Ep. 86 - Good News from the Wild: Conservation & Colonel Lieber

In this episode, we spotlight real stories of nature bouncing back—from species saved to ecosystems restored. These aren’t theories or “what-ifs”… they’re proof that conservation works.

We share three powerful stories that show what happens when people step in, take action, and make a difference for the natural world.

And along the way, Travey brings in a piece of Indiana history—highlighting Colonel Richard Lieber, the visionary behind Indiana’s state park system, and how his leadership helped protect some of the landscapes we still enjoy today.

It’s a mix of hope, history, and real-world impact—the kind of episode that reminds you that progress is possible.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:09

Howdy! Welcome to Busted Knees and Pretty Trees. I believe things are officially in high gear around here. The camping gear is airing out. The farmer's tan is returned. I've already lost a pair of binoculars.

SPEAKER_00 0:24

And a phone camera.

SPEAKER_02 0:26

And I hope you're all finding your way outside as well. Last episode, we had urban wildlife biologist Jessica Merkling from the Indiana Department of Natural Resources on. Despite Patrick's expectations, she was not a heavy assault trooper with close air support demanding we comply with Indiana Fish and Wildlife Regulations.

SPEAKER_03 0:51

Yeah, that was my bad.

SPEAKER_02 0:53

I don't think it was necessary. We needed to hide behind the bushes upon her arrival.

SPEAKER_03 1:00

She was awesome. I was so happy to have her on. Great friend of the podcast forever.

SPEAKER_02 1:04

In fact, Jessica was quite the opposite of those expectations. I believe she arrived in a compact SUV of some sort. Yep. We had a lot of fun learning about the challenges, success stories, and bitter truths that come with managing wildlife in and around our urban spaces. It's a complex and fascinating field of study we don't often think about. Great episode. Y'all should take a listen. Thanks again, Jessica. And also thank you, Indiana DNR, for sending a cool biologist and not the enforcement droid from the 1987 cinematic masterpiece Robbo Cop. Oh, Murphy. Murphy, yeah. Quite the imagination, old man.

SPEAKER_00 1:49

Yeah, that was awesome. Thanks, Jessica.

SPEAKER_02 1:51

That was super cool. Big time. I am Travis White, and I'm happy that I put a canoe on top of my truck. And I thought it looked really badass.

SPEAKER_03 2:02

It looks studly, dude. You looked good. Thank you. You're welcome.

SPEAKER_02 2:06

One disappointment was my choice of tie-down for the bow, which was not properly rated. And the front shifted a few inches left of center. And it drove me nuts the entire drive that way.

SPEAKER_00 2:21

We were all aware of that.

SPEAKER_02 2:22

Okay, yeah. That shift scared the shit out of me when it happened. Lesson learned. So always make sure that you have the proper tie-downs, or bring a handy friend. Like my man here, who, after a couple warm-ups, can fashion a wicked trucker's hitch to button things up in a pinch. I had supreme confidence in that knot. The noble knotsman, Bradley Greer. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 2:52

It did definitely take me a little while to get that orientation right. And that's always the challenge. Orientation. You're always in a different position, like different circumstance.

SPEAKER_02 3:02

Oh yeah. Is that it? It's hard. It is. Like you got shit coming from different directions.

SPEAKER_00 3:07

Yeah. I get it. Yeah, I was proud of that. I was proud of that thing. Made it all the way home. Canoe didn't shift once.

SPEAKER_02 3:14

That being said, I did not feel safe. Uh I did not have interstate confidence in that knot. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:22

Yeah, I mean that thing is a sail. It's still a sail on top of the truck.

SPEAKER_02 3:27

So thank you, Brad. You're welcome. I would also like to thank our house river captain. This past weekend, he took us on an adventure that was waterlogged with nothing but fun, adventure, tales to be told, and memories we won't soon forget. Our proud paddle, daddy, patty, Richardson. That's the title of the episode.

SPEAKER_03 3:56

That's it, dude. We just nailed it. I believe now I can say ahoy. Yes. Right? Now it's on point. Paddle daddy patty.

SPEAKER_01 4:04

Paddle daddy patty, dude.

SPEAKER_02 4:07

I remember a point right in the middle of the trip where we stopped on a sandbar and Brad tapped me on the shoulder and he goes, Look at Patrick over there, just standing there, hands on the hips, with his bullets.

SPEAKER_00 4:21

Looking at us with the biggest smile on his face.

SPEAKER_03 4:23

I remember that moment. Well, dude, when I have good friends and family out on a river, just sitting, especially when we're just taking a cash trip, like, you know, coolers full of beer, stuff like that. It that just brings such joy. It's so nice to look at all my friends and family and just be like, man, this is this is cool, man. Yeah. Great day, too.

SPEAKER_00 4:43

And especially I feel like that river was the perfect amount of chaos to keep everybody laughing and on their toes and like messing up. Yeah. Like it was impossible to not get stuck in a tree or something. Everybody has stuck.

SPEAKER_02 4:57

Maybe not you.

SPEAKER_00 4:58

I mean, you seemed like you didn't struggle at all.

SPEAKER_03 5:01

I was watching everyone. I like Ashley finally told me she's like, just just keep your mouth shut. Like we're having fun.

SPEAKER_01 5:09

I was like, all right.

SPEAKER_03 5:10

Because I dude, it's you I it it concerned me how much paddling forward everybody was doing.

SPEAKER_02 5:17

Um, when we got back, I watched a YouTube video about how to paddle a canoe, and I completely understand what you were talking about now.

SPEAKER_03 5:25

So there I could I it was you guys made it fun, and I love that, but you could have made it a hell of a lot easier. Easier for me.

SPEAKER_00 5:33

Travis or Patrick saw some destruction like straight on firsthand.

SPEAKER_02 5:38

Oh, well, now that you mention it, I wanted to bring a little thing out here. A piece of debris from Brad and I's first canoe wreck. And and shellacked the shit out of it. Yes. Oh, you did shellack it? Oh, right. And I marked it Pigeon River 2026. Cool. Oh, damn. That's so fun. I don't know what we're gonna do with it, but it stands up.

SPEAKER_00 6:04

As a description, it's about like a three to four inch diameter log that me and Travis broke off of a down tree by running straight into it.

SPEAKER_03 6:12

That grummin canoe, though, went straight through it.

SPEAKER_00 6:16

Come on. And Travis was the captain of the ship at the time, too.

SPEAKER_02 6:23

Was I? Yeah, you were in the bag. Yeah, you were. Well, that was the second wreck where you flew out the front.

SPEAKER_00 6:31

You were no, you were you were the captain then, too. Damn. Well, it was my first time, you know.

SPEAKER_02 6:37

Give a guy break.

SPEAKER_03 6:38

Yeah. That was a great, great trip. Yeah, it was a blast. I had a great time. Camping was also the mosquitoes got a little rough, but that was fun. I want to take you guys out there, and I want to be the captain of your canoe, and I want you to see exactly how I would do it. Just to see if there's if there's some clarity.

SPEAKER_02 6:56

Well, I'll tell you, I've got a little more knowledge now with that the J. Yeah. The J paddle. Yeah, uh Canadian style. Yeah. I feel like I did pretty good. Yeah, yeah. You always do.

