Species Unite

“So, the irony is that meat that people are so obsessed about their cat needing… Yeah, in the wild cats needs meat because in the wild, that meat is a source of the nutrients that a cat needs. But on a commercial bag of pet food, those nutrients, those core key nutrients that the cat needs, they're not coming from the meat, they're coming from the pre-mix that is largely a synthetic mix of vitamins and minerals that have been lost from the meat.” – Shannon Falconer Shannon Falconer is the CEO and co-founder of Because, Animals,  a pet food company that is making cultured meat for our cats and dogs. Their first cultured meat product, Harmless Hunt Mouse Cookies for Cats, will be on the market in 2022. They are made with real mouse meat that is grown in a lab. No mice are hurt in the process. In fact, the cells that were used to make these cookies and all mouse treats at Because, Animals going forward are the only cells that they will ever need. The original mice are happily living as pets with one of the Because, Animal’s scientists. Cats and dogs eat more than 25 percent of the meat consumed in the US; which also means that petfood is responsible for more than quarter of the environmental impact caused by animal agriculture. There are plant-based pets foods but most American pets eat commercial dog and cat food, which often and mostly uses byproduct - meaning the parts of animals that people don’t want, the heads, the bones, the blood or they use the meat that can’t legally be sold for human consumption because the animal was dying or diseased. Because, Animals is going to change all of that one product at a time. Their mouse cookies are just the beginning. Nothing excites me more than cellular agriculture. And, it might take longer than most of us would like, but it’s happening… Eat Just’s chicken nuggets are being sold in Singapore and now, here comes the pet food. It’s the very beginning of a whole new food system, one that will eventually take down every last factory farm and slaughterhouse on Earth. Here we go…

“…because animal advocacy has now escaped advocacy and is entering different types of work, really science-oriented work…  maybe that was all it took in the first place. We just had such limited roles in the traditional sense of animal advocacy before. Because it was so communications driven… And so that's another reason why I'm so proud of how this field has developed is I think we've turned people into animal advocates by creating jobs that let that happen. It's such a special thing to be part of.” Isha Datar Isha Datar is the executive director of New Harvest, the global nonprofit that Isha is executive director of New Harvest, a nonprofit research institute that funds open, public cultured meat research. In 2010 while still an undergrad, Isha wrote a paper called “Possibilities for an in vitro meat production system.” This was among the few papers to ever discuss cultured meat in academic literature and a few years before anyone had tasted the world’s first cultivated meat ball. It was the beginning of Isha's quest to establish the field of animal products made without using any animals. Isha has been executive director of New Harvest since 2013. She’s also co-founded Muufri (now Perfect Day Foods), where they make milk without cows and Clara Foods, where they make eggs without chicken. In 2015, Isha coined the term "cellular agriculture" — officially creating a category for agriculture products produced from cell cultures rather than whole plants or animals. Cellular agriculture is the future of food and Isha is one of its greatest pioneers.

