TWS’ Oregon Chapter launches podcast

The Oregon Chapter of The Wildlife Society is producing a conservation podcast to provide information to the public about conservation, success stories and other natural resource issues in the state and region.

John Goodell, the chapter’s president-elect, said he and the board, realized a podcast would be a good idea after taking part in a task force to propose natural resource funding in Oregon. “It never went anywhere and kind of died,” Goodell said. “Funding bills introduced to the state legislature never made it out of committee. Elected representatives were not hearing about it from their districts. It was a good example of a huge need for public outreach.”

Goodell said the ORTWS Board recognized the need for natural resource experts to communicate with the public more directly. “We need to tell our own story in this age of polarized content, where professional newsrooms are shrinking and nuanced reporting is disappearing,” Goodell said. “A primary goal of ORTWS is to aid public discussion of natural resource management in our state and to promote the application of sound science in resource management decisions.”

Called “Northwest Nature Matters,” the podcast, funded by the Oregon Chapter and in partnership with the Oregon Wildlife Foundation, includes causal conversations with regional natural resource experts, mostly in the Northwest. Goodell interviews them about their career as well, hopefully giving students and early career professionals insights into how to navigate the professional landscape.

The first few podcast episodes include success stories like the recovery of the peregrine falcon, sustainable funding solutions, the Oregon spotted frog, bighorn sheep conservation and bioethics in wildlife management. “I’m hoping to branch out more and try to represent as much taxa as possible and try to represent diverse professions within the field,” Goodell said.

The podcast launched Monday. New episodes will be available every other week.

Listen on the host website here. It’s also available on iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play and Spotify.