#40 - Amy Gulick - Author of The Salmon Way
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Mark Titus
Welcome to the Save What You Love podcast. I'm your host, Mark Titus. Well, on today's episode, we get to spend time with my friend Amy Gulick, who is an award winning nature photographer and writer. Amy, stories and images have been featured in outdoor photographer, National Wildlife, Audubon, Sierra and a lot of other publications. She has won more awards than I can enumerate right here.
00:00:24:13 - 00:00:55:04
Mark Titus
We both share the prestigious Daniel Housberg Wilderness Image Award from the Alaska Conservation Foundation, and Amy, above all, loves salmon. We talk in depth about her two books, The Salmon Way and Salmon in the Trees. And if you're listening for the first time and you've never heard any of my work or our extended work about wild salmon, this is the best primer I can think of.
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Mark Titus
This is an engaging, thought provoking, fiery and complete conversation with Amy about these animals, these beings that we love so very much because they give their very lives. So life itself can continue. And a reminder, if you're enjoying this podcast and you listen through Apple Podcasts, consider giving us a review and a rating. It really helps get the word out and get our podcast out into the world.
00:01:20:18 - 00:01:44:16
Mark Titus
And also, if you want to join this team and join what we're building, consider making an investment in Eva's Wild. We are taking investments right now for as little as $100 into the company through We Fund Her, which is a crowdsourced platform and you can find the ability to do that right on our Web Sites homepage at evaswild.com.
00:01:44:17 - 00:02:04:12
Mark Titus
That's the word save spelled backwards wildcard. And consider joining us. Making the next film in my trilogy, The Turn, and also becoming an owner, an actual owner in this company that we're building here together. All right. So without further ado, I give you Amy Gulick.
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Music
How do you save what you love?
When the world is burning down?
How do you save what you love?
When pushes come to shove.
How do you say what you love?
When things are upside down.
How do you say what you love?
When times are getting tough.
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Mark Titus
Amy Gulick Welcome. Welcome to the Say What You Love podcast. So happy you're here in person. Can you believe it?
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Amy Gulick
Thank you for having me.
00:02:49:10 - 00:03:13:11
Mark Titus
Yes, of course. So this is an opportunity. I love the long format of all this. You can edit things out. You can ramble, which is super cool. You know, in the film world, we're always cutting and cutting and cutting, and we can kind of let this ramble and go. And with that in mind, I would just love to hear your story.
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Mark Titus
Tell me your story from a wee little time.
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Amy Gulick
Where on earth do you want me to start?
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Mark Titus
I think you know.
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Amy Gulick
My salmon story Does my story?
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Mark Titus
Your story? Your story, your sense of place. Like, how did you how did you come to find this roots in this very magical place here in town and country?
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Amy Gulick
How? Well, all right. If we if we can ramble a little bit, we can all go way back.
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Mark Titus
Please do.
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Amy Gulick
So I grew up in Illinois, in farm country, you know, right on the border, kind of like really like suburbia and rural. You know, cornfields were a few blocks from my house and and that kind of stuff. And I was one of those feral kids, you know, feral who, you know, refused to wear shoes and was always outside and climbing trees and skinny knees.
00:04:10:10 - 00:04:32:06
Amy Gulick
Totally. I was just going to say scraping my knees were always bloody, catching frogs and salamanders and and, you know, I, I can look back on all that now and just realize, you know, I was just kind of being a normal human being. I mean, that's what human beings have done for ever. And at least in my childhood, I was lucky to to grow up that way.
00:04:32:08 - 00:04:52:14
Amy Gulick
But I think I was also, you know, honing my observation skills. Clearly, you know, of nature. Just I would love just being outside and just watching stuff, you know, birds. And again, I spent a lot of time on ponds and like little streams because that's what we had, you know, available and and then kind of remnants of forest, whatever was there.
00:04:52:14 - 00:05:13:23
Amy Gulick
So just observing and looking up at the clouds and just, you know, my imagination was whatever really it wanted to be. Like nobody was telling me how to think or or how things were. I think I was figuring it out for myself. And that's and again, I just think that's being a normal kid. Really? Yeah, absolutely. So I don't think there's anything terribly special about that.
00:05:13:23 - 00:05:37:06
Amy Gulick
But but, but, you know, now I look at kids today, it's like, my gosh, you know, I, I feel I feel for kids who don't really have the opportunity to do those things because I think everything that I am today really stems from that childhood and all that time spent outside and just imagining and thinking about stuff and and just making observations and putting stuff together.
00:05:37:08 - 00:06:03:20
Mark Titus
I think there's there's such a confluence of people. Maybe it's just our proclivity to gravitate towards humans that we gravitate toward. But on this show and people, you know, in the work that I do and you do, I'm sure, have that same origin story, like it's creeks, it's tadpoles, it's shiners, it's crawdads, it's trout, and then sort of a matriculation maybe up into the salmon world.
00:06:03:21 - 00:06:09:23
Mark Titus
But that's that's such a great commonality. And it brings a smile to my face. I had the same thing growing up.
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Amy Gulick
fantastic. Yeah. So I think maybe that connection, if there is a connection, I think, but like to to maybe that childhood and then now you know how immersed I am in salmon. I have to say, you know, when I was growing up, all I knew about salmon was that they came from a camp and I love them.
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Amy Gulick
And it was it was such a I don't want to say an exotic taste, but it was a very different taste for somebody growing up, you know, in the middle of corn country. But I really liked it. And I think as a kid growing up in that kind of environment, I think maybe that was a little unusual. It was.
00:06:48:03 - 00:07:12:18
Amy Gulick
But I just remember that, like opening that can and just being bowled over by this very strong, bold, not only taste and smell, but the look to this incredibly orange, you know, flesh was in this stuffed into this look. And I just remember really liking it. And I remember kind of taking my fork and maneuvering it around the skin.
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Amy Gulick
And there were always bones, you know, and then the little vertebra. And I didn't really know what they were, you know, but I liked them. They were crunchy and they tasted good. And I don't know, just the whole experience about that. One little can of salmon definitely left a lasting impression. And I also remember looking at the label, you know, and I don't exactly remember what was on the label.
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Amy Gulick
I'm sure there was a boat and maybe, you know, some semblance of ocean and some kind of fish or something. But I just remember looking at that label and just thinking of some faraway land because I was nowhere near the ocean but some faraway land where these incredibly strong, bold fish came from. And it just kind of sparked my imagination.
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Amy Gulick
So every time the scan would show up on the counter, you know, kind of run down and, you know, use the electric can opener and just, you know, pretty.
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Mark Titus
Precocious for a midwestern youngster.
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Amy Gulick
I know, right? Yeah. No, I just remember I just remember really liking salmon and just it left an impression on me and didn't know anything about the fish, where they came from, who caught them, who live with them, what their lifecycle was. But it left an impression. I can see that now. And then fast forward really to gosh, my early twenties I guess, and I moved from Illinois to Washington State, you know, So now I'm landing smack dab in, in, in Salmon Country.
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Amy Gulick
I still didn't know anything about salmon, but my husband, that's whole reason why I moved.
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Mark Titus
Going to ask.
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Amy Gulick
Him? Yeah. My husband to be was he is a native Washingtonian and and I always knew I wanted to live west. So that was an easy, easy transition for me. And I just remember one day after moving here and we were living kind of the north end, the Lake Washington at the time, and it was probably September ish.
00:09:05:02 - 00:09:27:20
Amy Gulick
And he just comes tearing into the house and just kind of screams The salmon are running. And then he runs right back out the door and like leaves the door wide open and like the salmon are running. What does that even mean? And where are they running to? And all I knew is that I had to run after him and see where he was going.
00:09:27:20 - 00:09:46:21
Amy Gulick
And so next thing I know, we're like running, you know, through neighbors backyards and jumping over fences. And finally we kind of get to the plaza through some little forest area and there's this little creek. And I think it was it was probably one night a creek, you know, I've waited it.
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Mark Titus
Yes.
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Amy Gulick
Yeah. And again, I didn't know that. I just moved there, you know. And so I'm like, where are we going? And, you know, what are we doing? And but anyway, here we are in front of this creek, and there's just these like, flashes of silver and, and a tail here and a head there and more splashing and, and all of a sudden, like these wriggling bodies are kind of all next to each other.
00:10:06:17 - 00:10:27:13
Amy Gulick
And I'm just absolutely transfixed. And and, and the weird part for me is I'm sitting there and I'm we're not saying a word. And he is so transfixed on this. You know, he grew up with this like he knows he knows this drill. He knows this ancient ritual, you know, that's been going on, you know, forever. And I don't this is like my first exposure to it.
