The Parks Podcast

Send us Fan Mail

In 1900, birds were something you shot and pinned to a hat. Then an ornithologist named Frank Chapman suggested people go out on Christmas and count them instead. Today, a family will drive four and a half hours across the desert, three kids in the back seat and every one of them holding binoculars, just to spend a weekend looking up.

Recorded live at the Maryland Outdoor Recreation Summit in Ocean City, Maryland, host Missy Rentz sits down with Wayne Klockner, Executive Director of the American Birding Association, in front of a room full of the people whose job is getting the rest of us outside. A week earlier, Wayne had taken Missy on her very first birding trip at Assateague, where she spent two hours learning what to look at (and mistaking pine cones for birds).

In this episode:

• From Hat Feathers to the Christmas Bird Count: How birding started as a way to stop the killing.
• A Million Ways to Bird: Why watching the feeder in your backyard counts just as much as chasing a rarity across the country.
• “That’s Not Your Fault, That’s the Leader’s Fault”: Why beginners feel intimidated on bird walks, and whose job it is to fix that.
• Missy’s First Morning at Assateague: How birding turned out to be less about competition and more about learning to be present.
• Not Just Retirees in Vests: Why young people are trading screen time for binoculars, plus the ABA’s sold-out young birder camps and city Community Weekends.
• What Birds Do for Us: From birdsong at lunch to the canary in the coal mine, why birds matter beyond their beauty.
• For Parks, Tourism and Retailers: Interpretive signs, scheduled bird walks, and the clothing companies already designing gear for birders.
• How to Start: Find other birders, get a basic pair of binoculars (8x40 or 7x35), download the free Merlin app, and pick up a field guide.
• Birding All Year: Why fall migration, which runs into early December, is a great time to begin.
• No Yard Required: How Christian Cooper turned a Manhattan balcony into a stop for birds with native plants.

Recommended reading: The Sibley Guide to Birds by David Allen Sibley · Better Living Through Birding by Christian Cooper

Support the show

Send us Fan Mail

Water is the most boring thing in your pack — right up until it's the biggest problem of your day.

Alison Hill runs LifeStraw, but her background isn't gear. It's infectious disease. She came to the company to tackle waterborne illness, not to start a retail brand.

In this episode: — Why most Americans assume they have safe water, and why that's a misconception — aging infrastructure, lead contamination, boil advisories, unmonitored wells — Responding to Hurricane Helene in the town she grew up in — How much water to actually carry, and why there's no magic number — What dehydration does to your decision-making, which is the part nobody warns you about — How to choose a filter without standing paralyzed in the aisle: start with the use case, not the product — And why you can trust it: a partnership with The Carter Center that has taken Guinea worm disease from about 3.5 million cases a year to ten worldwide

Plus the speed round: Gates of the Arctic, chili pork rinds, lemurs in Madagascar, and the greatest gift the parks give us, in one word.

Support the show

Send us Fan Mail

This is the last episode of the Save Public Lands series — and we are four days from National Public Lands Day.

Tania Lown Hecht — VP of Communications and Strategy for Outdoor Alliance — joins me to close out the campaign. As we recorded this, 60 people from the Outdoor Alliance coalition were on Capitol Hill meeting with lawmakers on behalf of the outdoor community.

In this episode: — What Outdoor Alliance is: a coalition of 10 national outdoor recreation groups representing climbers, paddlers, surfers, backcountry skiers, mountain bikers, and trail runners — What 60 advocates told lawmakers this week — including the Roadless Rule comment stats (98-99% of public comments in support of keeping it) — Why Save Public Lands was born out of last summer's sell-off fight — and what happened when offices said they'd "never gotten this many messages about any issue ever" — Why the human-powered outdoor community has more in common with hunters and motorized users than with the timber or mining industry — How connection to place is the foundation of the conservation movement — Tania's personal story: cancer as a teenager, a first question about the mountains, and why she's dedicated her life to public lands

The petition closes September 26th — National Public Lands Day. savepubliclands.us. Four fields. Thirty seconds.

Support the show

Send us Fan Mail

You don't have to be a big company to show up for public lands.

