Transcript
Alexis : Hi, friends. How's everybody feeling today?
Plant People: The sun is shining, so it's a good day.
brett: I'm feeling good. It's been so hot down here. Hot, hot heat.
Plant People: And yeah it it's been in the 90s the last two days.
Alexis : Yeah.
Plant People: We went from early April, and we've talked about the crazy April weather, at least here in Kentucky, dry, hot, early, and then it turned off with frost, and now we're back into the 90s.
Plant People: But finally, we're going to get some rain, it looks like, this week. So, yeah, excited about that.
brett: Yeah, well, wait we have ah we have a guest from the the great north.
Alexis : Don't jinx it, okay? I'm not...
brett: what's What are things going like going on up in the Minnesota?
Plant People: Yeah.
Eli Sagor: Man, it's been dry. Yeah.
Plant People: it been dropped there also? Yeah, I was wondering. Yeah.
Eli Sagor: yeah Yeah, but it's been cool. It's kind of a funny spring. We started out real warm, and then it got cold. And so a lot of our trees have been you know small little leaves, just kind of in a holding pattern.
Plant People: Okay. The same.
Eli Sagor: But they'll start growing soon.
Plant People: <unk> Yeah. So because it sounds about like Kentucky spring. It's ah been a yo-yo. I would like to say that that's unusual, but it seems like it's becoming more typical, the variation. So maybe it's just me. I don't know.
brett: Yo-Yo's coming back in vogue.
Plant People: I don't know.
brett: Is that what you're telling me, Ray?
Plant People: It is. It never went out, Brett.
Alexis : I have seen a lot of cool yo-yo tricks online lately.
Plant People: Never went out. Never, never.
Alexis : So, you know, maybe it's a thing.
brett: Cool.
Plant People: I've got some scars from yo-yos. I mean, still to this very day, those of us that were in the extreme yo-yo crowd, you know, way back.
Alexis : Did there spikes on them?
Plant People: So if you sling them hard, you know, they were originally a weapon.
Alexis : How do you get scars from yo-yos?
Plant People: Do you not know this? They were designed originally back in you know antiquity as well. Yes. Yes. Yes, but no, if you're doing yo-yos right, you may end up with scars. I'm just saying, Alexis. Yeah, it's fine.
brett: Wow. i That's extreme yo yo-yoing. Well, we're going to we're going to talk a little bit about forests and forestry and all that kind of stuff today.
Plant People: ah Yeah, yeah.
brett: But before we do, I wanted to ask a question, but it's actually going be more more related than usual.
Plant People: Okay. Okay.
brett: And that is, what is the your favorite time of year to spend in the forest? Yeah.
Eli Sagor: Well, yeah, I'll jump in. And for you Kentuckians, that this might sound out of sync, but I love it when it's cold. ah Walking, clomping through, you know crunching down on cold snow, no bugs.
Plant People: Ooh,
Eli Sagor: Love it.
brett: yeah
Plant People: who I like that. That is a very valid point. The no bug angle is going to be hard to beat. Yeah. That's going to be.
Alexis : Considering the ticks are so bad already this year Yeah, that sounds pretty good.
Plant People: a
Plant People: Yeah.
Alexis : pretty good
Plant People: Yeah. Tick awareness is at an all time high right now. So absolutely. Yeah.
brett: all right you're up
Alexis : I'm going have to have say late spring, personally. Like, I don't want it to – yeah, the beginning of May in Kentucky, late spring is –
Plant People: Late spring.
Plant People: what Why is that? I mean, just because the leaf emergence or what's going on late spring?
Alexis : Yeah, it's like you kind of hit – it feels like ah the best of both worlds for a lot of stuff, right? Everything's still, like, fresh green, but it's not – usually not, like, miserably hot, um you know, usually.
Plant People: Oh, yeah.
Alexis : –
Plant People: thought i thought you would define it by the ephemerals. I know how you're an ephemeral fan. Oh, yeah.
Alexis : Yeah, yeah, I do like the ephemerals. It's that sweet spot.
Plant People: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Everything's lush.
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
brett: Ray, you have the like Red River Gorge ah blooming calendar. is it's it Is it still tattooed on your lower back?
Plant People: ah In my head, yes.
brett: No, no it's not.
Plant People: Now, I have to tape it onto my forearm.
Alexis : The tramp stamp, right?
Plant People: So when I'm walking, I know where all the big leaves are, you know, all the magnolias in the place.
brett: I see.
Alexis : Yeah.
Plant People: No, I love, ah you guys already know this, those, ah you know, that are with me week in and week out. But I love the fall time of the year when it starts to get crunchy underfoot, a different season of crunch.
Plant People: Okay, Eli.
brett: ah
Plant People: But when it starts to get crunchy underfoot and ah you get that fall smell in the air, not only that, but the colors, that is my absolute charm. for many, many reasons, but I love that time of year with the changing of the seasons.
Plant People: Really, really.
Alexis : Ray's also very, he he's a basic girly and loves him his pumpkin spice and his cinnamon. And we love that.
Plant People: You did not have to out me like that, Alexis.
Alexis : we love that for you, Ray.
brett: Flannel.
Plant People: Okay. I god um really appreciate you for that.
Alexis : but Ray, we all know, we all know, just, you know, own it, own your basic girly.
Plant People: Thank you. Okay.
brett: Yeah.
Plant People: Okay. Now Eli knows. Now Minnesota may know because he has a podcast also, Alexis.
Alexis : Yeah.
Eli Sagor: Thank you.
Plant People: The word is getting out. So.
brett: Yeah, Ray showed me his phone.
Alexis : Everybody will feel better.
Plant People: Yeah.
Alexis : Those other basic girlies out there.
brett: Ray showed me his...