00:10:27:15 - 00:10:46:23
Amy Gulick
And I but I was so transfixed watching these salmon, you know, these and I. I don't even think I knew that they were salmon at the time. But anyway, so watching these fish just work so hard, they were just so determined. And I think that was the lasting impression there. It's like determination. It's like, what are they doing?
00:10:46:23 - 00:11:06:16
Amy Gulick
Where are they going? You know? And like, what? And why are they swimming upstream? Like this seems to be a lot of work. And and again, I didn't know anything about the salmon lifecycle, but I knew that these fish were incredibly determined. And then I also knew that there was something really special about these fish that lived within Chris, you know, who was my husband?
00:11:06:16 - 00:11:27:00
Amy Gulick
I mean, these fish were so much a part of who he was, I could just sense that we didn't even have to talk about it. It was it was just so obvious at the time. So, so then fast forward another few years and now Chris and I are in Alaska, and this was my first time in Alaska and we're out on the Kenai Peninsula somewhere.
00:11:27:00 - 00:11:50:14
Amy Gulick
It's kind of September. It was rainy, you know, it was just kind of that kind of, I want to say miserable weather, but it's perfect weather for salmon. You know, it's very salmon weather. Yep. And I didn't really know that at the time either. But I've come to learn that. And we're getting driving somewhere and all of a sudden kind of screech, you know, another one of these, the salmon are running, you know, kind of thing and pull over.
00:11:50:14 - 00:12:18:16
Amy Gulick
And next thing I know, we're running up a kind of a mountainside. Now and traipsing through forest again and now following this very winding creek. And this time I'm all I'm seeing are like blobs of red and and very blurry blobs of red. Like the water wasn't, like, perfectly clear. And I'm like, what the heck? I mean, look, they look like kind of like blobs of blood, really kind of like in the water.
00:12:18:16 - 00:12:49:01
Amy Gulick
And then, and then I'm noticing that these big red blobs are are, are moving upstream, like slowly by slowly, they're kind of inching upstream. And then we get closer to the stream. I'm like, my gosh, you know, here, these are fish, these are salmon. They're different than the ones I saw in one at a creek. But here they are again, incredibly determined, very strong, very bold, making their way, you know, thin by little thin kick and, you know, and holding like holding steady.
00:12:49:01 - 00:13:08:23
Amy Gulick
Right. Like they never tend to, like, go all the way back down sometimes. But they're holding steady, making their way up that stream. And again, no words are spoken. You know, you can hear the croaks of ravens and just the, you know, maybe the drips of rain, you know, hitting the leaves on the forest and the splashing again of their tails.
00:13:08:23 - 00:13:37:00
Amy Gulick
And and just this very solemn again, I want to say kind of ancient ritual, you know, that's now that's now really a part of me. Yeah. You know, and and and I think I was kind of forever changed. It's like, wow. And and I do remember finally kind of breaking the spell, you know, that we were that both Chris and I are kind of under just being transfixed, you know, watching this, you know, what's been happening for millennia.
00:13:37:02 - 00:14:03:11
Amy Gulick
And here we are. This is kind of our moment in history, like watching this ancient thing going on before us. And finally, I you know, I am a very curious person by nature. We can definitely talk about that because that's another, you know, way that I got to where I am now. But I just couldn't help it. It's like, okay, like where, you know, where where are these fish coming from?
00:14:03:13 - 00:14:22:14
Amy Gulick
And and Chris said, you know, he just said the ocean. I'm like, okay, So we're in a stream, freshwater stream. They came from the ocean. And then, you know, my next question is, well, how did how did they get here? Like, how did they find their way here, you know, from the oceans, a big place. Like, how did they get here?
00:14:22:14 - 00:14:33:05
Amy Gulick
And he just very calmly again, never even looked at me, just kept his eyes focused on the fish. And he just said, it's one of the greatest mysteries of life.
00:14:33:07 - 00:14:58:16
Mark Titus
So here you are across the country, across the continent, you've discovered this mystery and I love the word you use. Curiosity is just such a blessing. So how did you tumble into the work that you do then? Now you're here. How did you find your way upstream to you, to the to the work that you have been called to do?
00:14:58:19 - 00:14:59:22
Mark Titus
That is so beautiful.
00:15:00:00 - 00:15:29:21
Amy Gulick
Yeah, well, I mean, going back a little bit, you know, again to childhood, I was always just fascinated with storytelling. But I can look back on that now and it's like, you know, that's just a normal human trait, You know, before before I could read or write, I was telling stories, and that's, you know, how I was trying to make sense of my world and making connections and then sharing, you know, that with, you know, whatever, whoever my community was at the time, you know, my family and friends.
00:15:29:21 - 00:15:49:08
Amy Gulick
And that kind of thing. But that that's just a human thing. I mean, you know, literacy has only been around for a few centuries, you know, maybe at most. So, you know, prior to written and, you know, that kind of and written and reading, you know, a language, I mean, what did humans do? How did we connect with each other?
00:15:49:08 - 00:16:08:07
Amy Gulick
We told stories. You know, we sat around the campfire and and we told stories. So again, I don't think there's anything unique about that. But but I think my fascination and passion for storytelling just I just never outgrew that. So when I was young, before I could read or write, I was telling stories, I was drawing, trying to illustrate the stories.
00:16:08:07 - 00:16:27:18
Amy Gulick
And then somewhere along the way I think I was about eight or nine and my family got one of those. We're going to laugh at this, right, But the Kodak pocket camera. God, I remember conversing right? Yeah. Camera in everybody's pocket, which, you know, we all kind of laugh at now because not only do you have a phone, but you have a camera in your pocket.
00:16:27:18 - 00:16:54:19
Amy Gulick
But it was the first pocket camera and it was really revolutionary. And and I just remember getting a hold of that camera. And when I figured out what it could do, it's like, my gosh, like, this is my tool of choice for illustrating these stories that I'm so passionate about telling. So again, fast forward when I moved, you know, from the Midwest out to the Northwest, that passion for storytelling never really left me.
00:16:54:19 - 00:17:23:09
Amy Gulick
I mean, I was doing you know, I went to college, majored in business, was working in the financial industry, was horribly bored. But it was it was a way to make a living. And then when I moved out here, I had the opportunity to kind of follow my passions a little bit more and try something different. And so I was working in commercial film for quite a while and on the side I was pursuing stories and publishing them and and then that took off more and more.
00:17:23:09 - 00:17:54:14
Amy Gulick
And then I really started doing that more full time. So I'd been working on doing a lot of magazine work at the time, and my stories focused on the outdoors, whether it was outdoor recreation or wildlife or natural history or something like that. And I really enjoyed that and I continued to do that work. But somewhere along the way I really wanted to dig in and go more in depth and spend much more time on one topic and putting together a book.
00:17:54:16 - 00:18:05:07
Amy Gulick
And I just nothing probably makes me happier than being in a green, drippy, wet forest. And so the Northwest is just perfect for that.
00:18:05:09 - 00:18:06:14
Speaker 2
Yes, it is.
00:18:06:16 - 00:18:31:13
Amy Gulick
But there's another place north of here in Washington state, southeast Alaska, and about more than 80% of southeast Alaska is the Tongass National Forest. And so I really wanted to dig into that area and and really tell that story. Not that that story hasn't been told many, many times, but I was really looking to tell a new story of an old familiar place.
00:18:31:13 - 00:18:58:10
Amy Gulick
And the Tongass desperately needed a new story. When I was digging in, the old story was was a very divisive one. The timber wars, divided communities, you know, it was industrial scale, clear cut logging that wasn't sustainable. But, you know, how do you you know, how do you change this way of life that a lot of the communities there were were dependent on.
00:18:58:12 - 00:19:20:16
Amy Gulick
But at the same time, we were destroying these forests, you know, this incredible forest, which is really like the last best place of what is north America's coastal temperate rainforest. So I was wanting to dig in and really tell this story, but but in a different way, in a much more positive way, and get people thinking a little bit differently about this place.
00:19:20:18 - 00:19:44:07
Amy Gulick
And so I was wanting to do a book. And so I started before I actually spent time there. I was doing a lot of research and kind of digging in and just trying to figure out what makes this place so special, you know, and what makes it tick. And somewhere along the way in my research, I came across this incredibly dry scientific paper.
00:19:44:09 - 00:19:44:14
Speaker 2
And.
00:19:44:14 - 00:19:45:14
Mark Titus
That just lit your world on.
00:19:45:14 - 00:19:49:05
Amy Gulick
Fire, right? Well, in a way it did the way it did.
