Wild Idea Buffalo Company is a bison ranching business that exists to conserve and restore the prairie ecosystem of the northern Great Plains. With no roundup, and an innovative field harvesting method, they care for the well-being of the bison, and as much as possible allow them to express their co-evolved behaviours. You can follow their blog and order their bison meat at Michael DiGiorgio recorded the banjo-bird jams I'm using in the intro and ending. You can find his amazing nature art at . Mike says that if you'd like to buy the album of his nature-banjo jams, you can find his email on his website and he can mail you a CD. You can support the production of Muse Ecology at .

In this episode, we continue our investigation of the Great Plains Bison with a visit to 777 Bison Ranch near Rapid City, South Dakota.  Owner Mimi Hilenbrandt and fellow operations manager Moritz Espy gave us a tour of the pastures and corrals.  Along the way, we discussed differences and similarities between bison and cattle, the possibility of a buffalo commons, their business model and how it affects the bison, and how their decades of Holistic Management and bison grazing have led to regeneration of the prairie landscape.  We also discussed a few of the complex questions the bison forces us to wrestle with. You can find them at In the episode I refer to a book about restoration bison ranching.  It's called A Wild Idea, by Dan O'brien of Wild Idea Buffalo Company, whom you'll hear from next episode. Michael DiGiorgio recorded the banjo-bird jams I'm using in the intro and ending. You can find his amazing nature art at . Mike says that if you'd like to buy the album of his nature-banjo jams, you can find his email on his website and he can mail you a CD.

In our visit with Mark Tilsen in the Black Hills for Episode 5 about Tanka Bar, our interview happened to take place right before a prayer walk to a proposed gold mining site up the creek from Mark's place.  As I began to include this synchronous content in the Tanka Bar episode, I realized that it lit up a section of the rabbit hole that needed it's own episode for a proper introduction, so I created this bonus episode to explore some of the complexities that emerged while looking at gold mining in the Black Hills.  It includes another historical introduction, audio from the prayer walk, and recordings from phone conversations with Mark Tilsen and Cheryl Rowe of Dakota Rural Action. Here's a photo of the Homestake Mine site, photo credit to Rachel Harris: Links: Tanka Bar: Dakota Rural Action:  Mineral Mountain Resources:  U.N. Special Report on Indigenous Peoples in the U.S.: You can find the album, Under a Buffalo Sun, containing John Trudell's Buffalo Wild poem, and another album of Mignon and Good Shield's entitled Soul-A-Mente. You can find the New Food Economy article Mark mentions in the update interview . Michael DiGiorgio recorded the banjo-bird jams I'm using in the intro and ending. You can find his amazing nature art at . Mike says that if you'd like to buy the album of his nature-banjo jams, you can find his email on his website and he can mail you a CD.

In this episode, the second of four in this series on the bison in the Great Plains, we visit the lands of the Oglala Lakota in the Black Hills of Western South Dakota, where we met with Mark Tilsen, cofounder of Tanka Bar.   Tanka Bar, a company owned and operated by the Oglala Lakota of the Pine Ridge Reservation, created the first commercial bison meat and fruit bar based on one of their sacred foods, called wasna.  The mission of Tanka Bar is to restore the Pine Ridge landscape and economy by bringing back the buffalo.  Before the interview with Mark, I also share a bit more history of the time of the buffalo slaughter.  I feel it's useful to have some understanding of the creation of the wounds that Tanka Bar is working to help heal. There's also a bonus episode that wove with the buffalo investigation in the Black Hills, that will be released days after this one. We'll look at historic and and current natural resource struggles in lands granted to the Oglala Lakota in 1868.  It's much the same story as the extermination of the buffalo that we dive deeper into in this episode, but has enough non-buffalo complexities that I decided to give it it's own space in a bonus episode.  It includes an interview with Cheryl Rowe of Dakota Rural Action. You can find out more about Tanka Bar and the Tanka Fund at the following links: You can find the album, Under a Buffalo Sun, containing John Trudell's Buffalo Wild poem, and another album of Mignon and Good Shield's entitled Soul-A-Mente. You can find the New Food Economy article Mark mentions in the update interview . Michael DiGiorgio recorded the banjo-bird jams I'm using in the intro and ending. You can find his amazing nature art at . Mike says that if you'd like to buy the album of his nature-banjo jams, you can find his email on his website and he can mail you a CD.