Plant People: Okay.
brett: Well, he, cause you showed me that album in your phone that it was called fall selfies and there was like 8,000 pictures in it And I was kind of confused as to, I guess it seemed like a lot of the same content, but, um, you know, every day, every day springs eternal, I get a new day.
Plant People: Yeah.
Plant People: Yes. Yeah. There's some plants in there in my head. It's kind of yeah, over and over again. Every day is a good day.
Plant People: Well, Brett, we need to hear from you, buddy.
brett: um I think I'm going to go plus one on the, on the winter.
Plant People: Your favorite season.
brett: ah I think mainly because so like I ah get really hot when I'm walking around and when I have glasses, like basically anytime other than when it's cold, my glasses will just be completely steamed up the whole time.
Plant People: Okay. Okay.
brett: And so then it Becomes a tripping hazard.
Alexis : I... True.
brett: I already don't see very well in the first place. And so I think, ah you know, the the less sweating I can be doing is cool. And and the visibility on like deciduous stands where you can see through stuff across areas that you couldn't otherwise see.
Plant People: Okay.
brett: There's a charm to the lush ah little, you know, corridors created. But I think I think I prefer the the wintertime.
Plant People: Okay.
brett: It's also like more a more advanced time of year to work on your tree identification.
Plant People: oh
Alexis : ah
Plant People: Your winter botany skills, Brett?
Alexis : true
brett: Yeah. Yeah.
Plant People: Yeah, absolutely. And no ticks, so.
Alexis : I don't like ah trekking around like the Michelin, when like my Michelin man suit, like that's the way I feel.
Plant People: Brett's just out there in his t-shirt and shorty shorts.
Alexis : Yeah.
Plant People: Okay. In the winter, 21 degrees.
brett: right.
Plant People: Brett's just out in it. He's out in it, man.
brett: Just a pilgrim on the road.
Alexis : I'm definitely that kid and is in his big pink bunny snowsuit trekking around. so
brett: Yeah. I would be very tempted to like tip you over and see if you could get back up a turtle style.
Plant People: No.
Alexis : Honestly, it's very turtle-esque, yeah.
brett: Yeah. little turtle Well, we're joined by a really ah cool guest that I actually recently met up in Washington, DC. We were at ah a meeting in the same place and And we got to talking and he mentioned he he's interested in maybe starting some but more podcasting stuff up and in his neck of the woods. But Eli, would you mind to introduce yourself and kind of your affiliations and let the folks here know who you are?
Eli Sagor: Yeah, hey everybody, really glad to be here. I'm Eli Sagor, I'm an extension forestry specialist with the University of Minnesota. I'm based up at the Cloquet Forestry Center, which is our kind of, you could think of it as our school forest, 3,500 acres or so, a couple hours north of the Twin Cities, near the western end of Lake Superior, and really a beautiful spot, a great place to be.
brett: That's awesome. we had We've had some folks on from our, um our Robinson center in at Kentucky that has a lot of forestry focused stuff, the wood utilization center and some of their, they have retreats and all kinds of other stuff.
Plant People: Here, here.
brett: And so what, what kind of stuff do you typically get into in your job? Are you doing mostly education? Are you doing more research, more like what's, what's the, I know there's no such thing as a, as a normal day in extension, but what is, what do some of your normal days or typical days look like?
Eli Sagor: Well, my best days are in the woods. I do two things. I, yeah, I do.
Plant People: here here
Eli Sagor: I do two things. I don't have a research appointment. I'm a hundred percent extension, but maybe it's say umm ah I'm a 50% extension, 50% administration. You can all boo if you want.
Eli Sagor: But several years ago.
Plant People: Uh.
Alexis : Hmm.
brett: Blue this man.
Alexis : felton
Eli Sagor: Yeah. Right. I took on a new role as program leader for our university of Minnesota extension, natural resources programs. Just got a great team of folks. So i I provide leadership to that group. That includes aquatic invasive species, pollinator education, forestry, and our Minnesota Master Naturalist team. So it's a good group.
Eli Sagor: So increasingly, it's about kind of leadership supervision strategy with with that group. And I love that. I've been doing extension for 26 years. and even though, as I just said, my best days are in the woods and I can talk a little more about that. I i also love working with people and um thinking about ideas. How can we do what we're doing a little bit better? How can we innovate? How can we keep people on their toes, use new technologies, new ways of connecting, all those kinds of things. And just love doing that with the group.
Eli Sagor: When I'm not in my admin role, I am an extension forestry specialist. Most of my extension teaching is with professional resource managers. Not all of it, but most of it is. we have an organization called the Sustainable Forest Education Cooperative.
Eli Sagor: And I swear, I'm the luckiest person in in extension to be running this group. We've got 56 now organizational members. They are ah public and private you know companies and agencies, tribal natural resource agencies,
Eli Sagor: wood products companies, soil and water conservation districts, you name it. Collectively, they employ just about all the professional natural resource managers in Minnesota.
Eli Sagor: And my job with that group is to find out what their professional development and continuing education needs are, and then work with them to plan and deliver them. It's awesome.
brett: Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: And, you know, my best days and I, um, I have some pictures of this that I have as my desktop background. I just love our standing in a circle of people in the woods, people whose job is to care for these incredible, diverse, natural ecosystems that provide food and fuel and fiber to meet our needs.
Eli Sagor: And that are also, again, diverse, native functioning ecosystems. Forestry is awesome. And when we think about You know, the big challenges facing us, climate change and invasive species and all these things.
Eli Sagor: These are the folks, they don't think about these things in theory. They're thinking about it and managing it and making decisions every day.
brett: Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: And boy, pretty quickly you get past the fluff and into what do I really do about this? What should we do on this piece of ground to deal with this? And boy, I love those conversations. I always learn a ton from folks. So that's that's kind of what I do.