00:19:49:07 - 00:19:59:18
Mark Titus
This is the moment I'm actually we're intuiting each other's thoughts here because I want that. It's that moment. Where is that moment? You gave yourself permission. It sounds like you're leaning in, right?
00:19:59:18 - 00:20:20:12
Amy Gulick
Yeah, right. And I and I will preface this by saying I'm not a scientist. I'm an avid naturalist. I love science, but I'm not the one doing the science. And I'm certainly not the one, you know, communicating in what is often kind of a secret language, you know, among scientists. And that's not true.
00:20:20:14 - 00:20:21:11
Mark Titus
It sure seems that way.
00:20:21:11 - 00:20:37:07
Amy Gulick
So yeah, yeah. And again, I mean, you know, every you know, every profession has its language and and and science definitely has its language, but sometimes there's a lot that's lost in translation between science and the rest of us. Mere mortals.
00:20:37:11 - 00:20:39:03
Mark Titus
Mere mortals. I love that.
00:20:39:05 - 00:20:39:12
Speaker 2
Yes.
00:20:39:15 - 00:21:06:13
Amy Gulick
So, so I'm struggling through this paper and I don't even really know how I came across it. I think I just googled, I don't know, you know, Tongass and Forest and and I don't know, something maybe connections or something like that. And and I think the title of the paper was something along the lines of the upstream flow of marine derived nutrients in a terrestrial environment.
00:21:06:15 - 00:21:07:07
Amy Gulick
Right.
00:21:07:08 - 00:21:08:21
Mark Titus
Let me guess what that refers to.
00:21:08:21 - 00:21:13:19
Amy Gulick
Right. But right there, I mean, I almost didn't get past the title, right? It's like, God.
00:21:13:21 - 00:21:15:05
Mark Titus
Really sexy.
00:21:15:05 - 00:21:50:08
Amy Gulick
Can you do I really have to get through this? Yes. And anyway, it's something something compelled me to dig in. And I really struggled through this paper, but I made it to the end and I almost kind of just put it aside. And then all of a sudden something something went off in my head. A light bulb clicked or blinked on, and I just said, Do you do you mean what this paper's trying to tell me is that there are salmon in the trees, Because if that's what this is all about and that's what this paper is really telling me, then that's the coolest thing I've ever heard in it.
00:21:50:08 - 00:21:51:09
Mark Titus
Is that is the coolest.
00:21:51:12 - 00:22:13:16
Amy Gulick
Like the coolest thing. And if I can help people understand how it is that there are salmon in the trees, then they'll understand what makes the Tongass and Southeast Alaska what it is and why it's so special and not just special for its own sake and for the wildlife and the wild communities that, you know, depend on this connection between salmon and trees.
00:22:13:16 - 00:22:30:16
Amy Gulick
But the human communities that also depend on this connection. And so that was the moment where I just couldn't get this idea out of my head. And when things don't leave your head, that's when you know you have to set out and pursue them further.
00:22:30:22 - 00:22:48:04
Mark Titus
Absolutely. What keeps you going through this? I mean, there's no guarantee that this is going to be successful or whatever, whatever that means. But you got to get up every day and feed yourself and move forward and pay the bills. And what what kept you driving you to do this?
00:22:48:10 - 00:23:13:01
Amy Gulick
I think a lot of it was that connection. I realized, you know, as as a kid, the things that I was the most passionate about and and really found interesting were ecological connections. It wasn't just, here's a bear or here's a fish. It's like, how did these things interact and why do they need each other or how do they benefit each other?
00:23:13:03 - 00:23:47:07
Amy Gulick
How does it all fit together? I'm definitely kind of more of a big picture thinker, but I also think that other people really like making these connections too. And this this remarkable connection between salmon and trees in southeast Alaska, in the Tongass. It's not intuitive. It's not like you're probably going to figure this out on your own, although as I just said, that I'm I'm quite certain that Native people have figured this out long ago.
00:23:47:07 - 00:24:02:18
Amy Gulick
And we're very aware of these connections, because as I've come to learn, that's how they think. They think in terms of connections and how everything fits together. And I think in the Western world, we we tend to compartmentalize things and we're not always putting things together.
00:24:02:21 - 00:24:04:07
Mark Titus
And we're very impatient.
00:24:04:09 - 00:24:10:02
Amy Gulick
Yeah, right. Yes. And I'm one of those, too. I'm a product of that struggle.
00:24:10:02 - 00:24:12:07
Mark Titus
I know the struggle is real.
00:24:12:09 - 00:24:34:09
Amy Gulick
But but yeah, So I think I think what keeps me going and you're right there are lots of ups and downs in a project like this. I think when you take on a much longer term project, you're just opening yourself up to more to more ups and of course more downs. There's always going to be periods of of I almost want to go I don't want to be melodramatic, but despair.
00:24:34:11 - 00:24:40:21
Amy Gulick
Sure. You know, you're like you're like, my gosh, what was I thinking? You know, how on earth did I think I could actually pull this off?
00:24:40:22 - 00:24:59:17
Mark Titus
And last week, Yeah, I get it. No, it's it is true. That's. That's why I am so curious about this. It's. I want to learn from you and glean how you keep this this spark alive to create this. It's. You're birthing something. It's beautiful. And yet it's hard when you're in the middle of it.
00:24:59:22 - 00:25:19:12
Amy Gulick
It is. It is. Because. Right. You can't really see one. So you can't see the end. Like, you know, you know what, you want that finish line to be sure. But but there's no blueprint and how to get there. That's right. You know, like no one's setting this out for you and saying, you need to go here and here and here and meet with this person and film this or write about this.
00:25:19:12 - 00:25:41:01
Amy Gulick
And you have to figure all that out. And it's and it's hard as you know. But I think with in both of my book projects, I think what's really kept me going is just this this the passion for the subject, certainly, but then my passion for wanting other people to get as excited about it as I am. Yeah.
00:25:41:03 - 00:26:17:17
Amy Gulick
And to see how awesome you know, whether it's salmon in the trees in this connection, see how awesome that is. Or, you know, in the second book, which, you know, we can get into the salmon way how awesome people's lives are who who live with salmon and what incredible ways of life salmon allow people to live. I just I want to believe I have to believe, right, that if if people understood these things and could see them the way that I am experiencing and seeing them, then I think that they would come to the conclusion that, wow, this, this is important, this is really important.
00:26:17:17 - 00:26:42:09
Amy Gulick
And why on earth are we cutting down that forest and and jeopardizing that connection between salmon and trees? Or why are we, you know, destroying salmon habitat, you know, that that the salmon rely on and therefore, the people that rely on the salmon rely on? Why would we do that? So I think those are the kinds of things that both keep me up at night, but keep me going.
00:26:42:14 - 00:27:22:13
Amy Gulick
Yeah. At the same time, I just I think so much of, you know, I guess like, you know, the environmental issues that we face today, that that and, and environmental issues are also social issues. There's no separation there. We tend to compartmentalize them, but they're they're one and the same thing. But I think so many of these issues that we face today, if people just understood how all these things work and how all these pieces fit together and that we are so, so dependent on healthy forests and healthy oceans and healthy rivers, then I think we'd be making a lot better and different decisions.
00:27:22:15 - 00:27:51:02
Mark Titus
I agree. Salmon are connector for sure, and we're going to talk lots more about that. But I sense amongst our peers and even folks that are not necessarily in our circle of salmon devotees, there is another connector that supersedes all of that and that's place. What is it about this place? In this place I'm going to broadly say salmon country.
00:27:51:02 - 00:28:07:09
Mark Titus
Every every part of this bioregion where salmon streams connect a terrestrial location. What is it about this place for you that is that connector or that constant source of curiosity and wonder?
00:28:07:11 - 00:28:16:21
Amy Gulick
yeah, well, that's a great question. I, I think we all need a home stream.
00:28:16:23 - 00:28:20:11
Mark Titus
yeah. And so. Great. Thank you for that.
00:28:20:11 - 00:28:43:04
Amy Gulick
Yeah. And, and by home stream, you know, it could be doesn't even have to be water, you know. But, but in this case, you know, in Salmon country it clearly is, you know that home stream is it's a river It's a stream. It's a lake. It's maybe it's the big ocean itself, but it's a place that that we can identify with.
00:28:43:08 - 00:28:59:15
Amy Gulick
It's a part of us and we are a part of it. And and I think when you have that kind of connection to a home stream, you you're grounded, You feel grounded. You also feel a sense of responsibility to take care of it.
00:28:59:17 - 00:29:00:08
Mark Titus
I mean.