SPEAKER_00 7:08

Yeah, I think you do good. The further I went on, the more I was figuring out how to steer, like back paddle.

SPEAKER_03 7:14

The issue that you had was Travis was paddling. Right. And that's the other big no-no. Yeah. Is until the back guy says paddle once up here, don't touch the water.

SPEAKER_00 7:27

I was like, let's switch so you can see what I'm talking about by you just randomly paddling.

SPEAKER_03 7:31

Yeah, it's actually really boring to be up front in a in a canoe going down. Unless it's, of course, like a faster, more technical river like that.

SPEAKER_00 7:39

Not unless you're getting thrown from said canoe.

SPEAKER_03 7:42

Yeah, yeah. Hey, we hey, really quick though, we also have Farn in the house. Hey, what's up, y'all? Yeah. Farn's my longtime buddy. Uh went to we met each other in fourth grade, and we've just been kicking it ever since. Absolutely. Farron's up here from Indianapolis, decided to join the podcast for a little bit for a little bit uh of all the stuff we're going to talk about today, which is showing conservation.

SPEAKER_02 8:03

Because I've always been saying we got this extra seat.

SPEAKER_03 8:06

Yeah. Let's do it.

SPEAKER_02 8:08

Thanks for letting me join y'all.

SPEAKER_03 8:09

Dude, thank you for being down here, Farron.

SPEAKER_00 8:11

You're my bro homie. Patrick was in fourth grade. That was what, like 83, 84?

SPEAKER_03 8:18

These guys call me old. Farn was playing basketball at Camp Crosley, and I said, Can I play with you? And he said, Yeah. And then we've been kicking it ever since. Damn it, didn't you at least are in the 90s, baby?

SPEAKER_02 8:31

You any good? Yeah, no. Didn't even say that. We have one thing that we should definitely mention. We had Ashley and Debbie with us, but we also had Kirsten, our beloved. She came.

SPEAKER_03 8:42

She did come in on short notice, yes. That was awesome. Yeah, that's a good thing.

SPEAKER_02 8:48

And she was a hero. Yes. Yes. But that's a tale for another day because we're going to do, I think, our next podcast on perhaps our trip that we took.

SPEAKER_03 8:59

That's right. We do want to cover some of it. Along Pigeon River. That's right. Yes, sir. Yeah. We got a News Panther up, and this is the first News Panther in a couple weeks. I'm a little psyched about it.

SPEAKER_00 9:09

Yeah, and I kind of went along with the theme of today's episode.

SPEAKER_03 9:14

Which just throw out there, the theme of this episode is going to be conservation.

SPEAKER_01 9:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 9:18

We've been talking a lot about conservation and what conservation is, and talking to a lot of conservationists. It is, is conservationists. But tonight we just want to cover some of the wins that we think are awesome in conservation.

SPEAKER_00 9:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 9:34

Okay, Brad, go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 9:35

All right. Well, the story that I wanted to cover was because I had just come across an article about the Endangered Species Act. And they were covering mainly what the big wins have been since the act. Because this act does require funding from Congress. And in recent years, it's become more and more under attack. Because a big part of what the ESA protects is the habitat that animals are in, as well as the animals themselves. ESA? Yeah. Uh Endangered Species Act. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So some people sp like are fighting against it because it is so restrictive. Like, you know, like let us drill oil. Like they just opened up the in in Minnesota. The boundary waters. Yeah, the headwaters to the boundary waters. They just like opened it to mining.

SPEAKER_02 10:30

Like restrictive to like industry.

SPEAKER_00 10:33

Yeah. I didn't know that. Yeah. What the fart? Yeah, it's pretty crazy. So that's people fighting against the Endangered Species Act saying like it costs too much money and everything. So I'm going to kind of go through what the act is, how it became what it is, and then some of the big wins that it's had. So it was passed in 1973 and is the primary law in the USA for protecting and conserving imperiled species from extinction as, and I think this was in quotation, so I think it's actually in the act. Consequence of economic growth and development untampered by adequate concern and conservation. Good Lord. Wordy. Yeah, that is pretty wordy. So basically. So basically, from animals becoming extinct from a consequence of human growth, taking resources, land away.

SPEAKER_02 11:29

Well, what do you know what the like the trigger for that would be or what was? Or had it been like a fight that had been going on? Did it have to go through?

SPEAKER_00 11:39

Of what made it start? Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. I got that. Well, so first, like I'll get into that. The purposes of the Endangered Species Act or ESA are twofold. It's the prevention, extinction, and to recover species to a point where the law's protections are not needed. So like the overall goal is to like list an animal to protect it and then delist it eventually. That makes sense, yeah. So in order to do that, it oftentimes requires protecting species and the ecosystems. So like birds like mosquitoes. So they have to protect, like, you can't just wipe out the mosquitoes. Right. So it's not only like the animals themselves, it's their ecosystem.

SPEAKER_01 12:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:22

Um the ESA requires agency like the the ESA requires agencies to designate imperiled species as threatened or endangered. And I think to do that, there was one week we talked about how it was somewhere in Washington, like they were filing a petition to protect an animal, and it was like a marmot or something in like a small region and the Cascades. People petitioned to say this animal needs to be uh on the endangered species list, and then the government has like so many days to review it, and they issue like a 90-day review, and so it kind of goes back and forth. Do you have to have people on that petition that are of like authority in that field? Yeah, I mean, you have to have a full case study and like supportive evidence. It's not just we need this many signatures. Yeah, right. Because then that's what triggers these a these agencies to go out and do a study on how bad is it, like what is happening, why is it happening, how can we fix it?

SPEAKER_02 13:31

Is there uh like a specific government entity that does that?

SPEAKER_00 13:35

Yeah, it's the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service. Um so like the one thing that it does is prohibits harassment, harming, and hunting of listed species, and then the fish and wildlife and marine fisheries are in charge of like enforcing that and setting the limits and everything. So is that like the uh United States DNR? Pretty much, yeah. Yeah. The federal DNR. So there were a bunch of iterations that came along before the ESA was passed. And the first was the Endangered Species Preservation Act of 1966. And this came like after, so like it just kept kind of ramping up and up and up. There were treaties signed, international treaties about like animal protection, habitat protection, and everything. And that wasn't working, nothing was their populations were still in decline. So then they came out with this act in 1966. And in this time, there was an estimated 16 whooping cranes left in the wild. Like that was one of the reasons. Like there was things like that where they started saying, okay, we gotta like start taking this shit more seriously. Shit's getting pretty bad. So in 1969, Congress passed an act to provide some more congressional authority and actually like give some funding and some teeth to actually being able to protect and do anything, and not just say, like, hey, you can't do that, you know. Give them a little bit of power. And right off the bat, the the first group that they listed was 14 mammals, 36 birds, six amphibians, and twenty two fish. Right off the bat? Yeah. So the first ones that they ever listed were only considered game or wild bird.

SPEAKER_03 15:27

So hunters were going out hunting this bird for X amount of years and then starting to see a decline, or those birds aren't coming back to where they would go hunting for generations. Well, and those are now they're saying, well, these are endangered, so let's get these on the list, bring them back so we can.

SPEAKER_00 15:44

I mean, yeah, I they're probably sounding the loudest alarm that it's happening and coming to the realization. But also I think they just didn't maybe think of because like what was added to it in 69 were mollusk, mollusks and crustaceans. So I think they may not have, or they may have just like said, let's just start with game animals, then we'll like slowly add more stuff to it.