Plant People: ah You said ah you learned from those folks. It was interesting. I started after Brett kind of introduced ah you as a, that you'd be coming on as a guest. at I was looking into that group that you just mentioned. It was interesting. It seemed like there was this focus that isn't always the case, but this focus of peer to peer. Did I, is that correct with that group that as far as a learning model, I kind of picked up on that. It wasn't really a top down model. It seemed like a lot of the interconnectivity of that group is one to the other. It, As far as the flow of info, is that right?
Eli Sagor: that That very much is right. Yeah, a big um kind of thread running through a lot of the work that my team and I do is about, especially with this work with professionals, is about elevating the voices of practitioners.
Eli Sagor: So again, these are folks that spend every day working in the woods. And I can talk about this paper I just read or a talk I just heard, you know, Brett give at a conference in Washington, D.C., but their eyes are going to glaze over pretty quickly when they hear about that sort of thing.
Alexis : just
brett: Especially if they tell it if you tell them it's for me, that's a good way to clear out a room.
Eli Sagor: If they know who you are, we're done.
Alexis : Yeah. Snore. Snooze fest.
Eli Sagor: That's right.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: That's right.
Plant People: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: But you know, a lot of us are good at clearing out the room. and, and they, you know, again, their their eyes glaze over so fast once they realize you're reading from a script or you're, you know, just got to get through my 400 slides.
Eli Sagor: and And when you can talk about real problems, real issues,
Alexis : then
Eli Sagor: you know i don't have all the answers and they don't have all the answers i don't mean to say that practitioners know everything that all of us need to know but boy when we come together and and maybe i did read a paper about some new technique that somebody tried and maybe they would then say well yeah that sounds good but i don't know if that would work in this situation but it might work over there boy those are good conversations and well this sounds great but would a logger ever
brett: Mm-hmm.
Plant People: Uh-huh.
Eli Sagor: bid on that sale. And if a logger wouldn't buy that sale, then we're never going to get that treatment done because that's how you get forest managed is through timber sales.
Alexis : Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: And so, you know, there's economics in there, there's operations, there's communication, there's ecology, there's conservation, there's climate adaptation, there's all, i mean, any number of issues.
Eli Sagor: um And, and, and I just really deeply believe that we're, you know, no, no one person or even group of people has all the answers we need. And so, too long, especially in academia, and we try to, you know, we like to be on the stage, we think we've got all the answers, because we do this fancy research.
Eli Sagor: And, um you know, in some fields, maybe we do, you know, i I wouldn't want to be experimenting on the fly with cancer research, or, or you know, brain surgery,
brett: Right.
Eli Sagor: But, um you know, a field like forestry, and I think the same is true of horticulture, you know, is is as much about trying things out and seeing what we can learn as it is about, you know formal experimentation and study.
Eli Sagor: So, yeah, you're right, Ray. We really do try to put practitioners up in front of the group. and You know, there's a reason I said it's standing in a circle as opposed to somebody on the podium, because we're all we're all contributing to that dialogue.
Plant People: You know, we really talk about that concept a lot and and I've thought about it a lot more, ah but with Master Gardeners because, ah you know, and they they quickly realize this. when It's about a 12-week program here in Kentucky, at three eight hours a session.
Plant People: So ah we have them for quite a period of time. But I stress early on that they'll learn as much from each other through those informal, you know, connections that they make one with the other as they will for me.
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
Plant People: And they know that's absolutely true after about the second episode of Listen to Me Drone On. But i always stress that, and it's just so true. And when I was in the eastern part of Kentucky, I did i worked a lot more with forestry.
Plant People: I was in a county that was about 80-plus percent forested. And those informal connections, peer-to-peer, you know, one person knows their neighbor. I ah quickly come to appreciate I could have a program and and bring in a very, you know, good Dr. Stringer or someone that's very good in forestry for a formal talk and not have much participation.
Plant People: And I kept racking my brain, what's going on, what's going on. But I quickly learned that if I kind of went out and met with a neighbor and then he talked to his neighbor, especially if one of them made money logging, had a good experience with a logger.
Plant People: And, you know, they, then I started asking all these questions and that's really how I made inroads, no pun intended.
Eli Sagor: Thank you.
brett: ah
Plant People: forestster joke But that's a really how i made inroads with that group.
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
Plant People: And it it was tapping into that kind of personal relationships and edging in that way rather than you know coming strictly from the university. And then we could apply you know the information that we had once we got to know the people and and figuring out those networks and how they communicated with each other.
Plant People: But really interesting how, especially that community, I come from a family of loggers, how they got information, ah good and bad, ah but you know learning about things, finding landowners if you're logger and vice versa, if you're a landowner, finding a reputable you know, longer, but interesting topics, super interesting to me.
Eli Sagor: Well, and so much of that comes down to trust and, and, uh, and, and it's those relationships and it's trust and trust comes from conversation.
Plant People: Yes.
Eli Sagor: And, you know, I think it's interesting too. So you mentioned Jeff Stringer, Jeff, I've known for many, many years. He flew me out to Kentucky. I made my first visit to Lexington, and, and the area, uh, to the state actually, uh, probably 20 years ago now with Billy Thomas and, and, uh, and Renee Williams and Brett.
Plant People: wow. Wow.
Plant People: Oh, yeah.
Alexis : Bye-bye.
Eli Sagor: Oh yeah.
Plant People: You know all the gap folks here, yeah.
Eli Sagor: And, um,
brett: yeah
Eli Sagor: Yeah. so So good times and um and yeah great. so So I know i have a sense for, you know, Jeff's just an outstanding educator. And I think what you said is is still true.