00:29:00:10 - 00:29:26:08
Amy Gulick
There are other people who that's their home stream as well. So, you know, you have this shared interest and this shared caring of your home stream. I just think it's I just think that idea of a home stream is super important. And whether you live in Illinois, you know, there's there's a home stream there, whether it's a patch of forest or a pond or something, something that grounds you, you know, to the earth itself.
00:29:26:10 - 00:30:07:20
Amy Gulick
And I think in our modern Western society, where where most of us who are of European ancestry, we were we were separated from our home stream through our ancestors. You know, who who came here. So we don't have really that long term connection. Long term meaning thousands of years. Yeah. You know, connection to a place. And I think a lot of Americans tend to be kind of ungrounded and we don't even know it, you know, And but when you're ungrounded and you're not connected to a piece of the earth, I think it's really easy to make really bad decisions about that piece of earth.
00:30:07:20 - 00:30:42:15
Amy Gulick
It's if we're separate from it and then we harm it, it's kind of no big deal because it's not a part of us. We're not harming ourselves. We don't really feel it that way. And and I think so much of this is subconscious unconscious. I don't think that we do a lot of harm intentionally. But but by being separate from, you know, that home stream, I just think it's easier to to not get too worked up about destroying a stream or cutting down a patch of trees because we weren't connected to it in the first place.
00:30:42:16 - 00:31:12:09
Mark Titus
I think it's profoundly wise, and I feel that too. And I also feel, as you were intimating, a deep sense of longing, a desire, a longing, a yearning for that home stream. I've got Irish roots and been maybe it was watching the The Banshees of In a Year in which we just watched recently. It was very, very, very Irish film and I've been feeling a yearning for those kinds of roots.
00:31:12:09 - 00:31:43:19
Mark Titus
And I think that's why as a transplant here, my folks came also came from the Midwest when I was a little baby, six months old. I you know, I do have a deep yearning for the roots here. And there is, as you say, there is a very different characteristic that comes and evolves out of not only just identifying a place as a home, but it's a part of you and you're right.
00:31:43:21 - 00:31:53:12
Mark Titus
Those decisions that you make about how you interact with this landscape are profoundly determined by that nature of that relationship.
00:31:53:14 - 00:32:17:14
Amy Gulick
Definitely. And I think where I really learned that concept of a home stream and and caring for it and that it's a part of you and you are a part of it was from spending a lot of time with people in Alaska who are so, so clearly rooted in where they are and to a particular home stream. And it's really the first time I actually heard that term to what?
00:32:17:14 - 00:32:24:01
Amy Gulick
I never heard the term home stream before until spending a lot of time with salmon. People. Well, Alaska, you.
00:32:24:01 - 00:32:57:04
Mark Titus
Were also riding the wave here of progress through this this question line. I was just going to ask you about how you came into the salmon way. And this is this beautiful book I'm holding in my hands right now that I'm lucky enough to have a copy of. It's it's gorgeous in and of itself. And it is really personal and evocative with folks that we know a lot of these people ourselves.
00:32:57:04 - 00:33:07:09
Mark Titus
And if you're just coming in cold, you get a sense of knowing these people. After you read this book, what was the entry point into these communities for you?
00:33:07:11 - 00:33:25:21
Amy Gulick
Yeah, so, so backing up a little bit, so so salmon in the Trees was my first book. Yep. And and that focused on again this remarkable which I should really talk about this remarkable connection that grew up because I think you're teasing everybody, right? And they're like, well, how is it why, you know, why why are there salmon and trees?
00:33:25:21 - 00:34:02:05
Amy Gulick
How are there salmon and trees? So I'll explain that real quickly. So Tongass National Forest and more than 80% of southeast Alaska, the last best part of North America's coastal temperate rainforest and last best when I say that, it's like the most intact, you know, the ecosystem is still functioning as it as it should. So Tongass National Forest is about the size of the state of West Virginia, and there are 5000 salmon spawning streams throughout that whole forest as part of the world has some of the highest densities about brown and black bears.
00:34:02:07 - 00:34:25:20
Amy Gulick
And so these coastal bears have the luxury of feeding on salmon, which really helps them put on weight, which helps them survive winter hibernation. So certain time of year, kind of late summer or early fall, all these salmon, millions of salmon starts leaving the ocean and they start streaming into these 5000 salmon spawning streams. All these bears are, you know, hungry and they're waiting for them.
00:34:25:22 - 00:34:51:00
Amy Gulick
And bears don't really like being around other bears. They're not social. But here's all this, you know, this concentrated food supply that's coming in. And so a lot of bears will gather and a lot of different salmon streams. And because they don't really like being around each other, often what happens is the bears will come into these streams, I'll grab a fish and then they'll take it away from the stream and into the forest.
00:34:51:00 - 00:35:17:20
Amy Gulick
And so what happens, you know, think about millions of salmon, 5000 spawning streams, incredible numbers of black and brown bears, you know, on all of these streams over time, a lot of dead salmon or parts of salmon, remnants of the carcasses, whatever, end up on the forest floor thanks to the bears. And over time, all these nutrients from the bodies of the fish decompose into the soil and the trees absorb them through the roots.
00:35:18:01 - 00:35:43:01
Amy Gulick
Now, the big light bulb moment, for me, it's like I think it's easy for all of us to understand how fish can fertilize the forest. But that lightbulb moment of salmon in the trees really blinks on when you start to realize. So scientists, you know, they scientists are very curious nature as well. And they were trying to quantify how much salmon bears eat.
00:35:43:03 - 00:36:03:05
Amy Gulick
So that's kind of how this whole remarkable connection came about. So the only way you're going to quantify how much salmon bears eat is to sit on salmon streams and watch how much salmon bears eat. Well, they notice, too, that bears don't really hang around the streams, especially the less dominant bears. So they're like, there goes a bear with the fish, I need to go follow that bear.
00:36:03:07 - 00:36:25:18
Amy Gulick
And I'm trying to figure out how much salmon is a bear eating. So the scientists were going into the forest and what they were noticing was like, my God, look at all the salmon on the forest floor, like everywhere. And then and then the next thing they did is they looked up and they're like, Hey, look how big these trees.
00:36:25:20 - 00:36:26:21
Speaker 2
It's this incredible.
00:36:26:21 - 00:36:27:20
Mark Titus
Could there be.
00:36:27:20 - 00:36:48:22
Amy Gulick
Yeah, the connection, right? And then the next thing they did is they started to take I wonder what's in those trees. So they started to take tree core samples from the trees back to the lab. Then they analyzed the DNA of the tree, and what they found was ridiculously high concentrations of marine nitrogen. So it's a nitrogen bearing.
00:36:48:22 - 00:37:13:12
Amy Gulick
It's called nitrogen 15 ridiculously high concentrations of nitrogen, 15 entries near these seven streams. So nitrogen 15 comes from the ocean. So how is it that this marine ocean nutrient gets into the trees? It's it swam there, swam there in the bodies of salmon, and it was accumulated in the bodies of salmon from all the time that the salmon spent in ocean.
00:37:13:14 - 00:37:23:19
Amy Gulick
So it swam there in the bodies of salmon, and it was delivered to the forest floor by the bears. I always I always called the bears like the UPS FedEx delivery guys.
00:37:23:21 - 00:37:27:09
Speaker 2
They're already around, right? Yeah.
00:37:27:11 - 00:37:28:18
Amy Gulick
Right. They're already wearing the uniform.
00:37:28:18 - 00:37:31:08
Mark Titus
Yes, Yes.
00:37:31:10 - 00:37:56:17
Amy Gulick
Yeah. So. So that's how salmon got into the trees. And it's just this incredible, again, light bulb moment. And I've given this presentation many times to people in southeast Alaska, you know, who live there, to people in Ohio, to people in Florida, like all over. And it's always the same when people learn about it, they're like, my gosh, like, that's the coolest thing I've ever heard.
00:37:56:19 - 00:38:08:13
Amy Gulick
And then in the next breath they say, and it makes perfect sense. It which it does, right? But it's not intuitive to most of us. It's not intuitive. But once you learn about it, it's just, my God.
00:38:08:15 - 00:38:11:22
Mark Titus
You can't unsee it. Once you've been exposed to it.
00:38:12:02 - 00:38:32:06
Amy Gulick
Right? Right. And I like that you say it that way because it's something we can't see. And yet, once you learn about it, it's everywhere. It's right and it's in everything. I mean, like, the salmon aren't just in the trees right there in the bears. They're in the blueberries, they're in the people, they're in the orca's like they're in everything.
00:38:32:08 - 00:38:35:11
Amy Gulick
And that's to me that that's the magic of salmon.