SPEAKER_02 16:08

And then they add like a like a criminality to killing these animals.

SPEAKER_00 16:15

One of the big things was increasing the punishments for poaching unlawful importation or sale of any of the species that are listed that included a fine up to 10 can or yeah, $10,000 and up to one year in jail.

SPEAKER_03 16:30

Damn. That was in 1969? Yeah, that'll make you think twice. Damn right it will. Yeah, 10,000 bucks. Hey, really quick before we go further, and I'm not sure if you mentioned this, but you name you listed all those animals and species that were on that endangered list right from the jump. Was there like a process that you had to go through to get that animal? Because I'm sure it wasn't like you know what I mean? Like there's a group.

SPEAKER_00 16:54

What do you mean to get it? To get it on the list? To get it on the list.

SPEAKER_03 16:58

Like I'm sure there's a group that studied oh, that's what the petition was for?

SPEAKER_00 17:02

Yeah. The local, like, say uh Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. Right. They'll do a study on elk in a certain area and say, This is this is why elk are in endangered. Here's the evidence for why they're endangered. Okay, and this is what's happening.

SPEAKER_03 17:17

So then they get on the petition with their animal as an elk foundation. Yeah. Okay. I got what you're saying.

SPEAKER_00 17:23

Okay, so the government has to review it and then decide, yes, we're gonna investigate this. Like, no, there's not enough evidence. Try and like do some more work and come back. Sure, okay.

SPEAKER_02 17:35

I got there's a lot of like universities and all sorts of organizations that get involved with that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_03 17:40

I'm sure.

SPEAKER_00 17:40

I just yeah, we'll get into it. Like, there's a pretty crazy stat about what Cornell University did that surprised me. We'll get into. So in 1969, so we started 66, 69, the next one was passed, and then in 1973, President Nixon. I was trying to think if I could do his voice or not, but I don't think I can do it now.

SPEAKER_03 18:02

I can't even imagine his voice right now. What is his voice?

SPEAKER_00 18:05

Uh Nixon declared all I can think. All I can think of is the people need to know their president's not a crook. Is that what he said? Yeah, that doesn't sound like Nixon. Now he's not doing it. I didn't do it. That doesn't sound like Nixon. Where's he from? California or no, I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 18:24

I have no idea.

SPEAKER_00 18:26

Yeah. Uh but he declared that current species conservation current species conservation efforts to be inadequate, and he called on Congress to pass a comprehensive endangered species legislation. Go get it. Nixon. He actually signed a lot of environmental protection stuff into law. Damn it. But then he also did some shit like vetoed the Clean Water Act.

SPEAKER_02 18:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:51

And like took all the money from it.

SPEAKER_02 18:53

And Watergate. Too bad it wasn't young American, you know, conservation. I don't know what you mean. In Vietnam. Oh. All right.

SPEAKER_00 19:04

So he wanted uh Congress to pass it and pass it they did in 1973. It's the the same base act that is still around today. I don't know if it went to the Supreme Court, but for some reason the Supreme Court justice gave his quote on it, and it was that it's like one of the most sweeping conservation, wildlife protection, animal acts in the world. Like the most USA. Yeah. Well, goddamn right.

SPEAKER_03 19:36

Right? I mean, that doesn't surprise me. No. I mean, yeah. That's I mean, it's a massive, massive thing. And it is. It has a lot of power. Good lordy.

SPEAKER_00 19:46

So one thing that was cool about the act is it was written by a diverse group of lawyers and scientists that incorporated a bunch of new principles and ideas to conservation and wildlife conservation. And a lot of the biologists were from the different uh marine biologists, mammal biologists, kind of the whole spectrum of scientists.

SPEAKER_03 20:06

How would you like to be in that room when they had their like initial meeting?

SPEAKER_00 20:11

There's people arguing like the manatee deserves to be on there. Oh, that's not what I was thinking. We need to keep that power plant running at full speed.

SPEAKER_02 20:18

I was thinking just bringing it back. Whatever it takes.

SPEAKER_03 20:26

I just I wasn't thinking it like that. I was thinking the cohesiveness of just having all these brilliant biologists and people in a room. That shit would be that's oh yeah. I imagine it's all hunky dory. That's what that's what.

SPEAKER_02 20:39

I think it's a very complicated thing.

SPEAKER_03 20:41

Are they talking about the voting process or the or that? Just like once they picked what they're doing and then they have their initial kickoff meeting with all the biologists that they have funding for.

SPEAKER_00 20:52

That's just you have a hundred or I'd probably have more like five hundred thousand dollars to study. What can you do?

SPEAKER_03 21:00

Oh man, that'd be so cool. Yeah, that'd be cool.

SPEAKER_00 21:03

Man, all right. So uh next I'll hit some. This is like some of the the nut the the stats of how the ESA has performed since 1973. Let's go. Um there are success stories, and there's not a ton of success stories, but it has a 99% success rate when it comes to preventing species from going extinct once they're under the protection of the ESA. 99%. Like if you get listed, yeah, 99% of the animals listed have not gone extinct. I mean, you're begging the question what's the 1%? So eleven domestic species have gone extinct after being listed. American domestic? Yeah. Cause it was weird when I looked up the list. Some of them were like we're in Guam.

SPEAKER_01 21:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:51

And uh like some of the other atolls. Yeah. What do they consider domestic? I a lot of it, a lot of this stuff was Continental U.S. It's like a big part of it. Like Alaska is kind of an anomaly within the country because it's kind of more wild and out there than we can't really affect it as much. Your neighbor state. Yeah, but what's a domestic animal? Um one of them was like uh one of them was a warbler, one of them was uh Hawaiian um honey creeper. Doesn't domestic mean like I'm sorry, I'm confused.

SPEAKER_03 22:27

I was thinking you were gonna name off like 20 dogs.

SPEAKER_00 22:30

Oh no. Or does that mean? No, domestic to the U.S. Yeah, like endemic to the U.S. Oh yeah, yeah. Oh, like domesticated, like area. Yeah, actually we've created more domestic animals than we've lost.

SPEAKER_03 22:48

Oh man. Okay, now I'm on track again. I'm sorry, I've confused.

SPEAKER_00 22:52

I've been confused. But yeah, so eleven species total that are endemic to the United States. Over 1,700 species have been on the list since 1973. 1,500. That's plants and animal and animals. Only 11.

SPEAKER_02 23:15

That's pretty crazy.

SPEAKER_00 23:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 23:17

That's great.

SPEAKER_00 23:18

But then, but so then the other side of the coin is 57 species have been recovered and removed. So that's still not a lot that have been removed.

SPEAKER_03 23:28

Okay, so there's a lot though 99% of those species are endangered.

SPEAKER_01 23:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 23:34

They get off the endangered list, but that's not but then you keep going, that's 56% of those 99%. No. Have been wiped off that list completely? No. Oh shit.

SPEAKER_00 23:49

What is going on? What is going on? So 1,700 species have been put on the like endangered protection, or I think at least um uh what's the other one? At risk, not at risk, threatened.

SPEAKER_03 24:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:04

But only 57 species have been recovered fully and delisted. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. So you said 57%. It's like oh, okay. 57 species species.

