It’s time to open our mailbag and answer your questions about fall – and not just the season. We’ve interpreted the theme to include everything from dreams about falling to fallout shelters and, um, tornadoes. 

Plus, we reveal the long-anticipated winner of our poll on best alternatives for replacing the term “leaf-peeping.”

Question 1: Why do so many have recurring dreams about falling?

Question 2: How do tornadoes figure in myths around the world? 

Question 3: How deep does a fallout shelter need to be? 

Question 4: Are berries ripening earlier because of climate change?

Do you have a question about the natural world? Submit it to the Outside/Inbox! Send a voice memo to [email protected] or call our hotline: 1-844-GO-OTTER (844-466-8837). Don’t forget to leave a number so we can call you back.

Featuring: Abhinav Singh, Nani Pybus, David Monteyne, Shaheen Dewji, Richard Primack, Nicole Herman-Mercer, Katie Spellman.

SUPPORT

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LINKS

On dreams

• German chemist August Kekulé claimed to have pictured the ring structure of benzene, after dreaming of a snake eating its own tail
• A study on the threat simulation theory of dreaming

On Fallout Shelters

• Fallout Shelter: Designing for Civil Defense in the Cold War by David Monteyne
• A calculator to estimate your personal annual radiation dose
• Fallout Five Zero, a photographic chronicle of the Boston area’s now defunct shelters

On Berries

• Walden Warming: Climate Change Comes to Thoreau’s Woods by Richard Primack
• A study on Indigenous knowledge on climate-related changes to berry production in Alaska

CREDITS

Host: Nate Hegyi

Reported, produced and mixed by Felix Poon, Justine Paradis, Taylor Quimby, and Jessica Hunt

Edited by Taylor Quimby and Justine Paradis.

Executive producer: Rebecca Lavoie 

Music for this episode by Jharee, Thea Tyler, and Blue Dot Sessions.

Our theme music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Outside/In is a production of New Hampshire Public Radio.

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