00:38:35:13 - 00:38:57:07
Mark Titus
Well, I think this is a great way to dovetail into place. People occupying place, home stream. There's some practical reasons for living near a home stream. There's food there. What else is there? What what led you into the salmon way of life? What was the entry point for you into that?
00:38:57:09 - 00:39:30:17
Amy Gulick
Right. So so when I was traveling around southeast Alaska, working on salmon in the trees, I had the the good fortune to visit most of the communities throughout Southeast. And if you've ever spent any time in Southeast, there's there's about three dozen communities and they're all really different from one another as far as kind of just their personalities and and the kind of people who live there like and and people who are in the southeast, they'll joke and they'll they'll tell you about all the rivalries, you know, among the communities.
00:39:30:17 - 00:39:51:16
Amy Gulick
And usually it's in jest. But, you know, there's just a feel. Does it feel to catch you can there's a field of Petersburg, there's a field of Sitka, there's big, big fields in Juneau, you know, But they're all different. Yeah. But as I was traveling around and meeting with people, I notice, you know, the common language that everybody seemed to speak.
00:39:51:16 - 00:40:27:04
Amy Gulick
And then this thing that that tied everybody together was salmon. Yeah. You know, you could argue about a lot of different things. But when it came to salmon, there was just this common bond, you know, common language that people seemed to speak. And that really struck me. I was I was very struck by that. And then the other thing that really struck me was how salmon built communities and it seemed like whether I met with people for 10 minutes or ten days, I always left with salmon in my hands.
00:40:27:06 - 00:40:54:15
Amy Gulick
And I was so in credibly touched by that, especially when I learned just how much work goes into whatever it was they were putting into my hands. So it could have been like a frozen filet or a jar of smoked salmon or ziploc bag of dried salmon strips or didn't really matter. I came to learn just how much work and how much love went into what was now in my hands.
00:40:54:15 - 00:41:22:14
Amy Gulick
And what I learned was people weren't just giving me salmon, they were giving me a piece of themselves. Yeah, And there's no greater connection between human beings then than to have that kind of shared bond between you and again, I, I, I was a stranger in their land, and yet I was welcomed with open arms and, you know, again, went away with salmon.
00:41:22:14 - 00:41:39:08
Amy Gulick
There were times I was brought to tears. I was just so touched by that because it was just such a profound way of sharing who they are. You know, with me, I came to learn that and it made me kind of look at my own life. It's like, what do I eat? What am I sharing with people? What am I giving?
00:41:39:10 - 00:42:04:23
Amy Gulick
And I realized not a whole lot as far as as that went. But I also was kind of looking at where I live and it's like, well, we don't we don't have that volume of sand. We don't have that abundance of salmon anymore. And again, going back to that longing and that home stream, and I realized it's like, my gosh, like, I wish like I wish more than anything that we had that abundance here in the Northwest still.
00:42:04:23 - 00:42:37:01
Amy Gulick
And many of us are working hard to try and restore a lot of that. But it just made me realize it actually made me feel not only a sense of an intense gratitude to Alaska and the salmon ways of life that that the fish allowed people to live there. But I also invoked in me this incredible sense of loss and pain because because that those ways of life are just remnants, really, of here in the northwest of what once were.
00:42:37:03 - 00:43:07:04
Amy Gulick
But anyway, so traveling around southeast, just realizing how important salmon are to people, I started thinking bigger and it's like, okay, if salmon are this important to people in southeast Alaska, are they this important to people throughout the state of Alaska where salmon are? So that led that was, I think, my entry point into the salmon way. And so the salmon way it celebrates and it explores the relationships between people and salmon throughout the state of Alaska.
00:43:07:06 - 00:43:54:16
Amy Gulick
And it was really kind of a departure for me as far as it's incredibly people centric. Not that my other work hasn't included people, but my past work was really more about ecosystems and why ecosystems matter too, to people. Everything the salmon way is people centric all the way. It is about people and their ways of life that the salmon make possible and I was just, I think, living here in the Northwest and again realizing what we once had as far as salmon and ways of life and seeing in Alaska, the abundance is still there and salmon, ways of life still exist and revolve around these fish.
00:43:54:18 - 00:44:13:09
Amy Gulick
It was kind of this, again, this juxtaposition, but I was just so intrigued that there is still a place where the lives of people in salmon are linked. And I really wanted to know and learn what what are your lives like? What's it like, you know, to live with salmon and to have that be such an integral part of your life?
00:44:13:10 - 00:44:17:11
Amy Gulick
So that was my entry point into the salmon way.
00:44:17:13 - 00:44:30:13
Mark Titus
What did you find? What did you find when you started entering these communities, in these homes, in these fish camps and these huts and forced dwellings in this this beautiful book.
00:44:30:15 - 00:44:59:02
Amy Gulick
I just found incredible, very rich ways of life. And I, I and it's interesting, the word rich came up a lot in my conversations. It didn't really matter who I was talking with. So I my goal was to meet with the greatest diversity of people I could in in many different geographic locations in Alaska where salmon are. I mean, Alaska is a huge state.
00:44:59:04 - 00:45:24:06
Amy Gulick
I couldn't get to every salmon stream, but I tried to get to kind of like the biggest geographical areas where salmon are, you know, So Bristol Bay, southeast Alaska, the Yukon Kuskokwim area that the Big Copper River, a few other areas as well. And I met with Alaska Native people, you know, whose entire cultures have been built on salmon for thousands and thousands of years.
00:45:24:06 - 00:45:53:01
Amy Gulick
I met with commercial fishermen who catch and sell salmon for their livelihood, and that was sport fishing lodge owners, guides, clients, you know, people who are doing this more for recreation and then just kind of everyday Alaskans who, you know, maybe just have a you know, I don't know, let's say a government job or something like that. But this is how they spend their their free time is fishing and smoking, preparing salmon, filling their freezer, really.
00:45:53:01 - 00:46:17:13
Amy Gulick
But this is how they choose to spend their free time. So I met with a wide diversity of people and this word rich just seemed to be the theme that came that came up over and over again. And I'll I'll tell you a story because I think it was probably of the most profound realizations for me, especially around this word rich and wealth.
00:46:17:15 - 00:46:45:07
Amy Gulick
So I was on the Kuskokwim River, which is Big River system, and I was about halfway up the river, so about 255 miles from the mouth, very small little village, native village of Nipomo yurt, which is less than a hundred people. It's it's more seasonal than anything people are showing up from, say, Bethel, which is closer the mouth of the customer cram and more of a population center at 6000 people.
00:46:45:08 - 00:47:08:15
Amy Gulick
So people are showing up upriver but when the salmon are showing up so in June and I had the good fortune to spend some time with a family there and a woman named Shelly Leary, she is angelic. She's an Alaska native, and she was in her smokehouse and at their fish camp and she was putting up king salmon in the smokehouse.
00:47:08:15 - 00:47:32:05
Amy Gulick
And it was so one of those, again, kind of overcast, dreary, misty, drizzly, kind of cold days. SALMON Yeah, exact is that perfect salmon weather, right? But it can be a little hard on human bones, you know, And the night before they had been up, you know, she and her family had been until, you know, well past midnight, because they had a good catch.
00:47:32:05 - 00:47:51:22
Amy Gulick
And they you know, now you've got to process all those fish. And so they were into the wee hours of the morning processing the fish. So a lot of these fish were hanging in the smokehouse. But you have to tend to them. This is a this is a long process, you know, to go from fish to say, again, that Ziploc bag of dry strips, it's it can be like about a two week process.
00:47:52:00 - 00:48:17:23
Amy Gulick
And so Shelly and I are in her smokehouse. And it was just I just felt so good in the smokehouse and I wasn't really sure why. I think a lot of it, it was warm. It was again, it was kind of cold and drizzly outside. So it was warm. It was dry. That unbelievably delicious smell of smoke, fish as it's permeating my hair, my skin, my clothes, my brain.
00:48:18:01 - 00:48:40:00
Amy Gulick
You know, I just felt really, really good in the smokehouse. And it wasn't I was aware that I just felt really good, you know, And it was an it was just that cozy place, a nice place to be. And then Shelly starts talking and she starts kind of telling me some stories. And and one of the things she said that just so to this day is just it's never going to go away.
00:48:40:00 - 00:49:02:11
Amy Gulick
It's just like etched in my brain. And she just she just said she said I was I was taught to always be ready to have food for the winter when the smokehouse is filled. I feel good because I know I have enough. But when the smokehouse is empty, I feel poor. And and it was just kind of I her words kind of seeped in.