SPEAKER_03 24:17

Not percent.

SPEAKER_00 24:17

So once you get on the list, it's hard to get off the list. And that's one of the arguments against it is once you list something, it's there's no going back.

SPEAKER_03 24:26

But it does take a long think of like a Well that's because of a bunch of fucking people that don't give a shit. And how do we know any effort and start defunding this stuff? Like, no kidding.

SPEAKER_02 24:35

How do we know like what what are we referencing our healthy populations off of?

SPEAKER_00 24:42

And I think they are realistic. Like I can give I have some bald eagle stats, and that kind of is a good like a gut check kind of one. Yeah, okay. Because that was one of the early, like that was those first acts in '66. The bald eagle was one of the first ones that had protections. Like before there was only like a hand like alligator, American alligator was one, I think. No, I don't think that that's surprising. I don't I don't think I saw the turkey anyway. You figure they would have that's a big recovery story, too. What are the stats? So uh first, do you know what year the bald eagle? Sorry, and Patrick, sorry if this is a trigger for you. Patrick hates bald eagles. I don't hate them. He thinks they're boring.

SPEAKER_03 25:24

I'm bored of them now.

SPEAKER_00 25:25

That plays right into this story, actually. So, do you know what year they were adopted as the national symbol for the U.S.? We can go like a 30-year, like an era, 30-year time span. What year was the bald eagle adapted?

SPEAKER_02 25:39

I would say like in the mid-1900s. Early 1900s.

SPEAKER_00 25:44

Say 1700s. Patty cakes wins. Are you shit? 1782.

SPEAKER_03 25:49

Well, yeah, because it was originally the turkey, and then we decided that the bald eagle was a much more fierce. I believe it was Benjamin Franklin. I thought he wanted the turkey. Or he wanted the turkey. That's right. That's right.

SPEAKER_00 26:01

Yeah, 1782. You know, pretty early on. That was like one of the first priorities. Okay. I feel really simple.

SPEAKER_02 26:07

I feel really dumb. Seafair in my mouth 1950.

SPEAKER_00 26:13

This is an hour way before my brain, no. This is all new to me, interesting. Yeah, and I'm just wow, man.

SPEAKER_02 26:22

And I said that. The bald eagle. I embarrassed me, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:27

We're good. Yeah, when Nixon did the endangered Stacy Zag. Give the bald eagle the bird, baby.

SPEAKER_00 26:37

Was that the news panther?

SPEAKER_02 26:41

But that's okay because we kind of all have we all kind of had our own homework. Oh, yeah. And Brad did his, and that was his news panther. And I think my story that I have about success in conservation is gonna roll right off of Brad's just right. So if you don't mind, Patty, if I do my story after break, you go to town, brother. Okay. I'm fine with that. All right, guys. Are you ready for a little bit of oozier conservation history? Dude, let's bring it home. We're home right here, which I found out, which I when I looked into it, I didn't think like, uh, I don't know. You don't think of Indiana with our grand national or our grand state park system or whatever. No, at least nationally, I don't think we're known.

SPEAKER_03 27:39

No, we're definitely not known. We have a national park, though. I mean, that is true, but it is shrinky dinky and definitely not known. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 27:51

And but the cool thing is, is Indiana has a very important part in the history of our national park system.

SPEAKER_03 28:02

Whoa, is this what your story's gonna be about? Yes.

SPEAKER_02 28:04

Let's start with a Mr. Colonel Richard Lieber, a German American.

SPEAKER_03 28:11

Colonel Dick Lieber.

SPEAKER_02 28:13

He's known as the father of the Indiana State Park System. Can you say his name in a German accent? Uh Pichad Lieber. That was really good.

SPEAKER_03 28:28

That was way better than the Nixon accent earlier. Way better.

SPEAKER_00 28:32

That was good. Damn.

SPEAKER_02 28:34

Sorry, Brad. Sorry, man. He was born in 1869 in Deutschland. Uh he immigrated to Indianapolis where he had a couple of unks uh hanging out there, and uh that was in 1891. And he dabbled. Well, he was kind he came from a bit of an affluent family in Germany, and he came over to um Indiana here.

SPEAKER_00 29:00

I feel like that's a great time to be in the USA, like post-Civil War, pre-World War I. Yeah. That's just you're just you're just moving west. Yeah. You're just exploring.

SPEAKER_03 29:11

Whatever you want out of this country, go get it. Go get your 50 acres or whatever.

SPEAKER_02 29:16

And he became a very successful businessman in Indianapolis. He did many things. Like I think he managed like a hardware store, uh, did insurance, did uh I got all the notes here, but I don't want to run through it. Damn, you had to have insurance back then? Like wagon insurance. You know what? I always look back at like, oh, there were insurance companies? Like there was everything. Oh, sure, from the jump. What were they insuring?

SPEAKER_03 29:43

Homes? Everything. Yeah. Horses. Cars? Or uh insure your horse.

SPEAKER_00 29:49

Imagine appraising a house in 1890.

SPEAKER_03 29:52

That would be $20.

SPEAKER_00 29:53

$20. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:55

$20. But uh well, he married uh into an affluent Indianapolis family, and that's when he started to dabble in more civil affairs in Indy, and he got into all sorts of stuff like that. And then eventually he took a trip to Yosemite in California. It blew everybody's mind. And it blew his mind. That's Roosevelt, John Muir. Yep. That's a hell of a trip to take.

SPEAKER_00 30:23

And that what year was that? Uh I don't know. That's like Oregon Trail shit. Going out to Yosemite in like the late 1800s.

SPEAKER_02 30:32

Right. And he was like, well, Indiana doesn't like have that scale of you know monumental landscape, but there are some beautiful places in this state that he decided that he really would love to protect and then provide a place like Yosemite for Hoosiers. Well, I'm curious. Did he go out there just for Yosemite? Like he heard about it. I'm sure it was like uh you don't just go west for Yosemite, right? Early 1900s.

SPEAKER_00 31:03

Like, are they going on cross-country vacation? Well, they could have gone by train.

SPEAKER_03 31:07

That's probably like a year, that's probably like a year-long trip. What what year are we talking, Roosevelt and John Muir? I mean, he was John Muir's whole shtick was he was sending articles back to the east coast to influence people to come out and visit visit those areas.

SPEAKER_00 31:21

Yeah, it wasn't too late after that. I wonder if that was still, but he was the president. He could probably travel a little easier than but you're you're also thinking wagon.

SPEAKER_03 31:30

There's also train. I mean, Muir was doing a great job. That was his whole thing.

SPEAKER_00 31:35

I guess actually the train had been like a couple decades across country. I had a question, I can't remember.

SPEAKER_03 31:42

Well, I wonder what the landscape looked like in Indiana in the late 1800s. Like we know it now, and we could say, oh yeah, Indiana doesn't have that much wildlife or ecosystem, stuff like that. But like in the late 1800s, the landscape here looks quite a bit, although we discovered in the last uh a while ago in our one of our episodes that we've pretty much demolished all of our trees, but even like the marshlands, the black swamp area. I mean, I wonder what that landscape. Anyway, keep going.

SPEAKER_02 32:12

You remember Kankakee Sands? They said they drained the whole lake because it was so shallow and turned it into farmlands.