“…based on my personal experience and having worked with scientists and researchers most of my life, I would say that it's not too late. There are some things that are probably gone. There are places where only pockets of biodiversity may remain in the time ahead, but that doesn't mean we can't still have a healthy future. It may not be what it once was, but it's like the old saying - when's the best day to quit smoking cigarettes? Today - if you don’t quit today, when's the next best day? Tomorrow.  So, it's not too late. We may have lost 50% of the world's coral reefs, but that means there's 50% left. We may have taken 90% of the big fish in the ocean, but maybe there's 10% left. We don't have to kill 100 million sharks every year. We don't have to rollback legislation that determines how much carbon we pump into the atmosphere. We can speak out against that and tell our elected leaders that we care. The ocean doesn't have to turn acidic because we're dumping so much carbon into it that its chemistry is changing. These are things that we can change and can control. So, I do remain cautiously optimistic. I realize that the battle lines are drawn and we have to fight hard, but I do think that it's worth fighting for. It's not too late. And we can see a reversal in the places that have been protected. You do see that resilience. The ocean does know how to take care of itself. We just need to leave it alone…” -Brian Skerry Since it’s the last week of summer, not officially but for most of us, we are re-sharing this very important and compelling conversation with Brian Skerry. Brian Skerry is one of the world's greatest and most accomplished underwater and marine wildlife photographers. He’s also one of the most prolific: he’s been a contract photographer for National Geographic since 1998, his work has been featured in scores of publications including Sports Illustrated, The New York Times and BBC Wildlife, and he’s the author of 11 books including the acclaimed monographs Ocean Soul and Shark. In that time he’s won so many awards that it would take a second email to list them all, but particular highpoints include Brian becoming an 11-time award winner in the prestigious Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition, and when National Geographic magazine named one of his images among their 50 Greatest Photographs Of All Time. In his four decades exploring the world's oceans, Brian has experienced things that very few humans will ever get to experience, like diving with a population of southern right whales who had never before encountered human beings dropping down into their underwater universe.  Brian dives eight months of the year, often in extreme conditions - beneath Arctic ice or in shark-infested waters. His work brings us the beauty and the majesty of our oceans, but it also shows us the devastation and the destruction that we've caused them. His stories raise awareness, promote conservation, and ultimately create change. Today, June 8th, is World Oceans Day, the day to celebrate the world's combined efforts to protect the one ocean that we all share. And that ocean is in bad shape - between dead zones, loss of apex predators, rising sea levels affecting tidal ecosystems, the bleaching of coral reefs, oil spills polluting the waters and decimating habitats, overfishing and hunting of marine species, climate change, rising acidity levels, and plastic, plastic and more plastic - the ocean’s future seems extremely bleak. But, as I learned from Brian, there’s still time. Our ocean is resilient and there is so much left that we can save, but we have to act now. And, I can’t imagine a better day to begin than World Oceans Day. So, start by listening to Brian, one of the best tellers of ocean stories out there.

This week we are re-sharing one of our favorite episodes - a conversation with Carl Safina about beauty, wonder and why animals matter. "Beings who've succeeded on earth for millions of years, don’t seek, and should not require, our approval. They belong as well as we do. We do ourselves no favors by asking whether their existence is worth our while. We are hardly in a position to judge, hurdling and lurching along as we are with no goal, no plan except: bigger, faster, more.  If we had the courage to be honest about it, we would have to admit that whales and birds and apes and all the rest live fully up to everything of which they are capable. And we, regrettably, fall short of doing that. For them, to be is enough. For us in the isolating alienation of our title retreat from Life, nothing is enough. It is strange how dissatisfied we insist on being, when there is so much of the world to know and love."  Carl Safina, Becoming Wild  Carl Safina grew up raising pigeons on a rooftop in Brooklyn and hasn’t stopped interacting with the wild since. He is an ecologist and author who writes extensively about our human relationship with the natural world and what we can do to make it better.   First step: we need to care.  Carl’s books make us care. He advocates for every living creature out there, and is always graciously pointing out why animals matter, not only why they matter to us, but why they matter to themselves - something I’m pretty certain that most humans don’t think about often enough.  In his most recent book Becoming Wild, How Animal Cultures Raise Families, Create Beauty and Achieve Peace, Carl travels around the planet, exploring the cultures of chimpanzees in Uganda, sperm whales in the Caribbean, and Scarlet macaws in Peru. He shows us how other species teach and learn, and what life looks like in their animal societies, which is often as astonishing as it is spectacularly beautiful.  His writing has won several awards, including a MacArthur Genius Prize, Pew and Guggenheim fellowships, and the John Burrows, James Beard, and George Rabb metals. He is the first Endowed Professor for Nature and Humanity at Stony Brook University and the founding president of the not for profit, Safina Center. He also hosted the PBS series, Saving the Ocean. 

