon cut. You know,
it's a fun media friendly that you know, transportation agencies
(01:09:26):
can you know, get fantastic you know, trailcan footage of
animals using their new wildlife crossings and you know, have
a go viral on social media, right and to about
you know, I feel kind of cynical about about you know,
those transportation agencies at times. Right, that's it's like, okay,
you're you know, you love talking about the wildlife crossings
you've built, but not about all of the ones you
(01:09:46):
should have built. But you know, but but it is
it is true that you know that this is this
is one of those you know, multi win issues that uh,
you know that agencies and politicians want to be part of.
And so you know, writing and calling your your legislators,
you know, really does make a difference. And again, supporting
those groups that are working on this issue at a
(01:10:08):
state or federal policy level is also a big win too,
because you know, we do see lots of states, uh,
you know, states like uh, you know, Utah and Oregon
and New Mexico, you know, states on every side of
the political spectrum, right, passing bills that allocate new funding
towards the construction of wildlife crossing and crossings and the
conservation of corridors, so you know, and those those states
(01:10:32):
were all influenced, you know by groups like the newly
Fanatics Foundation, right, you know, hunting groups and other other stakeholders.
So yeah, do you know, just do the do the
good citizen of a democracy thing?
Speaker 2 (01:10:44):
Yeah? Yeah, it's one of those things that never gets old.
I mean, it's it's it's going to be one of
those deals. You hear about it, but you just have
to keep on working on You just have to keep
pushing that, uh sisspician, boulder up the mountain and keep
on keep on making the phone and send the emails
and uh and slowly but surely that stuff builds up
(01:11:05):
into into something that decision makers can't ignore.
Speaker 3 (01:11:09):
Yeah, so that's the that's the hope for sure.
Speaker 2 (01:11:13):
What Uh, I guess two things here to wrap things up.
Number one, can you preview for us anything coming in
the future, any fun new projects, anything we can look
forward to? And then uh, well I'll guess answer me
that is there anything you can tell us about the
future yet or is that still hush hush?
Speaker 3 (01:11:31):
Yeah, no, for sure. I'm writing a book right now
about about phish movement, kind of the aquatic counterpart to
to crossings. In some ways, fish movement as this kind
of keystone ecological and cultural force that you know, like
with ungulate migration, we've screwed up in a million ways
and are now called upon to protect and restore and understand. So,
(01:11:54):
you know, projects like the famous Climateth dam removal, Uh,
you know, where four damns are just taken out to
you know, emit salmon salmon migration into four hundred miles
of newly open river habitat. Projects like that are gonna
going to feature prominently in this book. But it's also
mostly an excuse to go fishing and and see fish
(01:12:14):
and lots of cool places. So it's it's my it's
my finly veiled angling.
Speaker 2 (01:12:18):
Project, smart man. As I as I mentioned before we
started recording, the last portion of my book that I'm
wrapping up now is about salmon and uh. And so
I've spent a lot of time over over recent months
reading about uh, you know, Columbia River Basin and Snake
River Salmon and all that. And then last year I
(01:12:39):
got to go up to Alaska and spend time in
the Tongus where there's also to talk about culvert issues there,
and then of course getting to go to a place
that doesn't have these connectivity issues yet like Bristol Bay.
So yeah, you're gonna have a lot of fun with
that project. I can't wait to uh, I can't wait
to read that one. Yeah, but we've got to wait
a while for that one. But there are two books.
(01:13:01):
People can rate it right now? Where would you like
to send folks to pick up a copy of any
of your previous books?
Speaker 3 (01:13:07):
You know, I always love when people support their local
independent bookseller, So you know, see if they if they
have crossings, your eager instack there and if not, order
them through through your your local indie. But you know,
if not there, they're available and every online retailer where
books are sold. So yeah, thank you, thank you in
advance to all you out there for supporting I really
(01:13:27):
appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (01:13:29):
Yeah, and do you do you like people to connect
with you on social media or a website or anything
else like that?
Speaker 3 (01:13:35):
Yeah? Sure, but my website is just ben gooldfarb dot
com and I'm you know, active on on Instagram and
Twitter and increasingly Blue Sky and all the all the
other places where writers are now obligated to have social
media presences.
Speaker 2 (01:13:50):
Awesome, all right, Ben, Well, I will be impatiently waiting
for the third book. Can't wait for that. And in
the meantime, I will just send you my thanks one
more time for doing some really important work.
Speaker 3 (01:14:02):
Thank you, Thank you Mark, thanks for having me, and
congrats on your own next book. I'm really stop to
read it.
Speaker 2 (01:14:07):
Thanks. If I can survive this next month, we'll hopefully
have something to show for us.
Speaker 3 (01:14:10):
Good good luck.
Speaker 2 (01:14:12):
Thank you. All right, and that's going to wrap it
up for us today. Thank you for joining me. I
appreciate you being here for this conversation, and until next time,
stay wired to Hunt.
Host
Mark Kenyon
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