Life with Fire

We're in Canada at the International Association of Wildland Fire Conference this week, and will be pulling some folks aside for some quick conversations about the conference themes and the research being presented and discussed. Our first "rapid fire" episode guest is Sarah Henderson, who works for the BC Centre for Disease Control as the scientific director of Environmental Health Services...

In our final episode sponsored by Protect Our Winters, we explored the economics of wildfire (both it's suppression and it's community and recreational impacts) with Jude Bayham, an environmental and resource economist at Colorado State University. Jude told us about some of his upcoming research, including his hope to utilize Strava data to determine where people continue to recreate in the aftermath of wildfires, in addition to lots of other cool stuff he has in the works...

In the fourth episode of our series sponsored by Protect our Winters, we spoke with self-proclaimed snow nerd Andrew Schwartz about his work as the lead scientist at the the UC Berkeley Central Sierra Snow Lab, where he explores all sorts of snowpack-related science but also how wildfires are impacting that snowpack...

In a special bonus episode of our recreation X wildfire series sponsored by Protect Our Winters, we spoke with professional skier Cody Townsend about what it's like to live in North Lake Tahoe as the threat of wildfire (or smoke) in that area seems to increase exponentially every fire season, as well as what kind of advocacy work he suggests for listeners who don't know where to get started in the climate or advocacy space...

Today we're talking trails! What do trails have to do with wildfire, you ask? Well, ask any trail builder that question and they'll tell you that they're kind of a pain to rebuild (and cut out) after wildfires. Today's guest Dillon Osleger is a trail builder, an environmental advocate, scientist and Executive Director of the Sage Trail Alliance, and also works with Protect Our Winters as both a creative and an athlete...

Welcome to the first episode of our four-part series discussing the impacts of wildfire on recreation, sponsored by Protect Our Winters! For this episode, Jamie Ervin of the Outdoor Alliance walked us through the myriad ways that wildfires create barriers to recreation access and enjoying the outdoors...

Have you seen that C̶o̶l̶l̶e̶g̶e̶ Hotshot shirt from Hotshot Brewery? This episode's guest Harrison Raine walks us through doing both of those things at once—and shares why he thinks more firefighters should pursue fire-adjacent careers that can make use of that invaluable, on-the-ground fire experience.

Listen—we know that prescribed fire liability insurance is a big, scary topic. But we encourage you to check out this episode, because while liability insurance is one of the bigger challenges in getting more "good fire" on the ground, it's also one of the least understood and more infrequently talked about challenges, likely because it is such a complex topic...

How can Indigenous communities regain power over their long-honed land stewardship and cultural burning practices? How can these practices be done without the influence of Westernized practices and policies, including prescribed burning? Today's guest Amy Cardinal Christianson, a Métis woman and Fire Social Scientist for the Canadian Forest Service, addressed these questions (and so, so many others) for us in today's episode...

Triss Seemiller is a trans woman who started gender-affirming hormone therapy when she was on a shot crew in California. She transitioned soon after she left the crew...