This episode of Muse Ecology is the first in this four part series beginning to explore humankind's relation to the bison in the Great Plains of North America. This buffalo series features diverse voices of folks involved in the bison's return that Alison and I met on our buffalo investigation journey in February 2018. While the next three episodes feature entrepreneurs and ranchers who are working to restore bison to the landscape, this first episode features voices of wildlife advocates who see the buffalo as a wild elder whose right to roam long precedes our recent human constructs.   The first visit on our buffalo journey was with the Buffalo Field Campaign, a volunteer-run organization that exists to defend the dignity and freedom of the last continuously wild herd of buffalo in North America, in Yellowstone National Park. Founded over 20 years ago by Lakota Grandmother Rosalie Littlethunder and videographer Mike Mease, through documentation and advocacy, the BFC seeks to promote awareness of the story and management of the Yellowstone bison, and to influence policy to allow them to roam free like the other wild ones.   At just over two and a half hours this episode ended up a bit long, but felt like one story to be released together, so I divided it up into chapters like an audio book or radio play, and created a table of contents with minute and second, to make it easy to restart if you have to take a break.   00:00:52         Introduction to the Buffalo Series 00:09:17         Arrival at BFC 00:09:46   Chapter 1: The First Annual Rosalie Littlethunder Memorial                                   Walk 00:15:44   Rosalie Memorial Circle 00:29:27   Chapter 2: Buffalo Awareness in Bozeman 00:29:31        More Words From Karen Littlethunder and Cheryl Angel 00:35:04        Awareness Rally Grooves 00:38:53   Chapter 3: Ski Patrol and Share Frog 00:38:55        A Daily Meeting 00:45:55        Buffalo Patrol 00:52:96        A Wild Lullaby for Share Frog 00:57:05   Chapter 4: Jimmy Brings an Important Message 01:09:46   Chapter 5: A Conversation with Stephanie Seay 01:11:24        Conversation with Stephanie 01:35:14   Chapter 6: A Conversation with Mike Mease 01:36:05        Details about the March webinar 01:36:46        Conversation with Mike 02:36:11        Closing Rumination and Introduction of Tanka Bar Episode   You can connect with the Buffalo Field Campaign, to follow their work or arrange to volunteer for a while, at Michael DiGiorgio recorded the banjo-bird jams I'm using in the intro and ending. You can find his amazing nature art at . Mike says that if you'd like to buy the album of his nature-banjo jams, you can find his email on his website and he can mail you a CD.

Episode 3 closes out Muse Ecology's inaugural series recorded in December 2017, about ecosystem restoration and the work of John D. Liu. In this episode, John and I have a conversation on the way to the airport that weaves through many topics currently affecting our global situation, and we discuss how a large scale shift to focusing on ecosystem restoration addresses the roots of all of them. John D. Liu is Ecosystem Ambassador for Commonland Foundation and Visiting Research Fellow at the Netherlands Institute of Ecology of the Royal Academy of Arts and Sciences.  He also catalyzed the Ecosystem Restoration Camps movement.  You can find his films and research papers at  One of the topics we discuss is how water vapor is more of a greenhouse gas than carbon emissions, and how ecosystem destruction has disrupted the water cycle and led to increase of uncondensated (not formed into clouds) atmospheric water vapor.  The source John was referring to for his greenhouse gas numbers can be found at the following link.  Water vapor also acts as a magnifier of other greenhouse gases through strong feedback effects.  Here's another article, from NASA, on water vapor's contribution to the greenhouse gas effect. Some have ascribed the increase in uncondensated atmospheric water vapor simply to warming caused by carbon emissions, as in the following article. Other researchers have been doing work synthesizing peer-reviewed findings from climatology, ecology, soil science, microbiology, and other fields that show anthropogenic causes, besides carbon emissions, of increased uncondensated water vapor and climate change.  The good news about such effects is that they are based on our land management, and hence can be changed.  The ecosystems that control the water cycles and climate have largely been cleared, drained, and paved or tilled up, and by restoring ecosystem function on the surface of Earth, we can restore hydrological cycles, which control most of our planet's thermodynamics.  Here are some links to some of this important work exploring these complexities. Walter Jehne's  paper was presented at Tufts, MIT, Columbus, Dayton, Oberlin, and Harvard Universities in 2015.  It addresses water as greenhouse gas, our land management's effects on the water cycle and climate, and the role of vegetation and organic carbon and microbiology in the soil.  Atmospheric carbon is relevant too of course, and he also has a great paper on the carbon drawdown possibilities of ecosystem restoration, .  He also gave a fantastic webinar presentation earlier this year, 2018, on the water cycle, how we've altered it, and what we can do about it, as a guest on the webinar hosted by my friends Neal and Raleigh.  You can find the webinar video . Juraj Kohutiar and Michal Kravčík wrote another great paper on civilization's land management's effects on ecology and hence hydrology and climate, .  They and others at the Rain4Climate group also wrote the book , also available for free online. Here are a couple more links with lists of further resources on the relations between vegetation, water cycles, and climate. There lots more out there on these complexities, and folks are continuing to do important research, so stay tuned in to this topic of the connections between ecosystem restoration, water cycles, and climate change.  We have alot to learn. _______ Michael DiGiorgio recorded the banjo-bird jams I'm using in the intro and ending. You can find his amazing nature art at . Mike says that if you'd like to buy the album of his nature-banjo jams, you can find his email on his website and he can mail you a CD. State of the Union, at the end, is part of my album The Sweet Subtle Revolution, that I've been thinking to record for a while now.  You can find a few of my songs and videos and a booking contact at The lovely version of Home on the Range in the background during the introduction to the bison series at the end was on the album The Spirit of South Dakota, part of an album series of music and nature sounds from National Parks around the U.S.  You can find this beautiful music at