Eli Sagor: It's, you know, it's often Jeff comes in with a huge amount of knowledge and and he's such a good educator that, you know, he's going to come in with questions to
Plant People: Yes. Yes.
Eli Sagor: But yeah I mean, you learn, you learn as much from the questions as from the content. I mean, if I start, if someone brings me in to give a talk and I start rattling off facts, those are going to go in one ear and out the other.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: But if we have a conversation, you're going to see how, you know, how a person who, who has a lot of experience and knowledge in a topic, you're going to learn how they think about it. What are the questions they're asking?
Eli Sagor: The answers are going to differ. Nobody has the answers that I need for my particular situation.
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: But if I know the right questions to ask as a learner, then I can ask those questions and I can usually find a pretty good answer. And if I see someone who knows a lot about the topic, um if I know what questions they're asking, ah that's more important than the answer. So i yeah I really deeply, as I said before, believe in the value of conversation and and exchange. And if we think that, oh, yeah only people with a lot of letters after their name you know are worth listening to, we're just missing the boat completely.
brett: Yeah. Well, I want to, I want to return to the, to the pedagogy and like outreach the way that you're thinking about doing that in a second, but I want to jump into some more plant nerd, forestry nerd stuff and just hear like, what are some cool things that you've seen over the last few years? Just things that come to mind that you were like, oh, that's a cool solution. Or like, this is an interesting thing. And maybe in the process, talk about like what, what the issues are in Minnesota in particular that people are maybe trying to confront.
Eli Sagor: Yeah, absolutely. So a few members of my team have been working on a project called Climate Ready Woodlands. um Emily Dombeck, Anna Stockstad and ah Angie Gupta have been doing this and they have been. So that's really, as the name suggests, Climate Ready Woodlands. It's really grounded in helping our forests adapt to a changing climate. And we're really seeing ah noticeably and measurably shorter winters here in Minnesota, as one example, longer growing seasons.
Eli Sagor: a milder winters, so we're not getting the winter kill on some non-native insects that we might like to see, um and that we might have gotten 10 or 20 years ago.
brett: ah
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
brett: Yeah.
Eli Sagor: ah So this, and that affects tree ranges. For many species, at least in our part of the world, tree species ranges, how far they go, you know, where they exist is is cold limited.
Eli Sagor: So, you know, someone, Alexis, you said earlier, you feel like the Michigan man when it's 21 degrees, I think I heard you say, well, that's, That's that's spring in Minnesota.
Alexis : Yeah. Yeah. I'm just...
Eli Sagor: that That's a mild day here.
Plant People: Perspective, Alexis, yeah.
Eli Sagor: yeah twenty we We start talking winter at 20 below and you know and and a lot of species, anyway, you know as as we see fewer days of 20 below and 30 below, that that really has a big impact on what trees can grow where.
brett: Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: um And likewise, you know're we're seeing ah as we have hotter and and different summers, you know some some some insects are reproducing more rapidly and causing problems. so Our forests are changing that climate ready woodlands work is grounded in the idea in combining really deep knowledge about native plant communities here in Minnesota.
Eli Sagor: We have an excellent ecological classification system with a new kind of science about the client the suitability of various species in a you know to thrive in a future climate.
Eli Sagor: So it's hard to predict, but we do have a lot of knowledge and information that climate modelers and plant ecologists and others can come up with. And that's just been fascinating.
Plant People: Are you trying to reconcile that?
Eli Sagor: Right.
Plant People: ah Reconcile that with the age of trees? I mean, in my mind, as you're having this conversation, I'm like, oh my goodness.
Eli Sagor: Yep.
Plant People: ah How do you work with the long-term perennial and kind of watch that? That's kind of interesting. Like, how do you reconcile that?
Eli Sagor: Very long-term perennial. So, I mean, in Minnesota, a standard rotation from the time you plant a tree to a final harvest can be well over a hundred years.
Plant People: Yeah.
Eli Sagor: And the climate is changing rapidly.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: So if the tree is well suited to today's conditions, it's maybe going to have a problem at the end of that rotation.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: So anyway, a lot of that's going on, not to get too deep into it, but it's, that's one of the things, Brett, that we're seeing a lot of attention to this concept of assisted migration.
Plant People: Hmm.
Alexis : Yeah.
Eli Sagor: How far should we be moving species? There are hazards, especially with moving nursery stock.
brett: Hmm. Mm-hmm. Ah.
Eli Sagor: You're all very familiar. Jumping worms are a big issue here. um You know, moving stock can have can carry risks. And so there's a lot to balance there. But we're thinking a lot about approaches to climate adaptation and and how we can steward our forests into the future, maintaining their productive capacity and the jobs and economic activity that people depend on and also needing to think differently. We we never had to think about climate adaptation, but we really do now.
brett: What are, what are the, like some of the key species? Cause you know, you're talking about 20 below and that's for 40 below that's, that's pretty serious. what What are some of the kind of key species that are, you know, most, I guess most economically identified as important, maybe most ecologically identified as important.
brett: I realize that's kind of like picking your favorite child, but ah maybe there's, there's a couple at least.
Eli Sagor: No, I can do it. I can do it.
Alexis : He's like, I got it.
Eli Sagor: ah
Alexis : No no problem.
Plant People: He's got it.
Eli Sagor: Yep. Black spruce.
brett: I do have a favorite child and it is.
Plant People: and He's got it.
Eli Sagor: I do.
Alexis : if
Plant People: And it's this one.
Eli Sagor: Yeah. I love black spruce. I just think it's the coolest species. Black spruce is this tall, skinny, scraggly looking, dark, you know, thing that just stands up straight like a, like a sentinel out in the woods.
