What if I told you the first people to paddle the length of the undammed Klamath River will be a group of high schoolers who had no whitewater experience a few years ago. In this episode I visit the Paddle Tribal Waters Program, which is teaching Indigenous youth to whitewater kayak so they can make the first descent of a freed Klamath and become educators and advocates for the river. It's an audacious plan--the undammed Klamath is unknown territory with some serious rapids. But it turns out the next generation is a group of incredibly capable, hopeful, uncommonly determined young people who are bringing their knowledge of and love for the river back to their communities and out into the world. It's enough to make the future seem a little more encouraging.

This podcast was made possible by support from American Rivers and was produced by Blue Canoe Studios with invaluable guidance from Kerry Donahue.

In this episode we hear from residents of the Copco Lake community who are missing one thing....a lake. The lake was created when the Copco One dam was built and it was drained in January prior to dam removal. I visited Copco Lake in February of this year to find a community reeling from this dramatic transformation to their town and experiencing a lot of grief, frustration, and uncertainty about the future. In this episode we give space to this sense of loss that exists amongst all the celebration and consider if a change in perspective could offer new opportunity for the town of Copco Lake.

This podcast was made possible by support from American Rivers and was produced by Blue Canoe Studios with invaluable guidance from Kerry Donahue.

In this episode we get nerdy about salmon. I speak to Tommy Williams, Research Fish Biologist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and Rob Lusardi, Assistant Professor at the University of California, Davis in Freshwater Ecology, about why salmon are such fascinating creatures and so important to river ecosystems, how dams take away their evolutionary strengths, and why dam removal could offer them their best shot at survival.

This podcast was made possible by support from American Rivers and was produced by Blue Canoe Studios with invaluable guidance from Kerry Donahue.