This is the fifth and final part of episode 2 at the Global Landscapes Forum in Bonn, Germany with John D. Liu.  In this part we hear two conversations about the important but historically ignored voices from indigenous nations, including their long history of oppression by globalizing civilization, the distinct worldviews inherent in the global economy and indigenous cultures, and the importance of bridging these differences and working together to protect and restore the Earth. John D. Liu is Ecosystem Ambassador for Commonland Foundation and Visiting Research Fellow at the Netherlands Institute of Ecology of the Royal Academy of Arts and Sciences.  He also catalyzed the Ecosystem Restoration Camps movement.  You can find his films and research papers at  We will first hear John Liu speak with Leo van der Vlist, who works for the Netherlands Centre for Indigenous Peoples and the Embassy for the Earth, and is a member of the international Forest Stewardship Council.  For over 25 years, Leo has been working with indigenous peoples to protect and restore their sovereignty, and for the last couple years has been working with large scale ecosystem restoration projects involving local communities. After Leo, we'll hear another profound conversation, with Marcos Terena, an indigenous elder from Brazil, along with his translator, Mercio Cerbaro, PhD researcher at the University of Surrey in the UK.  Marcos has been working for decades to involve sovereign indigenous voices in the global conversation. In 1988, he was integral to the inclusion of indigenous rights in the Brazilian Constitution. In 1992, more than 700 indigenous leaders worldwide elected him to speak to world leaders on their behalf at the U.N. Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, the first time an indigenous person had addressed the United Nations. He also founded the Union of Indigenous Nations, the first indigenous rights group in Brazil, and is the coordinator for the International Indigenous Forum on Biodiversity.  In this interview, he shares valuable observations, concerns, and wisdom about mankind's relation to Mother Earth. Michael DiGiorgio recorded the banjo-bird jams I'm using in the intro and ending. You can find his amazing nature art at . Mike says that if you'd like to buy the album of his nature-banjo jams, you can find his email on his website and he can mail you a CD.