 “It made me feel like I wished that I had some sort of a super power, so that I could just picked them up and take them somewhere safe. But unfortunately, I'm not strong enough to have done that. So what I did was decide, at 11 years old, that I was going to commit my life to safeguarding the species… that I'll do everything in my power.” – Jamal Galves Jamal Galves grew up in a small village in Belize that's famous for its Manatee population. When he was 11 years old, he saw a research boat near his home and got curious. He asked the scientists if he could tag along on their expedition, and for some reason they said yes. And, they let him come back the next day and again and again for next five years, until finally, when he was 16, they gave him a job. Now, 20 years later, he is the program coordinator for the Belize Manatee Conservation Program at the Clearwater Marine Aquarium Research Institute.   Jamal sees it as his life's mission to protect and save these gentle giants. Antillean manatees are a vulnerable species and their population is dwindling. They face numerous threats, from habitat loss, hunting, boat collisions, fishing gear, and natural disasters. Jamal’s work provides science and education to conserve them and provides the data for establishing sanctuaries, reducing watercraft speed limits, and fighting poaching. Jamal made a promise to the manatees when he was a little kid and not a day has passed since that he hasn’t lived up to it.

“It's kind of like light… you flick a light switch on in the room and when you flip that switch, what you want is the experience of a lit room. You're not thinking about whether it comes from renewable energy or fossil fuels. You just want light. Well, I think most people just want meat. They don't care if animals are slaughtered. In fact, they probably would prefer that they not be slaughtered for it.” – Paul Shapiro Paul is the founder and CEO of the Better Meat Co., an alternative protein company that is replacing animals in our food supply. He’s also the author of, Clean Meat: How Growing Meat Without Animals Will Revolutionize Dinner and the World. Paul spent the first two-plus decades of his career in animal protection. First, he founded and ran the animal protection organization, Compassion Over Killing, which is now called Animal Outlook, and then he spent 13 years at the Humane Society of the United States, working to give farmed animals better lives. He changed laws and the world for massive amounts of animals across this county. And then he had a realization… that food technology would save far more lives than anything else possibly ever could.

Tuesday, August 10th is World Lion Day, so we are re-sharing this conversation with Beverly and Derek Joubert. "When we were born, there were 450,000 lions, and today there are 20,000 lines. So that's a ninety-five percent decline. There were 750,000 leopards, and now maybe 45,000 leopards left. Cheetah numbers have dropped below 7,000. Tigers have had a little bit of a resurgence, but still under 5,000 and that's really worrying. We could lose a lot of these animals in the next 10 or 15 years"   - Derek Joubert  Are we being the best version of ourselves? That’s a question that Beverly and Dereck Joubert asked quite often during this conversation and also one that they seem to live by. It’s embedded into their work, their lives, their relationships - with each other, the wilderness, and the planet; as if the question floats above their heads as a gentle reminder of who they want to be in the world. And, the continual asking of that question shows in everything that they do, fight for, love, and are actively trying to save. They are award-winning filmmakers, National Geographic Explorers-in-Residence, and wildlife conservationists who have made over 30 films while researching, exploring, and doing vital conservation work throughout Africa for nearly four decades. They also happen to have what could possibly be the best love story of our time. They have been together for nearly 40 years and the great majority of it has been spent living in the bush in Botswana, making films, doing research, and fighting to save what’s left of the African wilderness and the large predators who inhabit it. For months and years at a time they’ve lived without electricity, without much human interaction, without many comforts, nor personal space – things that most couples have a difficult time managing over a week long glamping trip. They’ve been doing it for 38 years. Living in the bush for decades has included many death defying close calls, including what they simply refer to as the “incident” with a wounded (therefore angry) cape buffalo that nearly ended it all. Fortunately, everyone survived and after an 8 month stint in the hospital for Beverly, they returned to the bush and began filming again – at the exact place where the attack occurred. Did I mention that they are a little tougher than most of us? Their love story, like all of the good ones, is about something much bigger than themselves. It’s a story about Africa, the wilderness, the wild animals who live there, and it’s about fighting the biggest fight of our time, to save what’s left of this majestic planet. In the last 50 years, Africa has lost 90 to 95 percent of its large predators. We could very well witness the end of wild lions, cheetahs and other big cats in a decade or two. It’s that urgent and we are in that much trouble. If we want to live in a world with lions and leopards and elephants and rhinos, then we’ve got to get behind those who are out there on the front lines. Beverly and Dereck are not only out there, but they’ve documented it for decades, so that we can see and understand the African wilderness in all of its magnificent glory and so that we know exactly what’s at stake, what we are about to lose. Their most recent film was released in October. It’s a three part series called: Okavango, A River of Dreams. It’s a heartbreakingly beautiful journey through the place they’ve called home since the beginning.