Eli Sagor: And it, it only grows places that nothing else wants to grow. It grows in bogs, acidic peatlands, wet, You know, his feet are wet all year. ah It grows slowly. You'll be looking at a four inch stem diameter and the thing will be 180 years old. They're just cool.
Eli Sagor: And they they stand, you know, they're just out there in any conditions and they're happy about it. I love black spruce. They're just just awesome. You can really, they're very important economically. They're they're great. You know, they sometimes grow a little faster than what I said, but they'll be happy just hanging out there.
Eli Sagor: and they're really important economically they are an important source of fiber to the wood products industry you can only harvest them when it's really really frozen you know when it's frozen enough that you can get a gigantic uh piece of harvesting equipment out there into the middle of a bog and it's just a a neat environment peatlands of course are super important ecologically and in terms of climate because they store an absolutely immense amount of carbon
Alexis : Hmm.
Eli Sagor: So they're cool systems, cool trees. Tamarack are another one that often coexist with black spruce. They're our only deciduous conifer that's native to Minnesota. So that means they are a conifer.
Eli Sagor: They have needles and cones, but they drop them every year. And we get a lot of calls from homeowners that are maybe just bought a new house or property and, oh, all my trees are dying around October.
Alexis : Oh, yeah.
brett: Oh no.
Plant People: Yeah.
Eli Sagor: No, they're not.
Alexis : That's our bald cypress group.
Eli Sagor: yeah No, they're not dying.
Plant People: am.
Eli Sagor: Just be patient.
brett: They're living fully. They're experiencing a ah bald period.
Eli Sagor: Exactly.
brett: Let them, let them, let them live.
Eli Sagor: Yep.
Alexis : jimmy
Eli Sagor: They're lightening their load to get through winter. Yeah, they don't, you know, they're doing fine.
Plant People: i have
brett: Yeah, I think thinking about the just the the variation in the way that that the forests shift. And of course, there's not this demarcation line where above this things growing below thing. There's this trend, these transition zones. But going and experiencing like Alexis was recently out in Utah and while she was there, got to do some hiking and some other, and it was sent. I, she must've sent me almost as ah many pictures of trees as Ray has a fall selfies.
brett: ah And it yeah, cause it was just, it's so, it's like, i mean, you might as well be on Mars if if you haven't traveled to those places, as far as the different, just the different feel and, and adaptation and the speed of growth and water availability, all that stuff's really, really cool.
Alexis : Look at this one. Look at this one.
Plant People: Look at this one.
Alexis : What about this one?
Plant People: Look at this one's different. now
Alexis : certainly
Plant People: And ah you're fairly close to the Great Lakes. Is that correct? You're northeast. I'm trying to orient my brain to where you're located there.
Eli Sagor: No, that's exactly right. So we're just, my office is just about 20 miles west of the westernmost tip of the Great Lakes system.
Plant People: Oh, wow.
Eli Sagor: So the if Lake Superior looks like a wolf's head. And the Duluth, Minnesota is sitting right on top of the nose, the wolf's nose.
Plant People: Yep.
Eli Sagor: And my office about, I don't know, 15, 18 miles due west of there.
Plant People: I mean, I always said.
Eli Sagor: So yeah, right at the end of the Great Lakes.
Plant People: What a cool area. I mean, what a great area.
Eli Sagor: Oh, it is.
Plant People: I mean, how does how does that ah like impact the job, ah you know, professionally that you do being that close to those kind of ah geographic features as the Great Lakes? I mean, it has to impact it some, I guess.
Eli Sagor: It's awesome. I mean, we've got plenty of water.
Plant People: Yeah.
Eli Sagor: you know A little different story out in Utah. I know you were looking at the trees, Alexis, but yeah but we yeah water is an issue out there.
Plant People: Yeah.
Eli Sagor: We don't have problems with water. We've got plenty of water, at least for now.
Plant People: no
Eli Sagor: But it's ah it's amazing. The world's largest inland shipping port is in Duluth, Minnesota. Lake Superior, goodness, I i should. if If other team members were here, I'd I get it right, but I'm pretty sure it's the second, might be the second deepest lake in the world and maybe the largest lake by volume or is that Lake Baikal?
Eli Sagor: I don't know exactly, but it's enormous if it's number one.
Alexis : I was say like Baical that's where I went
Eli Sagor: Yeah, number one or number two.
brett: It's a big old lake is what I'm hearing.
Plant People: Big old lake.
Eli Sagor: it's and it's It's awesome.
Alexis : edm
Eli Sagor: Rugged, rugged lake shore.
Alexis : very large
Eli Sagor: Yeah, it's it's it's super neat. And a lot of Minnesota is not developed. We have a really interesting mix of land land ownership and land use. Only about a third of our forest land is in private ownership.
Eli Sagor: The rest is owned and managed by counties, by states, by the federal government.
brett: Wow.
Eli Sagor: Well over half of our forest land is in state ownership. So that creates a really interesting mix. You have some very large acreage owners that can do things at a massive scale. And then a whole lot of others who have 40 acres in the woods or some hunting land or whatever else.
Eli Sagor: And so, again, it just makes for an interesting mix.
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: But there's a lot of woods around here. lot of places to go walking in the woods, to go hunting, to go obviously fishing. We got, well, we call it, they call us the land of 10,000 lakes, but it's closer to 15.
Eli Sagor: And it's, you know, there's, like I said, lots of water and and lots of big open spaces to get out in it. So it's a great place. I didn't grow up in Minnesota. I grew up in the East and it's, um it's just, I've been here now for 26 years. So and Some days I still feel new, but but it's, yeah, I chose this place and I just love it.
