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Neil Gifford — bringing butterflies back from the brink of extinction
While many of us think of fire solely as a destructive force, Gifford understands that it is essential to enriching the ecosystem of a pitch pine barren.
Gifford, the conservation director for the Albany Pine Bush Preserve, got his first job at the preserve literally setting fires, controlled burns.
Fire, he explains in this week’s Enterprise podcast, recycles nutrients in a way that benefits rare plants.
“You can think of wild fire almost like instant decomposition,” he said, likening it to what happens in a compost pile — but almost instantly.
“Fire is taking nitrogen in particular, but also phosphorus, calcium, potassium, and other nutrients and releasing them into the soil and making them available for plant uptake,” he said.
Read the full story at https://altamontenterprise.com/05092022/neil-gifford-brings-back-birds-and-butterflies-brink-extinction
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Daughter and mother coach dragon-boat paddlers
31:33|Anna Judge and Louisa Matthew realize they live in an ageist and sexist society — but, with generous spirits, they are paddling against the current. The mother-daughter duo together coach a crew of dragon boat paddlers. Matthew, the mother, is an art professor at Union College. Judge, her daughter, is a certified personal trainer who led her mother into the sport. “A dragon boat is a 40-foot long, very narrow racing boat,” explains Matthew in this week’s Enterprise podcast. “That became standardized in the 20th Century but it’s based on a thousands-year-old Chinese tradition of racing the big rivers in China.” A dragon boat has 20 paddlers, two to a seat, with a person in the stern who steers and a person in the bow signaling directions, traditionally by drumming. “It’s the national sport of China,” said Judge “so it’s quite big in Asia and has subsequently spread to Australia, New Zealand, and Europe.” It came to the United States through Canada, she said, citing the work of a doctor in British Columbia who changed prevailing medical opinion on exercise for breast-cancer survivors.
Angelica Sofia Parker and Elca Hubbard prepare for a pageant while supporting each other
27:03|https://altamontenterprise.com/07242023/angelica-sofia-parker-and-elca-hubbard-prepare-pageant-while-supporting-each-other
