Bogs are our absolute favourite places to be. They’re not only tremendously important ecosystems, rich in exquisite biodiversity and massive stores of carbon, they’re also uniquely beautiful. These serene, colourful spaces jumble land and water into something at once both alien and familiar.

In this episode, we explore the wonders and the mysteries of peatlands, through the story of one very special (and threatened) bog just outside of the city of Vancouver. We meet the scientists who fought for its protection, and some of the folks who are studying it and working on restoring it to this day.

Plus, we answer a tricky question: should we still be extracting peat to help grow plants?

— — —

Visit futureecologies.net/listen/fe-6-8-for-peats-sake for photos from some of our boggy adventures, full credits, citations, and a transcript of this episode

🪼💖 This episode is sponsored by our amazing community of supporting listeners. If you appreciate it, you can become one yourself! Get the scoop at futureecologies.net/support

Mendel has another show to share with you: Waterbodies

It's a video podcast dedicated to a particular body of water we have here in Vancouver, called False Creek, but more generally it’s about how we can transform our urban spaces into thriving, biodiverse, celebrations of living nature — for everyone’s benefit.

If you live in a city on a coast, and you dream of swimming in clean waters, tidepooling along the shore, and seeing all kinds of sea life, right next to downtown, this show is for you.

So far on Waterbodies, we’ve discussed the interplay of environmental and human health, frameworks for Indigenous protected and conserved areas, environmental rights and personhood, marine biodiversity and citizen science, and urban planning in the face of rising sea levels, and there’s lots more to come.

Find Waterbodies on the False Creek Friends YouTube channel and wherever you get podcasts

PS. This is more than a podcast. It's a project in civic reimagination. If you'd like to get involved with grassroots environmental democracy, and take part in shaping the future of Vancouver, we'd love to have your help. Visit falsecreekfriends.org to learn more and get involved.

We had the opportunity to hang out with two of our favourite podcasters: Amy Martin of Threshold, and Amy Westervelt of Drilled.

We've previously featured both of their work on the Future Ecologies feed, and we couldn't pass up the chance to talk shop about the latest (fantastic) seasons of their respective shows, and get to know more about their personal journey. That's this episode: Part 1

In the supporter-exclusive Part 2, we get into more of a roundtable on the practice of environmental journalism and podcasting in these especially scary and chaotic times. For the two of us, unschooled and unqualified in anything resembling journalism, it was a blast to have the privilege of what ended up being a private consulting session with two of our heroes. Interested? You can find it on our Patreon

What do you call it when a population of podcasts mysteriously drop episodes on the same topic at the same time? It's Critical Mast!

We're so proud to present this nutty experiment in community podcasting, with its roots going back to the very beginning of our show (and the beginning of our dedication to silly puns).

Thanks to help from our pals at Jumpstart Nature, Golden State Naturalist, Learning from Nature: The Biomimicry Podcast, Nature’s Archive, and Outside/In, it's time for a bumper crop of podcasts about (or inspired by) the perplexing phenomenon known as masting: where plants somehow synchronize their seed production across staggering distances.

Give all these pods all a follow, & check out this Spotify playlist (to which episodes will be added as they drop).

— — —

🌱 💖 Thanks to all our supporters for making this show possible (and keeping it ad-free and independent)

Join our community for as little as $1/month for access to early episode releases, a bonus podcast feed, merch, our discord server, book club, and more!

We've got another edition of our intermittent interview show for you, this one featuring Sadie Couture in conversation with Hannah Tollefson.

You'll remember Sadie as co-producer and reporter of FE3.4 — Dama Drama. Since then, she’s become a PhD student in Communication Studies at McGill University pursuing research at the intersection of media history, sound studies, and feminist science and technology studies.

Hannah's work is situated at the intersection of environmental, media, and infrastructure studies. She researches the role of socio-technical systems in land, water, and labour struggles, infrastructures of energy transition, and the politics of green capitalism.

This episode focusses on Hannah’s writing on the Port of Vancouver, the concept of "tidewater", the nature of logistics, and the supply chain in which we’re all entangled. Don't miss it.

(Hannah's dissertation, the main subject of this discussion, is under University embargo until Dec 14, 2025. Check back here after then for a link. Until then, one chapter is available below).

Hannah kindly compiled the following citations:

References

• KD Derickson, The Annihilation of Time by Space: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335733261_The_annihilation_of_time_by_space
• Deborah Cowen, The Deadly Life of Logistics: https://www.upress.umn.edu/9780816680887/the-deadly-life-of-logistics/
• Reconstructing Pre-contact Shoreline (UBC article): https://open.library.ubc.ca/soa/cIRcle/collections/facultyresearchandpublications/52383/items/1.0407075
• Hannah Tollefson, on the ECHO program in The Journal of Environmental Media  https://www.researchgate.net/publication/383972463_On_synchronicity_Green_shipping's_logistical_and_real-time_media

Related news & links

• Future Ecologies episode “Terminal”: https://www.futureecologies.net/listen/fe-4-2-terminal
• On plans to dredge Burrard Inlet: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/dredge-burrard-inlet-vancouver-fraser-port-authority-tsleil-waututh-nation-1.7545465
• On tanker traffic impacts of TMX: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/tanker-traffic-trans-mountain-pipeline-expansion-1.7305702
• Report on effectiveness of habitat compensation in the Fraser : https://www.cmnbc.ca/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Assessing-Habitat-Compensation_2016Appendix-I-IV.pdf

— — —

✨ Get Hyphaedelity episodes (and all other Future Ecologies output) early on our Bonus Feed

We’ve got a great guest episode for you today, coming courtesy of our friends over at the podcast Cited.