While largely unfamiliar to many, peatlands perform crucial funcions in Earth's carbon and water cycles.  For many centuries we have been draining peatlands to free up land for commodity agriculture, destroying these important living systems.  We now are growing aware of the effects of draining peatlands, and some folks are exploring ways to preserve and restore these wet ecologies while still being able to produce and harvest biomass and other crops from these areas.  This sort of peatland agriculture is called paludiculture. In part 4 of this 5 part series at the Global Landscapes Forum in Bonn, Germany, we will hear John D. Liu interview 3 individuals who are working to change agriculture, finance, and policy so that they work to restore, rather than drain peatlands. John D. Liu is Ecosystem Ambassador for Commonland Foundation and Visiting Research Fellow at the Netherlands Institute of Ecology of the Royal Academy of Arts and Sciences.  He also catalyzed the Ecosystem Restoration Camps movement.  You can find his films and research papers at  Jans Joosten, one of the world's foremost experts on peatlands, is head of the Department of Peatland Studies and Paleoecology of Greifswald University.  ()  He will describe how peatlands function and some of the consequences of draining them.  Through his research, writing, and policy advising he has helped to protect and restore peatlands all over the world. Annawati van Paddenburg is Head of Sustainable Landscapes at the Investment and Policy Solutions Division of the Global Green Growth Initiative. ()  With member countries in Latin America, Africa, and Asia-Pacific, she has worked on climate and food security and sustainable growth in forest, agriculture, coastal, and marine areas.  Growing up in rural Indonesia, she is motivated by her observations of the destructive effects of business on the pristine landscapes of her childhood.  The Indonesian government has recently determined to rewet their drained peatlands, and she is working with them to develop commodity production business models that support both local communities and peatland ecologies. Aldert van Weeren is a cattail farmer. () After rewetting and restoring peatland areas, intending to sustainably harvest cattails for housing insulation, he found that he had legally created nature reserves and was not allowed to harvest from them.  He and others have been working to change these policies so that folks like him can restore and preserve peatland function while producing a nontoxic, renewable source of housing insulation. Michael DiGiorgio recorded the banjo-bird jams I'm using in the intro and ending.  You can find his amazing nature art at  .  Mike says that if you'd like to buy the album of his nature-banjo jams, you can find his email on his website and he can mail you a CD.

In Part 3 of this episode at the Global Landscapes Forum in Bonn, Germany, we will hear conversations between John Liu and folks who are working to restore degraded forest lands around the world through research, international business, and volunteer initiatives. John D. Liu is Ecosystem Ambassador for Commonland Foundation and Visiting Research Fellow at the Netherlands Institute of Ecology of the Royal Academy of Arts and Sciences.  He also catalyzed the Ecosystem Restoration Camps movement.  You can find his films and research papers at  Patrick Worms is President of the European Agroforestry Federation and Senior Science Advisor for the World Agroforestry Centre, a research organization that studies the benefits of trees in agicultural systems and helps farmers to implement their findings. Pieter van Midwoud is the Tree Planting Officer for Ecosia, the search engine that plants trees.  As people use the search engine, their counter shows how many trees they are responsible for purchasing, and Pieter is the one who connects with reforestation projects around the world to get the them planted. You can set Ecosia as your default search engine or try it out at . Paul Hol is the Executive Director of Form International, a forest management and services company that manages 27,000 hectares of sustainable forest plantations, forest restortion, nature conservation, and agroforestry in Ghana and Tanzania.  They work to restore degraded forest lands and local livelihoods while creating models that demonstrate that trees can be a good investment.   Aviram Rozin is the Founder and International Director of Sadhana Forest, a vegan volunteer-based organization focused on creating long-term plant-based food security through environmental restoration. Globally, there are 133 million malnourished people living in arid areas who have private land but are not using it to grow food due to lack of water and agricultural knowledge. Sadhana Forest trains local people in India, Haiti and Kenya in the use of water-saving irrigation techniques and provides them with free seedlings to plant drought-resistant, indigenous, food-bearing trees around their homes.  Aviram is also a board member of the Foundation for the World Education and the first council member from India in the Global Restoration Council.    Sadh Guru is a mystic, best-selling author, and founder of the Isha Foundation.  He has inspired a people's movement in India that has planted over 32 million trees.   You can find the entire conversation between Sadh Guru and Eric Solheim, Environment Director for the U.N. . Michael DiGiorgio recorded the banjo-bird jams I'm using in the intro and ending.  You can find his amazing nature art at  .  Mike says that if you'd like to buy the album of his nature-banjo jams, you can find his email on his website and he can mail you a CD.

In Part 2 of Episode 2, we hear some voices of folks who are working to bridge the world of global finance with the preservation and restoration of ecological function.   Caroline van Leenders is the Senior Policy Advisor of Greening Finance at the Netherlands Enterprise Agency.  She facilttes community of practice groups for investors to help them move their money to more benficial projects.  She is also a writer and advocate of regenerative economic system change.   Nanno Kleiterp is chair of the &Green Fund, which funds projects that show how highly productive commodity agriculture can be done in a way that protects ad restores forests, peatlands, and human livelihoods.   Jan Willem den Besten is the Senior Expert of Ecosystems and Climate for the Dutch national committee of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, the world's largest environmental organization.  Its vision is a just world that values and conserves nature.   Michael DiGiorgio recorded the banjo-bird jams I'm using in the intro and ending.  You can find his amazing nature art at  .  Mike says that if you'd like to buy the album of his nature-banjo jams, you can find his email on his website and he can mail you a CD.