SPEAKER_03 32:17

That's right. So I'm I mean Buffalo bison still being around? Are we talking herds of of big old creatures?

SPEAKER_02 32:25

My my grandpa was born in uh like 1908. Yeah. And he lived on the same farmland in Indiana his whole life. And it I don't know, it kind of all seems the same. Does he have journals? There are some.

SPEAKER_00 32:41

I saw an oak today. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 32:48

That's a whole nother story, though. Anyway, after uh Colonel Lieber's uh visit studio Samity, he decided he's like, I want to take or I want people to enjoy nature, conserve the beautiful land in Indiana.

SPEAKER_00 33:03

Wait, how do you get the rank of colonel?

SPEAKER_02 33:06

Uh that comes later. Oh. Um, but he uh basically paved the way for conservation in Indiana by forming the State Parks Department, and as the chairman, Lieber opened the state's first two parks in 1916 on Indiana's Centennial. Yo. Which would be McCormick's Creek State Park and Turkey Run State Park.

SPEAKER_03 33:32

Oh, nice. I have been to Turkey Run. That is that is a different landscape than what you'd expect in Indiana.

SPEAKER_02 33:40

Yeah. Uh, and it was all privately funded, including donations from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Yo, cool beans, which is I thought that was a pretty cool fact. Which is funny because these parks were established in 1916 and the first Indianapolis 500 uh when the heck was that? 1911. Oh, it wasn't.

SPEAKER_03 34:08

So just two years before they were throwing money into conservation, they were doing their own their first race?

SPEAKER_02 34:15

Yeah, the first 500. The first race was a race of helium balloons in 1909.

SPEAKER_00 34:23

Really? Then they went from helium balloons to race cars.

SPEAKER_02 34:29

That's a slow race right there.

SPEAKER_01 34:30

Yeah, we gotta speed this up a bit, y'all.

SPEAKER_02 34:34

Uh he established those two parks in 1916 on Indiana Centennial, and then in 1919, he became the first director of the Indiana Department of Conservation, which is the predecessor to the Department of Natural Resources. Wow. He served until 1933, and under his watch, Indiana Indiana established 10 state parks and many memorials and historical sites. Go get it, King. And in 1919, uh the attendance of these parks was 33,000. And in 1932, the attendance was six hundred and twenty-three thousand in Indiana.

SPEAKER_00 35:22

Damn.

SPEAKER_02 35:23

Damn. Um he was also he also pushed for models for charging admission and uh user fees in the parks to simply just to fund it and maintain it and uh expand it if needed. He also championed park inns, nature guides, and simply just preserving land for the sake of it. Like buying land and just preserving it, even if it's not the most beautiful picnic area or whatever.

SPEAKER_03 35:54

This guy's whole call was so travel to Yosemite, realized that we don't have that, but that there are beautiful landscapes in Indiana, and then he spent the rest of his uh life fighting for conservation or preservation of land and getting people out to that land till the end of his days. Boy, that guy had an epiphany out there at Yosemite.

SPEAKER_02 36:19

It doesn't end there. Um now, even today, Indiana ranks high among the most self-sufficient park systems uh among all the states, and the high quality of our systems are small but well maintained.

SPEAKER_00 36:37

Yes, I agree. I wonder if that's the difference between free and paid.

SPEAKER_02 36:41

A lot of them are free. Yeah. Um and we have substantial park systems because they're small, but they're abundant. Yeah. Um he also advised the National Park Service and he helped to organize and eventually chaired the National Conference on State Parks, which he chaired the one in 1921 at Turkey Run in Indiana. That is awesome. And Indiana eventually became a model for other states uh to develop their park systems. Um and at the time of his passing, Colonel Lieber was considered the most influential champion for U.S. natural resource conservation.

SPEAKER_03 37:26

This guy is awesome. Yeah. I'm I'm having trouble like even comprehending. I'm just still I this is awesome.

SPEAKER_02 37:35

He's a cool dude. I was really like blown away by Lieber? Colonel Richard Lieber. Colonel Richard Lieber. And I will, he became a colonel.

SPEAKER_00 37:45

I was just gonna ask.

SPEAKER_02 37:47

It's an honorary colonel because the governor of Indiana at the time when uh the United States started sending troops over to Europe for World War I, he needed a liaison between the US uh War Department and the office of the Indiana governor, and he chose Lever to do it, and he was given the rank of colonel.

SPEAKER_03 38:15

There's your answer.

SPEAKER_00 38:16

I'd rather get an honorary rank of colonel than doctor. I think so too, yeah. Yeah, that's bad. Would you? Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 38:24

Colonel? Colonel Bradley R? Yeah, over Doctor? Doctor Bradley R? Yeah, give me Colonel. Colonel? What about you, Peter?

SPEAKER_00 38:32

Yeah, Colonel. Colonel. Absolutely. Absolutely. But I mean What if it was Commander? I mean, there's a lot of doctors.

SPEAKER_03 38:39

There's a lot of doctors out there.

SPEAKER_02 38:41

I think Colonel's more rare than doctors out there.

SPEAKER_03 38:43

Colonel is probably more rare. Yeah. Hmm. Um really quick. Do you have anything about like how like what the process is or something along those lines for how he began to get people out at these parks?

SPEAKER_02 38:58

Um I think he did a lot of the like politicking and uh all that um just trying to get into the governmental system. To, you know, because I the only way you're gonna ultimately protect this stuff is to make it part of the system.

SPEAKER_03 39:19

I got the protecting, but then once you protect it, how do you get people there? Like that that number incline that you gave us just a second ago, that's that's dramatic in just a few years. Yeah. So like I I'm just and if you don't, then that's fine. I understand. But like I'm curious because that's a lot of a lot of propaganda, a lot of messaging to go out to people in early late 1800s, early 1900s. That's a lot of stuff going out.

SPEAKER_02 39:48

I think it's just getting getting the word out there, like anything you have to advertise, say, hey, and they called it recreating yeah, it's recreation.

SPEAKER_00 39:56

Come fishing.

SPEAKER_03 39:57

Maybe that's a part of like what you're saying, is shortly after the Civil War, everybody's starting to heal up, the nation's starting to feel itself again, and now it's like, all right, now let's have a little fun.

SPEAKER_00 40:08

Yeah, it's like the swing in the 20s. Yeah, but yeah, right, exactly. But 1900.

SPEAKER_03 40:12

Right.

SPEAKER_02 40:14

Yeah, yeah. Well, and if you think these parks, they're kind of just outside of the orbit of Indianapolis. Yeah. It's like right outside of you know, Bloomington, right. And you know, west just west of Indy, almost to uh Illinois. Like it's outside of town.

SPEAKER_00 40:36

Like I I was just watching a video that was talking about the first national campaign for the national parks, like poster campaign. And that I think that was in the 1930s, and they had only commissioned like four, it was part of the New Deal. They'd only commissioned like a great four or five posters.

SPEAKER_02 40:54

Uh the new deal with uh the park systems and stuff.

SPEAKER_03 40:59

I'm sure old Lieber was on top of that. Oh, yeah. I he was definitely on top of that.

SPEAKER_00 41:04

Yeah, it makes me want to see because the National Parks posters, their first posters were probably the coolest posters I've ever seen for national parks. So it makes me wonder if Indiana had some. That'd be cool to see like a like a uh retro, like Turkey Run from Visit Turkey Run.