Plant People: Yeah, I got to spend a little bit of time in the Upper Peninsula a couple years ago, and and I'd never been up that far north into that area. And the first thing I noticed, I was like, wow, the log trucks and the logging equipment up here is way bigger. It's way different than the eastern part of Kentucky. I was like, goodness. And just... the The conifers, you know, i was like, well, they can actually grow evergreens up here.
Plant People: Wow, that's different.
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
Plant People: But it was just, it just struck me, the quality of the air where I was at, it just, and being around the Great Lakes, it was seeing a body of water that big with tides and not smelling salt.
Plant People: My brain could not comprehend that, looking out at all that water.
Eli Sagor: Yeah, I've been there.
Plant People: What a great area. Yeah, it's awesome.
Eli Sagor: Yeah, it is.
brett: Well, one of the things that you know we were talking about earlier before I derailed us on to Cool Species and and that that discussion was just thinking about like information, delivery, communication. you know We work in extension. We work with a lot of technical assistance folks. And um Ray and I actually did ah an epic podcast episode a few, maybe a year or two ago, talking about I'm going to date Ray here, though he looks so so young and juvenescent and full of energy.
brett: ah He he worked worked through the introduction of the Internet into ah extension, like that it was like the Internet's coming, computers, get rid of the giant file cabinets, etc.
Alexis : Hmm.
Plant People: Not the case.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
brett: We've kind of got this this new thing with with AI, and I won't take us too far down the AI rabbit hole, but one of the things I'm struck by with your programming is that you've can kind of been working to implement technology while not losing contact with that human nature of the work of extension. um ah ah made a note about the the My Minnesota Woods project, and know you're interested also in in maybe doing some podcasting and that kind of stuff. Can you talk a little bit about how you...
brett: figure that out as a team or as a person, figuring out how to how to communicate in the digital age when we're still solving problems in the analog physical world.
Eli Sagor: Yeah, absolutely. I'm glad you asked it. And I'm right there next to Ray. I, I, uh, back in 07. In fact, I mentioned earlier that, uh, that Jeff Stringer flew me down to Kentucky and that was, uh, shortly after we launched this website, my Minnesota woods.
Eli Sagor: And we were one of the, I'm not going to say we were the first, but relatively early in the development of kind of digital extension work in forestry in Minnesota.
Plant People: Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: And, and that was, um, that was a lot of fun. So that's always been an interest of mine, but the story breath that, that, um, you and I talked about at that conference a few weeks ago is, is um really fascinating to me too.
Eli Sagor: So in a nutshell, basically I found, um I found us, you know i found myself reading this sort of editorial calendar of our calendar of our monthly email update.
Eli Sagor: Everybody's got a monthly email update and that's because theyre email works. People sometimes read their email and it's it's it's a good medium.
Alexis : Yeah.
brett: Bye.
Eli Sagor: But I was reading it and I was thinking, you know, this content is really good, but how could we humanize this? How can we, in the era of AI, how can we remind people that we are actual living, breathing people that live in your community and are thinking and solving problems or trying to?
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: And I started to think about conversation, just like we were talking and And it started to think, well, what if we made a conversational version of this? What if we talked about the monthly email update? What's going on in the Minnesota woods this month that you need to be thinking about?
Eli Sagor: um And that led to a number of other team members. I kind of pitched this idea and there was a little bit of skepticism. What do you mean we What if we make mistakes?
Plant People: Thank you.
Eli Sagor: And what are we going to do? The original idea was to do it via video with basically no editing. Hey, we're we're rolling. We're going. Let's keep it human. That's the point. Sure, we're going to flub and cough every now and then or whatever else.
Eli Sagor: and maybe we clean it up a bit, but let's be human. And, ah you know, we're not too far down that road. We're still experimenting. But Emily Donbeck, a member of our team, is I'm really doing a lot of thinking behind the scenes about platforms and how we want to set this up.
Eli Sagor: And it's going to be fun. We're, we're getting closer. I was at a conference last week in North Carolina, did some field video, field, audio recordings, which were, um, uh, which were good, good learning experience.
Eli Sagor: Some of them came out really well. Some of them I learned where you can't record and get anything useful at all, which is essentially a room full of people.
Alexis : Yeah.
brett: yeah
Eli Sagor: But, um, Anyway, we're we're experimenting, we're learning, we're going to flub some things, we're going to make some mistakes, but we're moving in the direction that you all have already adopted with this podcast that we're on right now. And, um you know, we're we're gonna we're going to learn as we go.
brett: Yeah.
Eli Sagor: But that's that's really been a lot of fun. And we we also had a podcast, you know when the pandemic hit, um a good friend of mine, Kyle Gill and a co-worker of mine at the Cloquet Forestry Center,
Eli Sagor: We started a podcast called Camp 8. Camp 8 is a an old red pine stand at the Cloquet Forestry Center where we work. And it's a stand that, for various reasons, that's where we take most people to when we do woods tours. And so it seemed like a good name. It's a gathering point.
Eli Sagor: And we just had, I think it was 12 episodes on how the pandemic has changed life for resource managers who work in the woods. and you know, just like throughout society, some people were really deeply and heavily impacted and others less so.
Alexis : Yeah.
Eli Sagor: I mean, if you work alone in the woods, you can maybe still go to work even during the pandemic.
Plant People: Bye.
Eli Sagor: It was interesting.
brett: got social distancing built into the job description.
Eli Sagor: ah Yep, exactly.
Alexis : yeah
Eli Sagor: And so it was interesting to explore some of that and that experience, and it didn't last too long. We did it for six months. um We loved it. Audience really liked it. I don't know why we didn't continue it, but, um But that that left me with that that understanding of of the power of conversation and of just asking and and spending time and listening.