“It is not hyperbole to say that livestock grazing on Western public lands is the single biggest and most important environmental impact that does the most damage. And, also causes the most widespread impact of any of the things that damage public lands, including oil and gas development, including strip mining and mountaintop removal, including, damming, the rivers. Livestock raising is the most pervasive and the most ecologically harmful - and it's everywhere.”  - Erik Molvar     In the United States, we have around 80,000 wild horses living on Western public lands. For decades, there's been a battle between the people who want these horses to stay and roam freely and the people who want them gone. Many of the people who want them gone are either a part of, or connected to the cattle industry.And, the agency that makes these decisions, whether the horses stay or go, is the Bureau of Land Management, the BLM. There are herds living on public lands throughout the Western United States. And one of, or maybe the most, beloved herd is the Onaqui. They live in Utah, around 60 miles from Salt Lake City. Because they're close to a city, people visit them often. The horses have become accustomed to a human audience, so they don't flee when they see humans. They trust them. Or at least they did until a couple of weeks ago when 435 of these majestic and very free horses were rounded up with helicopters by the BLM. 124 of them will become part of a birth control program and be released to the wild. But the other 300 will be put in a government holding facility. Eventually some might get adopted, but many will remain and holding for years. These roundups happen all the time, but the Onaqui roundup got a lot of publicity because these horses were so adored. The BLM’s reason for rounding up our horses is that they degrade public lands when the herds get too large. Now these same lands are rented for use for millions and millions of cattle and sheep. The horses are a teeny tiny fraction of animals that live on that land. Today's conversation is with Eric Molvar. He is not a wild horse advocate. He's a wildlife biologist and the executive director of the Western Watersheds Project, a nonprofit conservation group dedicated to protecting and restoring wildlife and watersheds across the American West. I asked Eric to come onto the show so that I could better understand how and why these roundups continue to happen.

“You can't get to a point where you're so sensitive that you don't call out cruelty and torture when you see it, whether it's to a human being or to the planet or to an animal, you can't just stay silent, but you have to approach in the right way.”      N -Nina Jackel Nina Jackel is an activist and journalist and the founder and president of Lady Freethinker, a media organization that provides news and grassroots action for a free and compassionate world - for every species. In 2013 Lady Freethinker was a blog written by Nina for a handful of readers. Those readers soon multiplied and today, Lady Freethinker is a media and news organization with a team of writers and millions of readers. Their investigations and campaigns have led to major animal cruelty victories across the globe. Nina is a relentless force in the fight for justice for animals but she also has huge empathy for humans and the sometimes slow process it can be for them to get fully on board.

“And then a letter arrived in the mail. It was from a woman who had heard about my work to help zoo animals. She said, ‘there's these two bears living in a cage in the town near my house. It's on a creek that floods every year. It's horrible conditions. I have no idea what to do. Can you help?’ I don't think she knew that I was a 13-year-old.” – Justin Barker Justin is an activist, a director, a producer, and the author of Bear Boy, The True Story of a Boy, Two Bears and the Fight to Be Free. When Justin was 13 years old, he started an organization called Citizens Lobbying for Animals in Zoos. And at 13, he created real change for captive animals, and not long after someone contacted him about two bears living in a wretched conditions in Northern California. Justin spent the next three years fighting to save these bears. Although his book is a young adult novel, it is a book that I think everyone should read. Justin is an example and inspiration of how one person can create enormous impact. And the fact that that person was 13 years old is all the more compelling.