Joy Seward — co-founder of RecPak and NOLS expedition guide — joins me for episode four of the Save Public Lands series to talk about how small businesses can get involved in advocacy, why The Conservation Alliance makes it easy, and what it looks like when a brand builds its mission into the business from day one.

RecPak was literally born on public land. Joy and her co-founder met on a NOLS course — operating on public land — and launched their company together afterward. Before their first sale, they already knew they wanted to give back.

In this episode: — What RecPak is: an ultra-lightweight 700-calorie, 42g protein meal for endurance athletes and backpackers — How RecPak was born out of a NOLS course on public land — Why Joy joined The Conservation Alliance before RecPak's first sale — The myth that advocacy is only for big companies — and why Conservation Alliance makes it low barrier for any size brand — What small businesses can actually do: social posts, tabling, directing customers to comment periods — Over a year of Joy's life spent cumulatively in wilderness areas as an expedition guide — What public lands mean to Joy personally — How to sign the Save Public Lands petition in under 30 seconds

Campaign runs through National Public Lands Day, September 26th.

Support the show

Send us Fan Mail

It can feel like every week there's a new emergency, a new deadline, a new thing to fight. That's not an accident.

Rebecca Gillis — VP of Government Affairs and Advocacy at The Conservation Alliance — joins me to decode what's actually happening to our public lands and why it feels so chaotic.

In this episode: — Executive orders: how they drive everything that happens at the agency level — Deregulation vs. what we're actually seeing — and why it goes one step further — The Congressional Review Act: an old tool being used in ways we've never seen, including Boundary Waters and Grand Staircase-Escalante — Budget reconciliation: the simple majority vehicle that's scarier than it sounds — Flood the zone: why the chaos is a strategy, and what that means for advocates — Why shortened comment periods, circumvented processes, and staffing cuts are all connected — Big Bend, Chaco Canyon, Bears Ears, Grand Staircase, Alaska, and Yosemite — quick updates on everything in play — The power of the outdoor industry: economic, reputational, and people power — 77 open comment periods — and how to navigate them without burning out — The doctor's prescription: keep going outside

Take action: ONX and Protect Our Parks both track open comment periods. The Conservation Alliance has form letters ready. Five Calls makes calling your representatives easy. And save the date — National Public Lands Day is September 26th.

Support the show

Send us Fan Mail

Public lands don't belong to one party. They belong to all of us.

Cal Callaghan — President and CEO of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers — joins me for episode three of our Save Public Lands series to talk about why this campaign matters, why a million signatures is a low bar, and what it means when people who don't look the same, act the same, or vote the same all show up for the same thing.

In this episode: — What Backcountry Hunters and Anglers does: 44 chapters, 35,000 members, year-round stewardship across North America — Why conservation is a "guilty pleasure" — and why that's fine — Reject the politics. Focus on the policy. It will affect you no matter where you are on the spectrum. — The Kevlar vest: how every user group — hunters, hikers, skiers, stargazers — is a woven fiber protecting the same special places — Why a million signatures is a low bar: there are more than a million people who buy a duck stamp alone — What public lands mean to Cal personally — from wilderness backpack hunts to throwing sticks with the dogs — And the simplest ask: go to savepubliclands.us. Name, zip code, email. Done.

Campaign runs through National Public Lands Day, September 26th.

Support the show

Send us Fan Mail

We launched Save Public Lands last week. Now it's time to talk about why this campaign is different.

Paul Hendricks — Executive Director of The Conservation Alliance — joins me to make the case for going on offense. After a year and a half of playing defense on public lands, the outdoor community is shifting its posture. One unified message. One million signatures. National Public Lands Day, September 26th.

In this episode: — Why "you can't just play defense forever" — the sports analogy that explains the whole campaign — The $1.3 trillion outdoor economy — and why it's probably way bigger than that number suggests — Who counts as a nature-dependent business (hint: it's a lot more than gear companies) — Why the attacks on public lands aren't landscape-specific — they're hitting forests from Alaska to North Carolina — Conservation easement law changes: the public lands fight happening on private land too — How to avoid advocacy fatigue: why Save Public Lands is designed to be the meta-campaign — What public lands mean to Paul personally — three generations on a backpacking trip

Sign the petition: savepubliclands.us — four fields, thirty seconds.

