Plateau on the Radio: Episode 13 Drought and Water Conservation

Listen to Episode 13 HERE...

Waterline Road on the San Francisco
Peaks (Photo by Cory Mottice)

This time around we are focusing on drought and water conservation and have on a great guest named Erin Young who is the City of Flagstaffs Water Resources Manager and we discuss the future of water security in Flagstaff, the history of the water supply here and conservation measures that are in place, as well as things everyone can do to conserve our precious water. Also a report about dust on snow, the US Drought Index Monitor, and the plight of the ancient Hohokam Nation who experienced one of the worse droughts in history here in the southwest.

For more information on the events being held through the Flagstaff Water Services Department head over to their website and check out the calendar. They also have a really nice history section that lays out the interesting ways Flagstaff has been utilizing water since the very beginning. Also if your interested in doing you part to conserve water, take advantage of the great rebate programs mentioned in the show that the City of Flagstaff offers its residents.

For more information on Red Gap Ranch, have a look at this .pdf file for some history.

Lake Mary is one of the main water sources of the city of Flagstaff (Photo by Chris Gering)

Plateau on the Radio: Episode 12 Citizen Science and Advocacy

Listen to Episode 12 HERE...

This weeks episode is all about the importance of Citizen Science and Science Advocacy. We highlight citizen science opportunities for our listeners to join in, talk about the upcoming March for Science Flagstaff event put on by CEBA with organizers Jackie Parker and Pete Motyka, as well as the Grand Canyon Wolf Recovery Projects Wild & Scenic Film Festival, and have a conversation with Mexican Wolf Advocates Jean and Peter Ossorio from New Mexico. Also an audio postcard from Citizen Scientist extraordinaire Ashley Doyle

And for more information on Mexican Wolves head over to the great website https://mexicanwolves.org, and check out some articles by my great guests including Pupdate by Jean Ossario that highlights news about the pups down in the Recovery Area.

To locate some Citizen Science Projects that were mentioned on the show look into SciStarter as well as Scientific American and The Citizen Scientist Grid.

Plateau on the Radio: Episode 11 Water is Life

Listen to the weeks show HERE...


Tune in for another installment of This is the Colorado Plateau  as we focus on water and drought across our region. Our three wonderful guests, Adrienne Soder and Mary Samar (Graduate Students at Northern Arizona University) and Dr. Denielle Perry, Assistant Professor with the School of Earth Sciences and Environmental Sustainability, and they are organizing and participating in the upcoming Student Water Symposium at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, AZ. We talk about their important research and about the importance of water policy in the West. Also a view of the drought from the Four Corners from Luke Runyon, a segment on mega-droughts, as well as water conservation tips from our very own Plateau reporter Ashley Doyle. Music from regional reggae rockers Innastate with Water is Life, and so much more!

The Colorado River, life-blood of the West

Plateau on the Radio: Episode 10 Volunteering for Wildlife and the Landscape

Listen to Episode 10 HERE...

Episode 10 of This is the Colorado Plateau is up and running friends (and you can listen live to future episodes at 10AM MST streaming worldwide on www.radiosunnyside.org, and in Flagstaff, AZ on 101.5 FM). We talked with Inka Knittle, one of the amazing organizers of the Grand Falls Clean-Up Event happening on April 6th and 7th out at Grand Falls on the Diné Nation, and also we are bringing you dear listeners opportunities on how you can get involved with volunteer activities this Spring on the Plateau, including the great adventure in spotlighting for Black-footed Ferrets out on the southern edge of the Plateau in April. 

Plateau on the Radio: Episode 9 Indigenous Perspective on Bears Ears

Listen to this weeks episode HERE.
This week we are focusing on the indigenous perspective surrounding Bears Ears National Monument by sharing the Heritage Voices podcast that recorded the thoughts of four amazing people. The panel consisted of Lyle Balenquah (Hopi Archaeologist), Regina Lopez-Whiteskunk (Education Coordinator for the Ute Indian Museum), Ed Kabotie (Hopi/Tewa artist and musician) and Angelo Baca (Diné/Hopi, Filmmaker and Cultural Resources Coordinator for Utah Diné Bikeyah). Tune in to hear their experiences with Bears Ears, and also thoughts on larger issues such as indigenous and Western science collaborations, and tribal sovereignty. Thanks to the great folks at Living Heritage Anthropology, the Friends of Cedar Mesa and the Archaeology Podcast Network for making this happen. 

Bears Ears National Monument, UT (photo by Donald J. Rommes)

Plateau on the Radio: Episode 8 Cave Ecology of the Plateau

Listen here: Plateau on the Radio - Episode 8 Cave Ecology of the Plateau
This weeks episode will find us not on the Plateau, but deep within it, as we explore cave ecology and biology with Ecologist and NAU Research Professor Jut Wynne. Also we have a segment on the late Stephen Hawking, Notes from the Field featuring the land swap news from the Hopi Nation, a new Audio Postcard from the Plateau, and a couple of songs of course...

For more on the work of our guest Jut Wynne check out:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/author/jut-wynne/
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jut_Wynne

Cave Life of the Colorado Plateau

In El Maipais National Monument on the New Mexico portion of the Colorado Plateau is a special place in too many ways to really count. The name El Malpais is from the Spanish term Malpaís, meaning badlands, and it is called that due to the extremely barren and dramatic volcanic field that covers so much of this rugged area.

The cinder cones, lava flows, and other volcanic elements of El Malpais are part of the Zuni-Bandera volcanic field, the second largest volcanic field in the Basin and Range Province. This volcanically active area on the southeast margin of the Colorado Plateau is at the intersection of the Rio Grande Rift Basin, with its deep normal faulting, and the ancient Jemez Lineament. These two features provide the crustal weaknesses that recent magmatic intrusions and Cenozoic volcanism are attributed to.

The smooth Pahoehoe and rugged A'a' lava flows of the Zuni-Bandera eruptions filled a large basin between the high mesas of the Acoma Pueblo to the east, Mt. Taylor to the north, and the Zuni Mountain anticline to the northwest.

And anywhere there is volcanic activity like this, there are also numerous lava tube caves, like the amazing Big Skylight Cave, where a special habitat exists beneath the light of one of the ceiling entrances. And within this habitat are some amazing lifeforms indeed.

Cave Ecologist and Research Professor Jut Wynne and colleagues discovered an new species of millipede living within this delicate and unique ecosystem. Named Austrotyla awishoshola n. sp. after a local Zuni term awisho(moss) and shola(many-legged creature). This millipede may have become restricted to the cave environment following the end of the Pleistocene, and is a spectacular example of how a species can exist solely in one specialized spot.

For more on this species and other cave life information for the southwest, check out the great links below:

Ecological Inventory of Lava Tube Caves, El Malpais National Monument, New Mexico. Jut Wynne. Colorado Plateau Research Station (note: this link leads to a .pdf document)

Southwest Caves Reveal New Forms of Life - USGS Fact Sheet. Jut Wynne and Charles Drost.