00:49:02:11 - 00:49:25:18
Amy Gulick
I was like, my gosh. Like, I just realized this profound difference between why I felt good about her full smokehouse and why she felt good about her full smokehouse again. I felt good. It was more a kind of immediate gratification, like Delicious food. I'm in a warm, cozy place. This just feels great. And for her, it was more this was food for the winter.
00:49:25:20 - 00:49:54:09
Amy Gulick
This was the equivalent of having money in the bank. This was long term security. And that's why she felt good. And I just realized the stark differences between our own lives and again, this concept of of of what does it mean to be rich and what is it and what is wealth. And I realized like this delusion and illusion that I have lived under really for most of my life, there's this delusion that there will always be food.
00:49:54:10 - 00:50:27:00
Amy Gulick
Even though I'm not fishing, I'm not hunting, I'm not growing, and I'm not even storing it. And it's just this idea that I've never really had to think too hard about where my food comes from or the possibility of its scarcity. And Shelly lives under no such pretense. I mean, this is and and it just put it again, put my own life in a very stark perspective, but it just made me realize there's probably no greater feeling of well-being than a food for the winter.
00:50:27:05 - 00:50:49:07
Amy Gulick
Like, you know, you're going to get through the hardest time of the year. Like, that's a that's a really I would feel very comforted by that. And she clearly does. And she's not the only one, you know, So so this feeling of, you know, what does it mean to live a rich life? So, again, you know, you're set, you know, you're secure for the, you know, the hardest time of the year.
00:50:49:09 - 00:51:16:22
Amy Gulick
And there's a community of people that are that are pretty much all doing the same thing. And in times of abundance, as you're all sharing, but more importantly, in times of scarcity, you're also all sharing. And what you know, this idea of, you know, that we have in the Western modern world, that we can all be independent and live on our own is is just a that's just a big delusion.
00:51:17:00 - 00:51:43:23
Amy Gulick
And it becomes quickly shattered when something bad does happen. And the other the other part of the story with Shelly is that we're sitting in her smokehouse and I'm understanding what it really what long term security really means. You know, it's it's food, it's community. It's knowing that you're going to get through hard times together. I mean, there's there's no better, I think, sense of human humanness really, than that.
00:51:43:23 - 00:52:03:06
Amy Gulick
And salmon does that for communities. But the other thing she the other story that she told me, she said, yeah, I, I was in Seattle not too long ago. I, you know, had something I had to attend to and I had a friend from the village was with me and we were walking around the city and we're looking at all the tall buildings and all the crowds of people.
00:52:03:06 - 00:52:24:13
Amy Gulick
And we just our first thought was what are all those people going to do when something bad happens? What are all of those people going to eat? And then the next thing she said was, we were really glad we were going home. And again, that just put in such stark perspective to me. You know what? What is a life?
00:52:24:18 - 00:52:48:01
Amy Gulick
You know, what does it mean to to be human, really? And salmon That's I think for me, this particular book, that is what I learned more than anything by spending time with the salmon people is what is a life and what does it mean to live a life well, and salmon, salmon help people do that.
00:52:48:03 - 00:53:21:00
Mark Titus
Wow. We're going to have to have a part two. So much to unpack in there. And I'm tracking on so many levels as you as you were rolling these ideas out. Those were things that I was thinking about this this idea of food scarcity. Sadly, there's too many people in this country that are hungry today. Children, especially. And if you ask a person like that, food is the rest.
00:53:21:02 - 00:53:51:22
Mark Titus
The rest of us who are lucky enough to have food on command or when we feel hungry don't really understand that because it is such a we require energy to keep going as an organism and most people in this country, that's a good thing don't necessarily feel the acuteness of that, but there are people that do every single day, and I think they would have a very different perspective than the typical Western outlook on this.
00:53:51:23 - 00:54:11:07
Mark Titus
Now, cut right to the nerve on Shelly's visit down here to Seattle. And I think about that all the time. You know, if the shit goes sideways here, like there's not a single average person on the street is not going to know how to put energy into their body.
00:54:11:09 - 00:54:12:04
Amy Gulick
and.
00:54:12:04 - 00:54:38:16
Mark Titus
Totally. That's that's kind of terrifying. So I, I want to not dwell on the terrifying aspect of that, but on the unifying aspect of, I think what what you also observed was this idea that in scarcity, in good times and bad, there is this community and we're also there's a dearth of that here. You know, it it isn't quite the same.
00:54:38:16 - 00:55:09:09
Mark Titus
And that's I think that's why my heart is in Alaska so much. I identify with. I yearn again, long for that. So once again, the food, this salmon bringing us together in that profound way. And the other piece, though, which I kind of want to segway into, is into the inarguable notion of food and the nature of food doesn't matter if you're right or left or blue or red.
00:55:09:11 - 00:55:43:00
Mark Titus
Any color in the spectrum? Does it matter who you love or go home with at night? None of that matters. We need food as an organism to keep moving forward. So this I know you've been very active as an activist in protecting salmon, and you and I have. And amongst our our peers and our friends have looked at food as a way of leveling the playing field to have discussions about places like Bristol Bay, which of course, is a giant food production place.
00:55:43:02 - 00:55:59:12
Mark Titus
So I would love to hear from you on how that notion of food has clearly come out of the salmon way as a book, but also in the work that you continue to do as an activist to protect salmon habitat.
00:55:59:13 - 00:56:28:23
Amy Gulick
Yeah. And food, you know, there's another word, you know, so I get to keep using the word rich because that's really one thing I just learned, you know that because people let me go back to the word rich just for a second, no matter where I went. But but particularly with, I think, Alaska Native folks who again, for millennia, for since time immemorial, this is how their cultures have survived and thrived.
00:56:29:01 - 00:56:55:08
Amy Gulick
And I heard the word, you know, we are rich, we are rich, we are rich people. As long as we have the salmon, as long as we have the home stream, as long as we have the land, we are rich people and most Western modern people. If you went to some of these Alaska Native communities from your, you know, very limited world perspective, you would not the word rich would not come to your mind.
00:56:55:14 - 00:57:26:23
Amy Gulick
You know, you might think, you know, no, this is a poor village or, you know, people are living in poverty here. But and by Western standards, they many people are at or below poverty level. But that's defining, you know, a rich or poor life in a very different way. But but every most people I met with just now, we are rich where the richest people in the world and they fight hard, you know, to to to maintain their traditional and customary ways.
00:57:27:01 - 00:57:43:10
Amy Gulick
But it was it was when again, when I first started meeting, particularly with the Alaska Native people, and I would ask them, you know, what does salmon mean to you? Tell me about your relationship with salmon? And they'd all look at me. So here's another word, right? And they just say, well, they look at me like I was a little crazy.
00:57:43:10 - 00:58:01:22
Amy Gulick
And they just said, Well, you know, does salmon are our food. They're our food. And and, you know, I was, of course, looking to go deeper than that. It's like, okay, I clearly can see that that they're your food. But, you know, tell me more. We know what are the fish mean to you? You know, how do they bring your family together?
00:58:01:22 - 00:58:34:06
Amy Gulick
And they what I came to finally understand because again, most people just say there are food. And what I came to understand is that they're their food is who they are. There's no difference. There's no compartmentalizing. Like, here's food, here's people, here's our house, here's you know, here's the stream at food is who they are. And in the Yup'ik language, the the native word for fish, I believe it's neck, neck and neck.
00:58:34:09 - 00:59:08:12
Amy Gulick
I'm not pronouncing that correctly, but that they're the ubik word for fish is also the same word for food. So to me, that just tells me everything. And it took me, again, several years of working on this book to understand when they say salmon are our food, what they're really telling me is salmon are who we are. And that was just for me, another big, big, profound insight because I had never thought of my food as who I am.
00:59:08:14 - 00:59:18:17
Amy Gulick
You know, you are what you eat. You hear that all the time. But it's you know, I was just thinking of that in terms of, you know, more of a health aspect, you know, it's like, well, I'm not a carrot.
00:59:18:19 - 00:59:19:07
Speaker 2
You know.
00:59:19:09 - 00:59:21:06
Amy Gulick
Or whatever, but maybe I am.
00:59:21:08 - 00:59:25:11
Speaker 2
You know.
00:59:25:13 - 00:59:50:17
Amy Gulick
Yeah. So food again, food is everything in in those cultures. But I again, I think what I think the salmon way is help me understand myself and my own life way better than I eat than I did, I think before starting this because again now here in my own life, it's like, okay, what am I eating and where does that come from and how is it grown and who is growing it?
