October feathered forest events & News

I’m feeling like it might be useful to have bird wings and truly fly! This is a whirlwind month–after a terrific September launch for Feathered Forest: Aloft with Birds in Ancient Trees.

First, check out this in-depth and insightful book review of Feathered Forest in the South Sound Bird Alliance October newsletter. Thank you to reviewer Anne Kilgannon and to the wonderful author and friend Maria Ruth for contacting her in advance. Here is how Anne ends the piece:

“As Marina lays out how all is connected, how much has been done to understand this matrix of complexity and evolution, she also insists on the beauty that fills our hearts and minds. The singular beauty of a wildflower, the complex beauty of how everything fits together to create our world. She inspires us to see, to listen; even if we can’t climb to the top of that magnificent tree, we can know it is there, touching a passing rain cloud, and sheltering myriad lives. A light chitter of birdlife floats down to us, like a feather, a sign of life, a call to stand with it.”

I’m writing this in the JFK airport on my way home from a terrific week in Vermont, starting with 50 people attending my presentation in a historic barn of Wells Farm of the Vermont Family Forests. I wish all of you could have been there. My dear friend Sandra organized a fabulous community gathering, complete with wood-fired pizza and apple cider from the trees nearby.

Sandra Murphy of Vermont Family Forests introduced me in the way that only a best friend can do! Grateful.

Then it was on to Phoenix Books in Burlington, in conversation with the inspiring, lively, and so very cool Trish O’Kane, author of Birding to Change the World.

With Trish O’Kane at Phoenix Books in Burlington, Vermont. If you have not read her book, *Birding to Change the World,* please do! It’s wonderful and so is Trish–she teaches at University of Vermont and connects college students with middle school students to immerse in birds and nature (and so much more).

Next up was a reading at Norwich Books, where several Chelsea Green Publishing staff attended–what a treat!

At Norwich Books in Vermont before the evenvt

So–big breath. I have a lot ahead in October, starting with speaking at the Greater Hells Canyon Council’s Fall Gala in La Grande. I’m happy to be heading there on Saturday, October 3rd, to join many of my friends, fellow board members, and staff of GHCC.

Then on Monday, October 5th, I’ll be on a live virtual program with Otherwise. Here’s the start of the write-up:

In this otherGardens gathering, we’ll journey into the layered, tangled ecosystems of ancient forests with Marina Richie. This isn’t our more typical session on food and farming, but in the ethos of otherGardens as an appreciation of nourishment and ecology, we’ll explore the lives of our flying kin and the ecologies they shape and inhabit.

And–just because why have a free day–I’m backpacking with my friend and fellow environmentalist Chandra LeGue into the Middle Santiam Wilderness and adjacent roadless areas overnight on October 6th (also the deadline for all comments to save the Roadless Rule–TAKE ACTION).

Then, it’s onward! SEE BOOK TOUR. Maybe I will see you in Portland, Corvallis, Bellingham, Corte Madera, Berkeley, and then back locally in Sisters and in Bend! Phew.