Eli Sagor: And I just think it's it's a tremendous medium.
Plant People: So what a great conversation.
brett: The number...
Alexis : I like... I
Plant People: Yeah.
brett: I was gonna say the number of times that we're out and, and Alexis and I are both pretty loud people. um And people will say they're like, find us from across the room and be like, I i recognize your voice from you're you're on the pod.
Eli Sagor: Oh, yeah.
brett: And it's like, whoa, the power of, I don't know if that's, I mean, yeah, that we're loud enough that they can hear us across the room, but yeah.
Alexis : i know, it's a little...
Plant People: The power projection. Yeah. Well, mean, that's kind of what he was talking about. ah Like a Eli, the power of amplification. How do we do that? Like in extension, we don't want to, I mean, I don't know if you guys have this up up north, but we don't want to be the best kept secret.
Plant People: And when I hear that, I kind of cringe a little bit.
Eli Sagor: Right.
Plant People: So, you know We've had lots of discussions here on a state level, and individual level.
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
Plant People: I'm based within a county, so I'm very fortunate um you know to be ah in the community in a county. ah You probably have a statewide focus, but no matter what your focus and range is, like if you have a great program or a great idea how to connect people, and that's really what it boils down to, it's not about programs.
Plant People: It's about people that the programs are for and You know, how do we do that with audio and video? And I love love Brett's always the humanist angle. And I really love that. How do we how do we match all that up and stick in a blender and make it come out and be something significant?
Plant People: And I think the tools are there. It's just the the tools are developing. They've certainly gotten better on the audio and video side. It doesn't matter if it's teams and how you feel about teams.
Plant People: Some i' feel about teams the way others feel about email, but at least it has, yeah, it has the video engagement piece, but yeah, there's all these tools.
brett: It's the purple people eater. Yeah.
Plant People: It's just leveraging those to amplify your voice. So, you know, when you have good things to say and connecting people and it seems like a lot of your background is kind of doing that or, you know trying to find ways to do that as I did a little bit of reading in preparation for today.
Plant People: It's pretty cool stuff. And Brett, you called me out when I first came into Extension. we were not networked. That was in 96 when I came into Extension in Kentucky. and And I didn't know what to think.
Plant People: I came into an office and they said, no, we don't have the internet here. And I like, do what? Very interesting.
brett: Like if you don't have the publication already printed in a file cabinet, you are not handing the publication to someone or, you know, it's like, come back, um um I'll mail it to you.
Plant People: Yes.
Plant People: Yes.
brett: You know, we'll find the file maybe.
Alexis : Yeah.
Plant People: Yeah.
Alexis : I can make you some copies.
brett: But then, yeah, even the.
Plant People: And that system worked at the time, but it was not at the speed and the expectations of the speed were not what they have now.
brett: Sure.
Plant People: And I find now that people have access to information.
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
Plant People: They just sometimes need someone to help them make sense of it, to kind of frame it.
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
Plant People: So it's like the job has changed over time in extension and it's still evolving, but it's kind of different.
brett: Yeah. Yeah.
Plant People: And I think it relates to all this access to information and the way we learn, the way we gather information, the way we seek it. So, yeah.
Eli Sagor: Boy, I think you just said a mouthful there. I think it's really super interesting. I totally agree. We're not in an information deprived age anymore. And back in 1996, even a lot had changed by then, but still information was a lot harder to come by.
brett: Thank you.
Eli Sagor: You just talked about that.
Plant People: It was a gateway.
Eli Sagor: And right.
Plant People: Yeah.
Eli Sagor: And now it's a fire hose or maybe even a tsunami.
Alexis : this
Plant People: It absolutely.
Eli Sagor: I don't know. We're all just awash in it.
Plant People: It's a typhoon or something. Yeah, it is.
Eli Sagor: Right. It's too much. And
Plant People: It's paralysis.
Alexis : i said
Eli Sagor: And just like you said, yeah, we need, what we really need is, is help making sense of it, interpreting it, applying it. I mean, AI has just, you know, to you know that there's, there's way more than you could ever want, but a lot of it doesn't really apply, or maybe it's a little sketchier, or is that really what, is is that really true?
Plant People: Yeah.
Alexis : What is the source for this?
brett: Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: I don't know. Yeah, exactly. And, and, you know, and, and we, we need to lean on one another, i think a little bit more than we have. And I think you know, again, I think coming together, asking good questions, um learning how we think about these things, how we make sense of things is more important than ever.
Eli Sagor: Yeah. Information's nice, but, you know, again, I said before, if I come in and just start dumping information, it's going to go in one ear and out the other.
Alexis : Mm-hmm.
Eli Sagor: If we can connect around a shared problem or a shared need, that's a whole different scenario. And that's, that's where we're trying to be. And I think, as you said, Ray, these,
Eli Sagor: tools are opening a lot of doors for us. And it's a little bit ironic. You know, we started calling this thing, the the human, my Minnesota woods, this, this project that we're working on, we haven't even published it yet. We're, you know it'll be out sometime soon.
Eli Sagor: I don't know when, um but it'll be out when the time's right.
Alexis : citizenson
Eli Sagor: But, you know, it is a little bit ironic about that we're calling it the human thing and it's all going through, you know, YouTube and Spotify and whatever, but, but the human voice is, is, is, is big.
Eli Sagor: So.
Plant People: Go YouTube.
Alexis : Well,
Plant People: I've got to install a NSYNC aerator tonight. And I saw YouTube for the rescue. Yeah. Learning. Go ahead, Alex.
Alexis : yeah, i like i I appreciate the you know human aspect.
Plant People: Sorry.
