Taylor Nilsson is Executive Director of the Butte Fire Safe Council. He described the mission of the Council in preventing wildfires as well as helping victims of fires. The organization has numerous partners in the Northstate and offers workshops on creating firesafe spaces, teaching kids the principles of smart living in fire country, and hands-on projects involving land restoration and sensible fire ecology. Volunteers are always welcome to participate in those programs. To learn more about the Council and its work, visit the website at buttefiresafe.net.  Listen to the program: click here.

In this program we learned about River Partners, a restoration nonprofit that, founded in 1998, has channeled $160 million toward restoration of nearly 20,000 acres of river corridors throughout California. Our guest was Michael Rosner. He is the director of Restoration Science for River Partners. He told us about some of the major accomplishments of River Partners since its beginning as Sacramento River Partners, most notably, the San Joaquin Dos Rios State Park recover and Southern California Expansion. Other topics and projects we discussed were:

• Salmon side channel restoration;
• Battle Creek farm recovery and rewilding;
• Planting 15 million milkweed through 2030;
• Motus stations installation to track some large and small creatures;
• Tribal engagement; and
• Science partnerships.

See the excellent and informative River Partners website for more information: riverpartners.org

Listen to this engaging and informative interview: Click here.

We've long been impressed by Matthew Trumm and his work in permaculture and fire resilience.  He is committed to creating a better reality through the Permaculture process, including earth care, people care, future care, and the return of surplus. He grows all kinds of stuff, works as a landscape designer and engineer, and does workshops in the schools and for adult populations. In this episode he described his work teaching permaculture in the schools, with the kids eventually selling some of their own products. And he described a series of upcoming workshops that comprehensively explore Permaculture principles. Learn more about his work at treetopppermaculture.org.  Listen to  the program: Click here.

We spoke with Blake Ellis, program manager for the Ecotherapy Program at the Big Chico Creek Ecological Reserve. She is Program Manager for the Chico State Ecotherapy Program with the Big Chico Creek Ecological Reserve. She is also an Associate Clinical Social Worker and a certified Forest Therapy Guide.  We asked her to describe "forest therapy" and how she is providing it in the Chico area at the Ecological Reserve. 

Listen to the program: https://archive.org/details/ecotopia-02-03-2026-17-00_202602

This is an interview we conducted with the author of Ecotopia, Ernest Callenbach, who died in 2012. In it, he gives some of the background of writing the novel, responds to questions about some parts of the book, and offers fresh insights into a world that desperately needs an ecotopian perspective.  To hear this outstanding interview, click here.

In this edition of Ecotopia, we spoke with Paul Kirk, the coordinator of this year's Snow Goose Festival and a member of the board of Alta-Cal Bird Alliance, which sponsors this annual event. To celebrate the arrival in the Northstate of a gazillion snow geese, who settle in rice fields and ponds, the Festival sponsors a four-day festival including field trips, workshops, and a grand banquet. Paul filled us in on the amazing range of workshops and other events and, off the cuff and drawing on his own experience as a birder, told us what people might expect to see on the field trips. Listen to the program. Click on the link.