SPEAKER_02 41:20

Oh, just like Indiana specific. Yeah, that would be cool.

SPEAKER_03 41:24

There's uh there's a series that ran by Creative Network for uh national parks called Sea America. I have a book up there for Sea America, and I I did get one from it's I can't find it now, but I got one for the Indiana Dunes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:41

Yeah, um, well, he died when he died, he uh died at Canyon Inn, which is at Turkey Run, and uh they buried his ashes there and at uh the Richard Lieber State Recreation Area, which is kind of you know in that orbit of Indianapolis, uh near Coverdale. Up the street around the Coverdale north of McCormick's Creek. Um and then another he uh one of his random job that he took up was art critic for the Indianapolis Journal.

SPEAKER_03 42:18

I thought that was funny. This dude just seemed like a fluent. He's one of those guys that was doing something good.

SPEAKER_02 42:25

He was a real go-getter.

SPEAKER_03 42:27

Real go getter.

SPEAKER_02 42:29

Yeah, so um it's I thought that this was a wonderful story because not only is it somebody that improved the Hoosier State in terms of conservation, but it just influenced the whole freaking thing nationally. Yeah. And uh I figured you guys would be uh pretty excited about that. Yeah, it is pretty cool.

SPEAKER_03 42:53

It's cool. Yeah, for and that lever dude is awesome. But what I I I think what I get kind of geared up or gassed up about there is the state parks. Like you know, we do a lot of talking about the national parks, especially here in Indiana, because you kind of dream about the big parks with the big mountains and the big animals and all these things.

SPEAKER_02 43:13

We've always grown up like, oh, Indiana, yeah, it's not as cool as the other thing.

SPEAKER_03 43:18

The only way to see anything cool is driving 10 hours, that kind of a thing. And it's just not true. And it's we've been taught to like hate our state. Yeah, yeah. And it's it's fun to hear that this guy from the jump was uh was promoting our state parks, and he didn't worry about national parks. We weren't going after that funding. We were gonna keep it small, local for our local people to enjoy. And I think that's fucking sweet.

SPEAKER_02 43:42

And everybody's gonna say, Whoa, that's pretty cool what you're doing.

SPEAKER_03 43:45

Yeah, especially with the birding adventures that we've gone on. It i I spend more time at state parks in the last two years than I have uh in anywhere else, really. You know, discount a Hoosier State. Don't discount it, you know what I mean? I'm there for that. I suppose it's my turn now. You're welcome. You're welcome for the awesome National Park Sales. Dude from Indiana. From Indiana. On behalf of Travis and Colonel Lieber, you're welcome. You're welcome for everything. Is it my turn now? Yes, sir.

SPEAKER_00 44:17

I'm I'm interested to hear what you got.

SPEAKER_03 44:20

Dude, I got we're gonna so you had United States. You brought it back down to the Hoosier State, Indiana. I'm going global. Oh.

SPEAKER_02 44:30

Oh, I thought you were gonna say Fort Wayne.

SPEAKER_03 44:32

No. Go to global. That way, 30% of our listening audience says no fucking idea what we're talking about. No, I'm going global, dude. And this is a win coming from uh this year specifically. It's been going on for a few years, but we uh the the title of this whole thing is World Reaches Milestone for Nature. The fucking world, y'all. We have reached a milestone milestone. That's right. In fact, 10% of the ocean is now officially designated within protected and conserved areas. Oh shit. 10% of the ocean.

SPEAKER_00 45:09

Protected by who?

SPEAKER_03 45:11

Uh well, we'll get into a little bit of that. But it's more indigenous communities, countries, uh every dude, everyone. This is such a massive deal. Um, I'll get into a lot of like that stuff, but I I have, you know, me, I like to read my notes, so don't fuck me up, Brad.

SPEAKER_00 45:30

Yeah, Brad. Shut that. That's my goal. I know it is. I know it is. I was waiting on my side. You guys always fuck me up every time. I gotta throw attention to this son of a bitch.

SPEAKER_03 45:40

Okay, so 10% of the world's oceans is is now in protected and conserved areas, right? So that number is extremely awesome and represents considerable process. I mean, I I think so. Uh but an area approximately the size of the Indian Ocean still needs to be designated by 2030 if the ish international ambitions for this ocean protection program are to be achieved. Okay. So we've reached 10%. We now still have to conserve a size roughly the size of Indian the Indian Ocean to be able to reach our goals. What's the goal? Ah, I'm glad you asked. Matter of fact, I I was hoping I would lead you there.

SPEAKER_02 46:25

Did you lead me right there?

SPEAKER_03 46:26

Yes, I did. I tried. So let me explain. In December of 2022, at the conference of the parties to the Convention on Biodiversity, or CBD, governments from around the world collectively committed to conserve 30% of Earth's land and seas by 2030. So they're calling it the 30-30. Land and seas. Land and sea, right? Okay. That's an ESPN program. Nope, no specific ratio. It was just a large goal. This is this commitment is actually target one through three. And the USA hasn't withdrawn from this? Nope. Oh no, the USA, as of as of uh May, May 7th, I think this this article came out of this year. Um, so what this is, is this is actually target number one through three, or more specifically three, out of 23 targets that this group has put forward uh for the future of our global society and our oceans and lands. Yeah more specifically, oceans in this story. Okay. So we have the CBD. You also have the Kunming Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, KMGBF. So this is kind of so you have the CBD, this is a member group of 195 nation states, including the EU. Okay, so you have the EU that's wrapped in that has all those countries, plus a hundred and ninety-five nation states, added with a bunch of ind indigenous communities all over the world, because as we're starting to conserve this biodiversity, conserve these oceans, we want to take into consideration traditional patterns and the indigenous communities that live and thrive in these areas that we're also trying to save, make sure we're doing the right thing for them. So, what this KMGBF is the framework for how they're gonna go forward in their processes for saving land and seas on Earth. Okay, are we there? We're there. You guys have any questions? I'm trying so far? Okay. With this target, the framework, CBD parties committed to conserving nature through protected and conserved areas, including those that allow sustainable use of resources and also recognizing indigenous and traditional territories. So what they're what they're trying to do is they're trying to say we need 30% of land and seas to be conserved. The way we're gonna mark that as in into that first bucket is that we are gonna set out land, like a size, a space, a circle or whatever of this area is going to be conserved and then managed by a group. The management kind of comes into this a lot because not they want to make sure that it's not just falling into a certain bucket, but that at that point they're being managed accurately, so then they can re report back and show that it's being successful, that we're bringing environment or uh ecosystem back, or this ecosystem isn't falling apart. Things along those lines.

SPEAKER_00 49:41

Yeah, measuring anything is the hardest part.

SPEAKER_03 49:43

Right, exactly. And then and then reporting those measurements. Um, and so by 2024, so 2022, this was put together. By 2024, 8.6% of ocean and coastal areas globally were within documented, protected, and conserved areas. So 8.6 two years later, then two years later, because now we're in 2026, about five million more square kilometers of ocean, which is an area bigger than the size of the European Union.

SPEAKER_02 50:17

Right.