They’ve got a new series out called “Green Dreams” — covering stories of radical environmentalist thought leaders, and the ripples they’ve left on the present day. We wanted to share with you the very first episode from this series, called “The Green Cosmos”, covering Gerard O’Neil’s 1970s vision for humanity’s passage to the stars.

Find the rest of Green Dreams and much more from Cited wherever you're listening.

We’ve got something a little different for you: something a little less in the sciences, and a little more in the humanities — in the realm of language and human experience.

Today, through a series of conversations, we’re exploring the notion of what it means to have a relationship to land, to be or not be of a place (in other words, to belong or not) and how the intrinsic tensions in all that may be metabolized through the practice of art, and more importantly, that of life.

Our co-producer and interlocutor for this episode is Darby Minott Bradford: poet, editor, translator, and the author of Bottom Rail on Top.

Our guests are author Jordan Abel (Nishga, Empty Spaces), multi-disciplinary artist S F Ho (Green Lines), and poet Cecily Nicholson (Wayside Sang, Harrowings)

Music by Thumbug

It's a double feature!

With help from recordist/anthropologist/podcaster Louise Romain and musician/conservationist Javan Hunt, we're visiting the Caribbean. First, off the coast of Colombia, on the islands of San Andrés, Providencia and Santa Catalina, and next a musical excursion to Grand Bahama.

— — —

From Reef to Ridge is an audio documentary love story with the Ocean, the reef, and its guardians; an invitation to travel to Caribbean shores to immerse yourself in the lived experiences of coastal communities, and in the sounds of the local ecosystems: the coral reefs and the mangroves.

You will hear stories from Raizal fishermen, turning their ignorance for corals into love, respect and admiration, and learn about the work of the female marine biologists of the Blue Indigo Foundation to restore and heal corals.

Together, they share about their dreams for the future of the reef, the challenges they face with global warming, climate change and extreme weather events, and the hopes of marine and coastal ecosystem regeneration after the recent hurricanes.

Featuring the voices of Laura Valderrama Ballesteros, Yanelys Cantillo Villa, Pedro Livingston, Ruben Azcarate, Camilo Leche, Casimiro Newball Hyman, Josselyn Bryan Arboleda, plus original music by Marc Blandel.

Find more from Louise at Circle of Voices, wherever you get podcasts, or at tuneintotheworld.com

— — —

As Waterkeepers Bahamas' Mangrove Nursery Coordinator, as a public educator, and as a musician, Javan Hunt has introduced folks of all ages to the joy of taking an active role in ecological flourishing.

Javan's dedication to environmental stewardship is rooted in his love for The Bahamas — a place of stunning beauty. Its ecosystems, particularly its mangroves, are the lifeblood of coastal resilience. But after Hurricane Dorian, vast swaths of these critical habitats were destroyed, leaving communities vulnerable. both ecologically and culturally. The crisis wasn't just environmental — it was spiritual, a loss of identity tied to the land and sea. He has used his artistry and environmental work to create a movement that restores more than just mangroves — it restores connection, culture, and a sense of home.

Find more from Javan on all music platforms, or at javanhunt.com

Hello! As you know well, we're not the news. The news is generally bad, and we prefer to not be bad news. So, it's a funny thing for us to release an episode about politics.

In this edition of Hyphaedelity, our interlocutor Adam Davis (EIP, FE5.6) and his guest Tim Male (EPIC) discuss going from working at an environmental NGO to within the White House, the role of executive orders, the state of environmental regulation, effecting change, the voting age, and much more (from a vantage point of January 30, 2025).

— — —

Want to get Hyphaedelity (and all other episodes of Future Ecologies) early, plus bonus content, merch, community discord access* and more? Join our Patreon, and support ad-free, independent podcasting.

*Where you'll find lots of impassioned conversation about this episode.

The Miyawaki Method of micro-forestry is a viral sensation: sprouting tiny, dense, native tree cover in neighbourhoods all around the world. With the promise of afforestation at a revolutionary speed, this planting technique has become the darling of green-space enthusiasts, industry, and governments alike — yet few professional or academic ecologists have commented on its efficacy, or even seem to have heard of it!

In this episode, we debate the legacy of Dr. Akira Miyawaki: the man, the myth, and the method.

— — —

Visit futureecologies.net for photos, a transcript, and citations for this episode

If you appreciate the existence of independent, ad-free podcasting, you can support us — at patreon.com/futureecologies