All Land is Beautiful

E3: Birds and Beef with Pelayo Alvarez, Director of California Audubon’s Conservation Ranching Program

According to Audubon California, our state has 61 million acres of rangelands that provide food production, carbon sequestration, water infiltration, and habitat for a wide range of species. However, this historic California land use is under threat with an average of 20,000 acres a year being lost to development or crop conversion. This means that in order to protect the birds and ecosystem services of our rangelands, the Audubon Society, and really anyone working in conservation has to work with the ranchers and farmers that own or lease and work those lands. And while there may be some different belief systems or opinions, the land, which is why I started this podcast, is the common denominator. And it's there that we find we have a lot more in common than we thought.
 
I’m excited to have had the opportunity to talk with Pelayo Alvarez, Director of California Audubon’s Conservation Ranching Program and long-time working lands advocate in the Central Valley region. We continue this conversation around conservation on an altered landscape, but for this episode through the lenses of carbon and bird habitat. We talk about the logistics, management plans, and support systems that go into making this more conscientious management of land a reality, and Audubon’s market-based approach through its bird-friendly land certification program.
Hope you enjoy and please check out these links for more information about the Audubon Conservation Ranching program, as well as where you can find your first piece of bird-friendly beef.
California Audubon: https://ca.audubon.org/conservation/conservation-ranching
Where to buy: https://www.audubon.org/conservation/where-to-buy-conservation-ranching-products?site=ca&nid=30191&origin=conservation/conservation-ranching&_gl=1*xo0xob*_ga*OTE1MTk3MzQxLjE2OTY5OTk1MTI.*_ga_X2XNL2MWTT*MTcwMTk5NjUzNi41LjEuMTcwMTk5NjY1Ny41My4wLjA.
 

E2: The Tricolored Blackbird, a Complicated Conservation Story with Robert Meese PhD.

Today we do a deep dive into one of my favorite bird species, the tricolored blackbird. On this episode, I’m joined by Dr. Robert Meese, a UC Davis biologist who has spent the last almost 20 years studying this threatened bird species, which I feel symbolizes this notion that there’s no one-size-fits-all solution to land conservation and wildlife protection, especially in California’s Central Valley. You’ll learn about the historic plight of the tricolored, the cessation of its decline, and future success, which embodies a complex of environmental and social issues that neither I nor Bob are qualified to completely analyze, but we touch on several. We discuss the Tricolored Blackbird Statewide survey, a collective effort most recently led by Bob, which utilizes over 100 volunteers to detect and monitor tricolored numbers across California's Central Valley, Coast Ranges, and Central Coast; the adaptability of this bird species, and how it’s come to rely extensively on an altered landscape, characterized by working lands, agriculture, grazing, and dairies; and touch on Bob’s work with state and federal agencies, nonprofits, and numerous private property owners educating, guiding, and studying the bird, from which he has gained a number of insights documenting patterns of movement across the state.
Here's the link to Bob's reference to footage capturing tricolored blackbirds & cattle foraging together: https://vimeo.com/230616322
 

Introduction to All Land is Beautiful

All Land is Beautiful is a series of conversations around the obvious, and not so obvious, natural beauty of California and beyond. The motivation and nexus to start this podcast comes from an ever-evolving personal perspective shift on what both contemporary habitat conservation means and looks like. You see, I, like I believe most people come to experience and perceive what’s good and bad for nature (at least the ones that I have interacted with) are of the mindset that the best we can do for nature is to simply remove ourselves from it and the natural of order of things will sort themselves out. You see a dense forest, you should leave it alone; you see a natural grassy field, well there certainly shouldn’t be any cows or sheep in it and in that case why don’t we remove all of that old barbed-wire fencing; driving through huge swaths of agricultural land, jeez can you imagine what this all looked like before we turned it into row crops? And while those are all completely legitimate ideas and trains of thought, over the last several years of working throughout the Sacramento Valley and Sierra Nevada Foothills, I’ve come to find this whole thing is far more nuanced.

E1: Rethinking Protection of Plants, Animals, and ”Wild” Places in California with Jaymee Marty, PhD.

On this episode of All Land is Beautiful I’m joined by Dr. Jaymee Marty, a biologist based out of the Sacramento Valley, and one of the many insightful and hardworking individuals working to conserve and manage the land, its plants and wildlife throughout the northern California region.
Jaymee is probably best known for publishing a study that scientifically confirmed that cattle grazing in vernal pools, which are seasonal wetlands that host a number of threatened and endangered plant and wildlife species, is not only beneficial but critical to the protection of biodiversity in these ecosystems. A concept that had long been understood within the ecological community, but had never actually been quantified. She continues her work with vernal pools conducting surveys for fairy shrimp and California tiger salamander on behalf of the United States Airforce, as well as a number of non-profit land trusts throughout the Central Valley region, and has picked up a number of other unique and interesting studies and work on other habitats and wildlife as well.
We talk about a lot here. Jaymee’s roots and path to a career in biology and conservation, cattle grazing and its benefits throughout the northern California landscape, and some unique instances in which native wildlife persists in unlikely environments. Hope you enjoy.