SPEAKER_03 50:17

That's massive, uh, has has has been added to that list. So that's where we get to 10.1. 10.1. But there's still a ton more work to do. I have a lot of questions, Patrick. Go ahead, please, try.

SPEAKER_02 50:34

I'm probably not gonna have the answers. Like, where do they pinpoint these areas of water and how do like if it's all over the world, don't you have to work with a nationality that's near that water, or if it's in their own. Well, how do they keep that water?

SPEAKER_00 50:51

How do you keep that water from leaving their zone of influence and going into a non-zone of influence?

SPEAKER_03 50:56

I don't know much about the zone of influences, but this is this is where the CBD comes in, is that this is one big motion by the global community of countries to say we have what authority do they do they have? I mean, any normal old authority that any environmental group probably has, although although this is there's a lot of government funding and a lot of government agencies working at this program. I think what this highlights in my when I was reading through this is the global recognition of what's going on with the climate and with our ecosystems alike. Is it more of a we will we're just trying to get people on board and then they will get enough people on board for whatever that area they're concerned with, and they can No, I mean I I I think very much now back to the management thing, and I'll get into a little bit later, but the management is kind of one of the pain points that they're showing. Yeah, that a country will say, okay, now we've protected X amount of miles of ocean or land, more specifically ocean. So now what they're saying is that okay, well, where's the reporting? Like, how do we know what's going on? Yeah, what's what you say it's protected and in these conserved areas, but how do we know that it's being successful? How do we know that ecosystem isn't falling apart or not rebuilding?

SPEAKER_02 52:16

Do they like not let fishing trollers through a Chinese ghost fleet?

SPEAKER_03 52:22

No, that's not happening, yeah. Not happening in in these areas. Okay. So, and then I think you asked the question, I can't remember, uh, how do they pick these sorts of things? Yeah. Uh I don't think they're picking it necessarily on like habitat of animal or habitat of species and stuff. I think what they're doing is I mean, most they're they're probably doing that, no doubt about it. But I think the most a lot of it is like this is a good area that isn't touched or we can manage easier or better.

SPEAKER_02 52:59

So this is gonna we're gonna add this to And it could be like Colonel Lieber, like let's not just protect land because it's pretty, let's just do it for the sake of it.

SPEAKER_00 53:09

But isn't it also kind of like this is our land now? We're taking over this. And that's with the water thing kind of. Whoever it is that ghosts, like is man, like monitoring it.

SPEAKER_03 53:21

Well, because it's it's it's the it's their own, I mean, it's their own country. Oh, it's like not international waters. Well, I'll get into that. I'll get into that a little bit because that's different. So that that's their I don't I'll get into that. Okay. So that's considered something different, and and that's another pain point. So there's really two pain points that they're suffering from right now, and that's the other pain point. So there's the pain point of management and reporting, and there's the pain point of the further out water. That's what I'll call for until I give you the actual quote. So I just I I I just want to go through a sweet little quote or long quote by Neville Ash, director of the UNEP-WCMC, which I will get into uh what that actually means. We all depend on the ocean for our survival. Over half of the world's oxygen is produced by life in the ocean. The great strides at the national level over the past two years to protect more than 10% of the marine realm is therefore a moment for celebration. But reaching this milestone is a reminder of how much work there's still there is still still to do. The coverage of protect the coverage of protected and conserved areas at sea still needs to triple by 2030, so to meet the 30% mark. And it is critical that both new and existing areas are managed effectively to deliver positive outcomes for people and nature. So that's a quote by Neville Ash, the director of the UNEPWCMC. Uh, when he says managed effectively, this is one of the two major pain points right now. Let me explain. Further, the KMGB, which is the F, which is the framework for the CBD, the UN Environment Program World Conservation Monitoring Center, which is the UNEPWCMC, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The IUCN are helping to monitor progress with these ambitious goals. The official progress report titled Protected Planet Report 2024, so put out two years ago, put out in 2024, is uh known as the most comprehensive analysis of global progress towards the KMBGF target three C.

SPEAKER_00 55:43

I'm gonna need this dumbed down too.

SPEAKER_03 55:45

Dude, I'm telling you, bro. Uh the KMGB once again. This is what Brad does. Actually, when I was writing this, I thought it was funny. The KMGB F, remember, is the framework that's kind of like so you have the CBD, which is the group of 195 uh nation states plus the EU plus indigenous peoples. So that's the CBD. And then with once they all met, they came up with the framework for how they were going to conserve, protect, and rebuild biodiversity and ecosystem in in these areas, in the in the oceans. So the framework that they came up with was the KMBGF. And then you have all these other organizations that joined the CBD from all over the world to help to help get this all moving. Right? So it's this what I just it's fascinating because this is the world coming together. So I think that's why it's so difficult. It's not just a few anagrams here and there. Uh it's it's a lot of them because there are organizations from all over the world that stepped up to take part in this global saving the environment initiative kind of a thing. And that's what kind of struck my fancy was what a good story that the the earth could come together to save the fucking earth. And part of uh it's a global global initiative. It's a global initiative, and you don't hear about that all that often anymore. So it sounded interesting. So then what the what the CBD came out with along with these groups was a protected planet report 2024, which so from 2022 to 2024, they studied, they gave a report in 2024, which was the most comprehensive analysis of this global ambitious project to show where they're at and what's going on to the world. Where are we at? So uh, well, we're doing I mean we're we're at 10%. We're 10% of this of this ocean has been now designated protected and conserved. That's a wild number. It's a wild number, especially when their goal is 30% by 2030, and we've already reached a 10 a third of that percentage in two in uh four years, really. Mostly coastal land or water? Hey, I'm glad you asked because I got more on that because that goes to Brad's question a little bit. It found that data was insufficient to fully measure and understand the effectiveness of systems of protected and conserved areas. So we have 10% of these waters, only 1.3% of the ocean that was has been covered by protected areas, uh, have management that's effective enough to assess and report out to this global organization.

SPEAKER_02 58:33

I could understand. The ocean is a big place.

SPEAKER_03 58:36

Well, even this 10%, it costs a lot. Yeah. And that I mean, that's a lot of reporting, a lot of management. So that's their big hurdle right now is super duper. We met this one-third goal of our initiative. But now how do we manage this protected land to make sure that there isn't whaling, that there isn't oil dumps, that there isn't trawling, things along those lines happening in this protected water. What they are saying is uh, well, 10% is wonderful without proper management and data, they are having a tough time being confident these parts of the oceans are being protected and conserves and conserved the way they are hoping. The other pain point, which is referred to as the high seas, which I think that is the coolest. Like, I want to be a pirate of the high seas. Like you're out there. The high seas.

SPEAKER_00 59:26

Do you ever play Sea of Thieves? No, it's a pretty fun Xbox game. You really feel like you're out there. I'll try that.