00:59:50:17 - 01:00:16:19
Amy Gulick
And, and do I live in a land of abundance in some way that I can now share what I am fortunate to have in abundance and how can I help support my own community through food? And so I've really kind of changed my own ways of eating and thinking and certainly sharing. And I've taken all of that from salmon and the salmon people.
01:00:16:21 - 01:00:40:17
Amy Gulick
But but the big difference to me, you know, between where I'm living and then again in Alaska and people who are living, not everyone in Alaska has a relationship with salmon, but those people who do. Again, the big difference is the food that I'm eating and now sharing and, you know, trying to connect with my own community through it's all it's all it's grown.
01:00:40:18 - 01:01:06:17
Amy Gulick
You know, it's farmed, it's harvested. And hopefully it's being done in good ways. But it's not a wild resource, though. Okay. Editor's note Please edit Please erase the fact that I said resource. We should talk about that too though. Yeah, it's not wild. It's not. It's not a wild living thing like salmon. And to me that's a big difference.
01:01:06:17 - 01:01:25:18
Amy Gulick
But but it's also, you know, the product of thousands of years of of agriculture, too. That's just kind of that's if without that I don't know what would we eat here? You know, we're so far removed from the hunter gatherer ways of of long ago.
01:01:25:20 - 01:01:59:04
Mark Titus
Well, Bristol Bay supplies half of the world's supply of sockeye salmon. And we know we're in a we are hopefully, knock on wood, coming into a space any day now. Frankly, we're we're expecting to hear news about from the EPA, about Bristol Bay. And by the time you're listening to this, hopefully it will be great news concerning basically putting Pebble out of business and not issuing them a permit.
01:01:59:04 - 01:02:34:06
Mark Titus
And now there's a lot of things and I seriously want to have a part two to this conversation, but to wrap the conversation up today, as you know, you've been involved in this. It's taken decades fighting the proposed Pebble Mine and the money behind that from giant mining resource extraction industries. There are other critical salmon issues like the transboundary mining issue in southeast Alaska, like the Snake River and restoring the Snake River.
01:02:34:06 - 01:03:06:19
Mark Titus
And we're going to be exploring those in my next film. But what, from your perspective, to kind of wrap the thought up about place and this idea of activism for place, what can we learn from what's happened by the indigenous led efforts in Bristol Bay and apply those toward the efforts that need to continue to move forward to protect the salmon we have left and to restore the places that have been torn apart by human industrialization.
01:03:06:20 - 01:03:07:20
Mark Titus
01:03:07:22 - 01:03:43:09
Amy Gulick
Yeah. Well, I think there's a there's a couple parts to your question there, but what I have certainly learned from a dangerous led efforts is they are coming at these issues with a very not only a different world view, but a different just a different way of doing things over and over again. I've always heard from indigenous people it's, you know, we are rich as long as we have the land, we are rich, as long as we can continue our customary and traditional ways.
01:03:43:09 - 01:04:17:23
Amy Gulick
You know, we are a rich people. We have always been. We will always continue to be here. But I also always hear from them in in when they're advocating and for who they are as the people for their homelands. They are always here. However we do this, we have to do it in a good way. And I remember the very first time I heard it was an elder, a native elder say that it's like it's like we have to do this in a good way.
01:04:18:01 - 01:04:52:02
Amy Gulick
And I didn't at the time, I didn't really understand what that meant. In my mind. Everything was always portrayed as a battle, as a fight. And I've learned from indigenous people they're very strong, very enduring. But this concept of doing things in a good way, I've come to understand. It's like, you know, we we are our actions. And if we go into everything fighting and viewing it as this battle and us versus them and whatever it's like, I don't think that's a good way of doing things.
01:04:52:07 - 01:05:17:14
Amy Gulick
I think the good way of doing things, as I've come to learn from people is, you know, having integrity and being very careful like what you say and what you think, because that's going to translate into how you act and react. So I love this this concept of doing things in a good way. I try and embody that now in my own work.
01:05:17:16 - 01:05:46:21
Amy Gulick
I realize a lot of issues like Bristol Bay or and don't get me wrong, these are really serious issues, like you're looking at like wholesale destruction of, you know, incredible habitat, like some of the best habitat in the world for salmon. Like, like that's what we're looking at. So I think it's hard for a certain mindset not to go into these issues in a way that isn't one of almost war, you know, and a battle and a fight.
01:05:46:23 - 01:06:09:22
Amy Gulick
But I think I think when you I don't know for me personally anyway, I do not want to be the bearer of doom and gloom, and I don't want to be like perpetuating this this constant state of being in a fight. And so I really made a conscious decision in my own work, and I'm trying not to sugarcoat issues.
01:06:09:22 - 01:06:34:07
Amy Gulick
I have to be careful of that, too. But I'm truly trying to make a conscious decision of it's like this is a story of love, you know, this is a story of of love for place and love for community and love for the very the salmon that are is that is enabling this unbelievable, beautiful way of life. Let's tell that story doesn't make headlines.
01:06:34:09 - 01:07:08:15
Amy Gulick
You know, does stories of love make headlines? Not necessarily in our modern you know, the Western world, you know, that we currently live in. But but does it build community like. Absolutely. You know, fights and battles. Those divide communities, you know, but love for plays for ways of life for each other. That's what builds community. And it's community that's going to have any chance of saving salmon habitat anywhere, whether it's in Alaska, whether it's here in the Pacific Northwest.
01:07:08:15 - 01:07:28:12
Amy Gulick
So I've certainly learned that through indigenous people, you know, this idea of do things in a good way. So that's that is definitely spilled over into me and how I want to portray the work that I do and tell the stories that I'm telling.
01:07:28:14 - 01:07:55:08
Mark Titus
Beautiful. We share that as well. You know, conflict breeds headlines, love endures, and it is what binds everything that endures. I'm going to ask you three more questions. One, what's next for you? Yes, the one you love, the question you love from your parents, from your friends, from your your old pal Mark. What what are you working on?
01:07:55:10 - 01:08:25:02
Amy Gulick
You know, it's interesting. So when my first book, Salmon in the Trees first was published, you know, and you had mentioned earlier in the conversation that, you know, you're birthing an idea, right? Well, that is really what I felt like when that book came out. That was a three year project. And I tell people it's like, you know, I, I feel like I was pregnant for three years and then I gave birth to this book because that's what you're nourishing your nurturing this whole way.
01:08:25:02 - 01:08:49:00
Amy Gulick
There are ups and downs. And by the time you're holding this book in your hands, it's like, you know, I just gave birth. So then I started to give presentations, you know, about salmon in the trees and, you know, doing book tours and that kind of thing. And the very first I gave, you know, gave the presentation question and answer afterwards, and somebody raised their hand, What are you working on now?
01:08:49:02 - 01:09:13:18
Amy Gulick
And I was so taken aback by that question because it's like I just gave birth. It's like you don't now abandon the child. Like now you have to spend time raising it right. And nurturing that along. So anyway, so that that's kind of an aside, but to your question, so but now I'm used to that question because. I get it every single time, no matter what kind of presentation.
01:09:13:23 - 01:09:33:05
Amy Gulick
what are you working on now? And I do try and explain to people it's like again, you don't just pop out a book and then move on to the next one. I mean, you could and I think a lot of authors and, you know, artists maybe do that, but I make my books to try and make a difference.
01:09:33:05 - 01:10:01:08
Amy Gulick
And the only way that they can have a chance of making a difference is if I'm giving presentations, interacting with people, educating people, partnering with nonprofit groups and government agencies that are working to protect habitat and protect ways of life. So what's next is really a continuation of what I've been doing for the last, gosh, 15, 16 years now with both books.
01:10:01:11 - 01:10:12:15
Amy Gulick
It's a lot of partnering again with with groups, with agencies, with really whoever is working on protecting salmon habitat and the ways of life that they make possible.
01:10:12:16 - 01:10:41:06
Mark Titus
We share that in common as well. I have that same same approach, really nurturing and seeing the project get out into the world and then do what it needs to do. So I feel, yeah, all right. So pretend time. Let's just pretend it could happen given the environment late, but let's just pretend your house was in the path of a flooding river and you only had time to obviously get your loved ones, your your critters out if you have critters.
01:10:41:09 - 01:10:44:23
Mark Titus
But if you could just take one physical thing, what would that thing be?
01:10:45:01 - 01:10:47:07
Amy Gulick
my gosh.
01:10:47:09 - 01:10:49:14
Speaker 2
Wow.
01:10:49:16 - 01:11:14:02
Amy Gulick
what a question. One physical thing. I really have to think about that. You know, you know, a lot of people and I have thought about this a little bit, but a lot of people actually have thought about it so much like they've got it prepared. Right. It's like all the photo albums, all of memories, all the photo albums are like in a box ready to go.