Support the show

Send us Fan Mail

The Roadless Rule is back — and we are in the middle of a 30-day public comment period that closes September 21st.

Katie Johnson — Campaigns and Engagement Manager for The Conservation Alliance — returns to the podcast to break down what's happening and exactly what you can do about it.

This is not a West Coast issue. The Roadless Rule protects 60 million acres of national forests in 37 states — and if the full repeal moves forward, 45 of those million acres could be opened to road construction, logging, mining, and industrial development.

In this episode: — The Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) and its three alternatives — including why the "modified" Alternative 3 still takes away 38 million acres — Why opponents call the rule inflexible — and why the rebuttals matter — The existing road maintenance backlog problem: there's no funding to maintain what we already have — Roads as wildlife barriers: migration corridors, breeding, fragmentation — Who gets impacted: gateway communities, tribal nations, thru-hikers, Triple Crowners, breweries, and everyone who drinks water — The Appalachian Trail, Continental Divide Trail, and Pacific Crest Trail: all have sections in inventoried roadless areas — 25,000 miles of trail at risk. 750 miles of whitewater access potentially affected. — How to submit a public comment in two minutes — and why aiming for a million matters

The Conservation Alliance has a pre-filled comment form ready. Link in show notes and bio. Deadline: September 21st.

Support the show

Send us Fan Mail

It's time to go on offense.

Today I'm joined by Fitz Cahall — host of the Dirtbag Diaries podcast — to launch Save Public Lands, a coalition-backed initiative to gather one million signatures and deliver them to Congress and state houses on National Public Lands Day, September 26th, 2026.

Three demands: No sell-offs. No backroom deals. No giveaways to foreign mining companies.

Sign it now at savepubliclands.us — it's four fields: first name, last name, zip code, email. Done. Then share it with five friends.

In this episode: — Why the outdoor community is going on offense after two years of playing defense — The three demands behind the Save Public Lands initiative — How signatures get used: the plan to physically deliver them to DC and state houses — The Boundary Waters — how community pressure stopped a toxic mine (multiple times) — Why this moment matters: a new Congress, a new election, a new chance to be heard — What public lands mean personally to Fitz — from climbing in Yosemite to building Dirtbag Diaries

Take action: → Sign the petition: savepubliclands.us → Share this episode → Tell five friends

Five weeks. One million signatures. National Public Lands Day, September 26th.

Support the show

Send us Fan Mail

Bulldozers just showed up inside Big Bend National Park.

28 environmental regulations waived. A $1.7 billion contract awarded to a subsidiary created specifically to protect its parent company's brand. Bipartisan local opposition from Republican sheriffs, judges, and the Republican congressional nominee for the district. And 1.3% — that's the share of overall US border crossings that happen in the Big Bend sector.

Chris Keyes, executive director and founder of RE:PUBLIC — a publication dedicated to covering America's public lands — joins The Parks Podcast to break down exactly what's happening on the ground and what you can do about it.

In this episode: — How it started: Kristi Noem's February announcement waiving 28 environmental regulations — The $1.7 billion Kiewit contract and the subsidiary created to protect their brand — Why the Big Bend sector isn't a high-priority immigration area (migration down 75% since 2023) — The Endangered Species Act, Clean Water Act, and NEPA — all waived — Big Bend's dark skies designation and what surveillance road lighting would mean for it — Why local Republicans and Democrats are both opposed — and what a federal judge just ruled — What you can do: organizations to support, how to contact your representatives, why local pressure matters most — What's coming next: the Ambler Road in Alaska — 200 miles, 4,000 stream crossings, a foreign-owned mine

Take action:

• Follow RE:PUBLIC at republic.land and sign up for their newsletter (twice a week)
• Support the Center for Biological Diversity and other organizations fighting this in court
• Call and write your senator, representative, and — if you're in Texas — your state officials
• Share this episode

Support the show