SPEAKER_03 59:33

It's so the high seas. So the Protected Planet Report of 2024 has also found that while the strongest progress since 2022 had been in the ocean, most of this has been done in national waters or coastline. So you have the government that goes in, they find a coastline or water right off the coastline, they say we're going to protect this. Now it's it's it's easy. It's it's low-hanging fruit, to Brad's point. Uh in these areas, beyond national jurisdiction, however, uh, despite the high seas comprising of over 60% of the surface of the ocean, coverage protected in conserved areas is only 1.66% out there. So that becomes the other pain point. Is great, we're doing a great job on our coastlines, we're doing a great job nationally, but these international waters or high seas, where most of the biodiversity is happening, 60% of that, and then conversely, where most of our oxygen is coming from, that water's not being protected at all, or 1.66% of it. So that becomes the second pain point.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:45

That's a very difficult thing, I feel like. Yeah. Far more difficult than I mean, you might as well be doing conservation on the moon.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:52

Uh it seems like we've explored more of the moon than we have a lot of the waters. I I definitely would agree. So you ask what can be done. Yes, sir. Ask that. What can be done? Uh, thank you guys for asking. Just this year in January, the first international agreement focused on protecting marine biodiversity in international waters has come into play called the UN High Seas Treaty, which just seems so neat to me. I just I get a kick out of the high seas. I'm sorry. The key element of the treaty is to put in place mechanisms to establish protected areas on the high seas. So we've recognized a pain point. We have all these organizations dealing with management of national waters or coastline, yeah, and now recognizing through the protected planet report of 2024 that we have a huge gap on the high seas, the EU government has come in and said, okay, like they've picked up that charter. They they pulled that baton out of their first runner's hand and they said, Okay, we're gonna do something about that. And they put together the high seas treaty to be able to start creating mechanisms to protect the high seas water and the ecosystems within it.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:12

Does that include like overfishing and all that kind of stuff? Well, we haven't we've been we've been fighting that forever, but we haven't really been it hasn't been like an organized target.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:23

Sure. So I'll I'll go into I mentioned the targets. So what we're talking about right now is target one through three, more specifically three. There's 23 targets that the KMGBF uh has in their framework, in that framework, or the CBD has in the framework. Sorry. Uh but really quick, if you are interested in keeping up with the story, you can set your alarms for 2027, early 2027, as that is when the next official evaluation of global progress on elements of target one through three will come out.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:55

Hey, Siri, set alarms for early 2020. 27 2027.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:01

Yep, that's right. And that report will be called the Protected Planet Report of 2027. So we have something to look forward to in the future. I think if if we were to kind of keep up with this, try to understand 2027, which is only a year away now. I mean, not even a year away, you're right. So we we will be getting a global report out as to how the global community is doing, and we've already reached a third of our progress in the oceans. I have some more information. The con the conference of the parties of the convention of biodiversity, the CBD, a legally binding international treaty dedicated to the conservation of ecosystems, the sustainable use of natural resources, and the fair sharing of benefits from genetic resources. So fishing, who gets to take those fish, what's how how does how does all this stuff kind of be shared amongst amongst ourselves? Um, it's comprised of 195 member nations, including the EU. I've already said that. The Kunming Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, the KMGBF, international blueprint uh adopted at the CBD to halt and reverse global biodiversity loss by 2030, and achieve a vision of living in harmony with nature by 2050. Acts such as uh acts it acts as the nature equivalent to the Paris Climate Agreement, setting specific actionable benchmarks for governments, businesses, and financial institutions. So, I mean, this is massive, right? This is a big thing. This ain't no this ain't no thing. Uh so just to end this, I'll go through some of those targets I mentioned because I'm sure every listener is curious. If this, if we've been mainly talking about target three, what are the targets going forward all the way to 23? Uh targets one through three focus on spatial planning to stop biodiversity loss, restore 30% of degraded ecosystems, and the 3030 goal to conserve at least 30% of the land and seas by 2030. So that's one through three. Targets four through eight aim to manage species, control invasive species by 50%, reduce pollution, mitigate climate change impacts on biodiversity. Targets nine through twelve cover sustainable management of wild species, agriculture, forestry, and aquaculture, enhance nature's contributions to people, increase urban green spaces. Target 13, ensure fair and equitable sharing of benefits from genetic resources. Targets 14 through 17, integrate biodiversity into planning, require business disclosures, reduce food waste, implement biosafety measures. That that was fun to me. And then the last few focus on eliminating harmful subsidies by $500 billion a year. Insane. Increase financial resources. Strengthen capacity building and ensure participatory gender responsive approaches. So those are all the targets that we have by 2050. I think that is insane.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:13

Keep in mind this is global.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:15

This is large. This is huge. I mean, yeah, you have I mean, we're talking about how hard it was to get or easy for for that dude uh to get state parks out. We're talking about the Endangered Species Act, and that's losing funding. And we have a global initiative that 195 countries, including the EU, are part of to be able to save this these waters from everything. And then those targets, I know I read them fast, but those targets are crazy. Like we're talking about agriculture, we're talking about making sure we can share these resources amongst countries. I mean, there seems to be a really neat like understanding that this is for everyone, and we're willing to put a lot of effort towards that.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:00

We're willing to say that we're willing to put a lot of effort towards that.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:04

Touche, but I mean, that's why I wanted to start with the with the stat, with the celebration first, in that I would agree with you, but 30% by 2030, which is only what, three and three and a half years away, and we've already reached a third of that, that is pretty tremendous. So it to me, it it I mean, it makes me hopeful that if they're putting such amount of effort towards already meeting a third that we're definitely gonna reach our 30-30 goal. And then if those same people are fighting for the other targets, we're gonna crush it, dude. You guys don't seem jazzed about it. I think it's because it was a shitload of data, but I think it's fantastic. I'm too cynical.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:46

Yeah, I don't have any faith in the UN and and countries around the world.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:51

Yeah, I think there's a lot more self-interest than protecting the waters of the world.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:56

Because all it takes is in the next administration and most any country to come in and say, like, eh, we're not doing that.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:02

Well, I think that's also a I mean, you're right, but to get out of a treaty is kind of a big deal.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:08

I mean, if I do hope that, you know, eventually we can come to terms, like as a human race, that we need to figure out a way to protect all this stuff and share it.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:20

Sure, but as of now, we haven't had to delete shit. And what I'm telling you is now we have 195 countries, including the EU. So you may not give a shit in the UN, but the rest of the world is there and fighting for towards something.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:35

So you gotta start somewhere. I have the perfect analogy. Like my the ESA stuff in 1966, they were passing shit, but they had no teeth to do anything. By the end of it, they had it fine-tuned and figured out, and the authority to actually enforce shit. This is like the first step.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:53

Yeah. Yeah, and some massively large first step. 10%. That was my conservation story. That was Brad's conservation story, and that was Travy J's conservation story. I think, if anything, that anyone can take from this, that there's a lot of cool things that's happened for nature, by nature, and I think we're still fighting for that to this day. And although we take some bumps and some bruises, like you guys are being negative about, I also think that there's a hell of a lot of positivity coming up.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:23

Travis did call me optim or pessimistic or what was it, glass half full. But he meant glass halfway. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:30

Yeah, that's the nature of it.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:32

Well, all right, dudes. Let's get the fuck out of here.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:35

I do have kind of a little sentiment here from uh the colonel. Um he had a philosophy that uh parks are rich storehouses of memories, a solace to the aged, and an inspiration to the young, emphasizing preservation, education, and public enjoyment.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:01

Lieber. Colonel Lieber. Colonel Lieber. Nice. Let's get out of here.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:05

Yeah, thanks for listening, everybody. Keep on stuff. Goodbye. Say bye, Farren. Hey, see you guys. Fantastic show, fellas. Thank you, sir.