01:11:14:04 - 01:11:37:13
Amy Gulick
Like if I've had neighbors tell me that, like, really? Wow. You're like, you're that prepared, which I find impressive. And yeah I mean, memories I think I have come to realize it's like, yeah, yes, I'd like to have the photos, the images that evoke memories. But if all of those if I couldn't get all those out, I'd still have the memories, right?
01:11:37:13 - 01:11:59:09
Amy Gulick
Still have that. So I think I'd be okay without that, you know? I don't know. I, I think when I was younger, I would have told you everything I could grab. You know? So I don't think I think too much. I just grab whatever I could and go. But I don't know. I think as I've gotten older, I just realize material things are just not important.
01:11:59:13 - 01:12:19:16
Amy Gulick
I mean, and again, I think I'm saying that from a privileged perspective as well. Certainly there are. I think there are if I really had to think about it, there are things that are important. Most physical things, material things can all be replaced. I mean, anything that you really need could be replaced. I don't know. I really.
01:12:19:18 - 01:12:19:22
Speaker 2
I'm.
01:12:19:22 - 01:12:21:19
Amy Gulick
Not sure. I well.
01:12:21:23 - 01:12:34:16
Mark Titus
Let's let's take it out of the physical realm then to two things. Let's put it in the spiritual realm about you. If you could only take two things, two traits that make Amy. Amy, what would you take?
01:12:34:18 - 01:13:01:02
Amy Gulick
okay, that's easy. Curiosity. Yeah. I don't want that to go away. And I, you know, just the ability to connect with people and move about in the world in a good way and, and just that, that innate ability to meet a stranger on the street and and try and make some kind of connection there.
01:13:01:04 - 01:13:12:01
Mark Titus
Mean you like doing it the good way Author of Salmon in the trees and the salmon way where can check out your work and follow along with what you're doing.
01:13:12:03 - 01:13:30:02
Amy Gulick
easily. So my websites Amy Gillick Ecom and why do you I c k dot com the salmon dot org and salmon in the trees dot org Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, all the all the usual suspects.
01:13:30:04 - 01:13:43:12
Mark Titus
Well, it's so good to be together in person and do this and we will do another one down the trail. I think there's lots more to talk about. So we'll stay tuned for that and I'll let you have the last word.
01:13:43:14 - 01:13:51:04
Amy Gulick
Whether there's one more concept or topic I want to talk about. And it sure, it came up when I said the word resource and I caught myself.
01:13:51:05 - 01:13:52:05
Speaker 2
Okay. Yeah.
01:13:52:07 - 01:14:16:09
Amy Gulick
Yeah. So you had asked me, you know, early on, you know, what was the entry point for the salmon way. And there was there was a conversation that I had that was one of those conversations you have that just won't leave your head. And so I look back on that conversation I had with with someone as that was another big entry point into the salmon way.
01:14:16:11 - 01:14:47:14
Amy Gulick
So this was a woman I met in Sitka when I was working on salmon in the trees, and it was very chance encounter, very brief encounter. She's a native woman. She has since passed. She's she's not with us now, but she was a master weaver and clink it and I was walking through an area, public space. You know, there are other people walking through and she was one of the artists that was featured in this in the space.
01:14:47:14 - 01:15:09:21
Amy Gulick
And she was weaving this gorgeous, you know, chilkat robe, which is traditionally made out of mountain goat wool and next to her loom. She had a mountain goat hide there, and she encouraged people to touch it and stroke it and just kind of see, you know, what the mountain goat will felt like. And so I'm stroking this wall and she's weaving away in this beautiful robe.
01:15:09:21 - 01:15:28:11
Amy Gulick
And then she also had her incredible basketry next to there. And I'm looking at the raw materials that she had laid out for the baskets. And these were spruce roots and cedar bark and and the whole thing was just beautiful. And I'm stroking this this mountain, you know, Heid And I'm looking at the spruce roots in the cedar bark.
01:15:28:11 - 01:15:55:18
Amy Gulick
And I say to her, I say, Wow, you know, with all these these plentiful resources in your, it's easy to see how your people have thrived. And she stopped what she was doing. And she looked me square in the eye and she said, resources said the mountain go, the trees, the salmon, the these aren't resources. We have relationships with the goat and the tree and the bear and the salmon.
01:15:55:20 - 01:16:25:10
Amy Gulick
And I again, it was another one of those light bulb clicking on moments and it's like, my gosh. And then she proceeded to tell me about these relationships. And I had never, up until that point, really spent a lot of time thinking about the difference between resources and relationships. And I think that this ties back into this idea of a home stream and being grounded or not having a home stream and not feeling grounded.
01:16:25:12 - 01:16:54:03
Amy Gulick
I think if you have a home stream, you live in relationship with your food. Clearly, you know, and in the case of salmon, you live in relationship with the other people who share that home stream. You don't think of salmon or trees as commodities or and really that's what the resources are means to me. But if you're underground and if you don't have a home stream, you don't know where your food comes from.
01:16:54:08 - 01:17:16:02
Amy Gulick
It's like everything's a resource now, everything's a commodity. And I think when you think in terms of resources, you just you don't think about where they come from and what happens, like, say, when you're taking salmon out of a stream or when you're taking trees from a forest, you're just like, here's lumber, here's copper tubing, here's frozen fish.
01:17:16:04 - 01:17:37:06
Amy Gulick
Whereas people have relationships, It's like, here's a salmon. Let's give thanks to this beautiful fish who just gave its life so that we could continue to live. Here's a here's a tree that now we're turning into a totem pole or a longhouse or, you know, a spruce root hat or something that's going to protect us or, you know, something like that.
01:17:37:06 - 01:18:07:07
Amy Gulick
So I always encourage people when the word resources starts to roll out of your tongue or off of your tongue, try and catch yourself and replace it with the other R-word is relationships. And so when you do that, watch how your mind shifts. And it's for me, it was incredibly profound when I started doing that, because I would say things like, well, you know, it's easy to see again how, you know, all these resources allowed you to thrive.
01:18:07:09 - 01:18:27:10
Amy Gulick
Whereas if I say it's easy to see how these relations ships have allowed you to thrive, that my mind just did of like a complete 180 when I started to replace those those words. And so I try really hard now to never use the word resources. And I always think in terms of relationships and I try and encourage other people to do it too.
01:18:27:10 - 01:19:07:07
Amy Gulick
And it's again, I encourage you all to try it. And and it's it's pretty profound and it's given me just a little bit of an inkling, again, into the lives, particularly Alaska Native people. They they that's how they think that is their worldview. It's all relationships. And so they think a lot about if a tree is or if a forest is going to get clearcut or a mine is going to be built on their home stream, that's going to affect everything and their entire being and their way of seeing and their way of living in the world.
01:19:07:07 - 01:19:36:19
Amy Gulick
And I just don't think those of us in the Western world, we we are not taught to think that way. We're usually not raised to think that way. And this is not it's not necessarily a criticism of of Well, I guess it is it's a criticism of our society. Certainly it's like if we're taught to think holistically, we're going to make very different decisions and I think we're going to make a lot better decisions.
01:19:36:19 - 01:19:49:23
Amy Gulick
So this concept, this idea, the difference between resources and relationships, that was clearly an entry point into the salmon way. And it's definitely a message I want other people to think about.
01:19:50:01 - 01:20:01:14
Mark Titus
Got nothing to add to that. That is the last word in in a beautiful way. And you're right. It it just shifts perspective instantly. Amy, Julie, thank you so much. We'll see you down the trail.
01:20:01:18 - 01:20:04:15
Amy Gulick
Thank you.
01:20:04:17 - 01:20:12:07
Music
How do you save what you love?
How do you save what you love?
01:20:19:23 - 01:20:41:22
Mark Titus
Thanks for joining us here on Say what you Love. If you'd like to support our work, you can subscribe to this podcast through your favorite podcast or Evaswild.com. That's the word save spelled backwards Wild dot com. And if you like these conversations, you can help keep them coming your way by giving us. A rating and a review on Apple Podcasts for photos.
01:20:41:22 - 01:21:07:17
Mark Titus
Follow us on Instagram at Save What You Love Podcast. This episode was produced and hosted by me, Mark Titus, and edited by Patrick Troll. Say What You Love is a partnership between Eva's Wild Stories and Magic Canoe in collaboration with the Salmon Nation Trust, and this episode was recorded on the traditional homelands of the Duwamish, people whose practices and spiritualities were and are tied to this land and water.
Creators and Guests