Alexis : One thing that I've kind of learned um you know is that There's this to kind of this um perception, this perfection that comes out of, you know, especially with universities, right? And we're supposed to be the answer to all. So not only, but, you know reversing that and okay, not only do I want to hear what expertise you all have as boots on the ground, but also that idea of how,
Alexis : Can we best give you the information that you are looking for? i think is a big a big thing. You know, we a lot of time have the information and then it's, you know, our job as extension folks to put that in a version that is the most suitable for you and the most human. And and also people are just desperately, I think, and and I can say this for myself, looking for real people, right? Because it's so just...
Alexis : it's, it sucks to feel like you suck, right?
Plant People: Yeah.
Alexis : So you see these people who are just perfect, and oh, they have all the answers, and they're doing everything perfectly, you know, and that's, that's not um all always something that lifts up our farmers or our, you know, growers or or these people in this industry we work with, they want someone who does cough on camera a little bit, you know or flubs or gets caught up in their words, but there's we know they're smart, but there's ah there's a level of trust that comes with that. I think of this is a real person. i know they're trying to help me and they're comfortable asking the questions, right? It also creates just sort of like this level of of comfort and frustration.
Alexis : to to work with people. and that's how we make those relationships in order to ask the questions and get get real answers, not just what they think we want to hear on how we help them. So it's glad it's good to know there's other people thinking along those lines of like, I don't have to be the perfect extension specialist with all of the answers.
Alexis : I know I don't have them and I want to actually be a real person. So it's and always nice to hear.
Plant People: Human touch, yeah.
brett: Yeah, it reminds me of in so in in music, you know you have this metronome where the the beat is just perfectly laid out, du the and then you'll have these really famous tracks that have moved millions of people, they've changed...
brett: And they are famously like rushing the tempo or dragging the tempo. And it's that like when AI music came onto the scene, the perfection of being on the beat, it felt kind of weird because like songs will naturally change tempos across the the course of a song even.
brett: the band members know each other. They've been playing so long that they all do it together, which is kind of crazy. It reminds me of that, like just perfection and the imperfection is like the, a new ah value that maybe we can put forth to say, look, we're not going to give you a thing where we rub, you know, pat you on the back and tell you everything you've said is amazing and perfect.
Alexis : Yeah.
brett: Like a, one of the AI chatbots does, and we're not going to give you this polished thing that maybe goes down easy, but we can give you some taste of reality and perspective and experience that's uh well ray mentioned i i tend to be the bring in the humanity and so i'm i'm curious this is something i've i've asked other people before eli do you have in your memory a a single like archetypal exact tree that comes to mind
Alexis : Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
brett: when we talk about the idea of a tree, like a tree from childhood. Some people have a one that had a rope swing or Ray maybe talk about the, uh, the dogwood that his grandma had. Um, is there, is there a particular tree from memory that from your either childhood or early life or any, any time in your life that comes to mind when you think of the tree?
Eli Sagor: You know, I think that's just a fascinating question. And I think maybe surprisingly to someone working in forestry or maybe not, but the answer is kind of no. um No, not an individual tree, but yes, forests, tons of them.
brett: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Plant People: Mm, the ecology of it.
Eli Sagor: um is Is there one? Yeah, when I think of um the archetypal, you know, forest, yeah, absolutely. And it's kind of, for me, it's kind of northern Minnesota, peatland or something like it.
Eli Sagor: um dark conifer foliage. Maybe it's black spruce. Maybe it's balsam fir or another species. Maybe there's some aspen mixed in with that light fluttering foliage. um But yeah, it's the woods. um it's It's the woods for me. It's that whole environment. It's the sound there. It's not an individual. It's a system.
Eli Sagor: And I don't know if that reflects, if that's forest versus horticulture or if that's just me versus other people, but
Alexis : ah
brett: No, that's amazing.
Eli Sagor: um But no, it's not an individual tree. It's it's that system.
brett: ah That's a much better answer than my silver maple that was in my parents' backyard that had a branch that I could like barely hop up onto. And then as I got taller, I was able to help.
Eli Sagor: They're all good.
brett: Yeah.
Eli Sagor: No, it's no better than that answer.
Plant People: you
Alexis : Comfort.
Eli Sagor: They're all good. And I've fallen out of trees. There have been lots of memorable trees in my life. too But no, when i when i when my mind goes that way to the archetypal thing, and it might actually it might be that Camp 8.
Alexis : yeah
Eli Sagor: Now that I think about it, that red pine stand on the Cloquet Forestry Center, there's such a rich human history there.
brett: Mm.
Eli Sagor: There's a visual, there's something about home there, not in a possessive way, but in a ah in in in a sense of comfort.
Alexis : comfort
Eli Sagor: Yeah, exactly, Alexis. And yeah, and I feel lucky enough to have a few of those, but that one is pretty close to the top of the list.
brett: That's amazing. Well, I think, you know, this conversation already feels way too short. And so we'll have to plan a round two. Maybe we'll dive in on some other. um I'd love to hear more about.
Alexis : More trees.
brett: Yeah.
Plant People: More trees, more forest.
Eli Sagor: Sounds good.
brett: Well, always. We really appreciate you joining us. um If you're out there and you enjoyed this episode, please do take the time to leave us a quick review, a thumbs up, ah five stars, wherever you're listening. It just depends on what kind of rating system, but also share it with somebody who maybe would like to hear about this and and learn from this conversation. We,
brett: Post these every week, usually on Mondays. You can follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts. we You can also contact us at hortculturepodcast at gmail.com.
brett: You can follow us on Instagram at hortculturepodcast. Leave us a comment there. ah Follow us. Tag us in your stories if you're doing something horticulturally relevant and fun.
Alexis : this is
brett: Until then, thank you very much, Eli, and we'll see you all down the road.
