Our Numinous Nature

Joanne Bauman of Topeka, Kansas is a yarb woman and the host of Mother Earth News' "Heirlooms & Herbals" podcast. Coming from a long line of plant people - Appalachians, an Oglala Lakota medicine woman & a pharmacist father - Joanne encourages us to foster a relationship with the land. She instructs us on how we might give an offering of herbs or our hair to the plants and animals we aim to forage and hunt. We hear about mullein torches, elderberry folklore, herbs specific to the prairie, and 'the doctrine of signatures': an ancient tool for determining a plant's medicinal properties. Joanne then shares a powerful story about both healing the land and intergenerational trauma surrounding Lt. Colonel George Custer, the Lakota & Cheyenne of the Black Hills, and The Battle of the Greasy Grass [aka The Battle of the Little Bighorn]. Perhaps one of the highlights of this entire podcast series comes after her story, we have the great honor of hearing Joanne sing a Lakota horse song. Wow!!! We finish up our backyard garden conversation listening to Joanne's experiences studying psychology & working with folks' dis-eases of the psyche. In closing, Joanne gives us a fun, yet precise tip about the real meaning of the word "guru."Check out Joanne's Prairie Magic Herbals & her Heirlooms & Herbals Podcast Follow Our Numinous Nature & my naturalist illustrations on InstagramCheck out my shop of shirts, prints, and books featuring my artContact: herbaceoushuman@gmail.com 

Deputy Stan White is a deputy sheriff, trapper, & fur buyer in Barry County in the Missouri Ozarks.  As a darkening storm swirls in the background, Deputy White speaks to his county’s rising drug-use, homelessness, & domestic violence as well as the changing collective feeling amongst the locals. He tells us a little bit about the fur market: from beaver castors to mink farming, 70's coons to western bobcats. We hear about growing up trapping with his father and uncle, and how setting his first trapline was an exercise in facing fear and possibly a rite towards manhood. Approaching story-time, our tastebuds wonder as muskrat meat, bobcat back straps and baked possum are brought to the table. Deputy White's first story illustrates the archetypal tension of fathers & sons; his second speaks to animal temperaments from a cantankerous cottonmouth to a stoic bobcat that seemed to act against its fiery nature.  Follow Our Numinous Nature & my naturalist illustrations on InstagramCheck out my shop of shirts, prints, and books featuring my artContact: herbaceoushuman@gmail.com 

Victoria Fillmore of Cedar Hill Homestead is a community herbalist in the wooded hills of central Tennessee where she homesteads with her husband, son, chickens, goats & herbs. We start our convo hearing about a rat snake in the chicken coop, the Foxfire books, poke sallet, experimenting with poisonous plants and capturing wild yeast. Then there's a massive shift from light plant talk to deep wisdom: Tori shares the story of her deceased mentor [a Lakota elder named Hawk] and his lesson-learned-too-late about dissipating others' negative energy. From there we are in the realm of animism, cleansing practices, and messages from the dead.Check out Cedar Hill Homestead on Instagram & Facebook.Follow Our Numinous Nature & my naturalist illustrations on InstagramCheck out my shop of shirts, prints, and books featuring my artContact: herbaceoushuman@gmail.com 

Lynn Faust - The Lightning Bug Lady - is a Tennessean naturalist and citizen scientist who has written the first ever North American guidebook on lightning bugs: Fireflies, Glow-worms, and Lightning Bugs. She has consulted in-the-field on numerous nature documentaries including BBC's new Seven Worlds, One Planet and their 2015 Life That Glows as well as Netflix's Night on Earth. This super folky episode is much more than Lynn's lightning bug 101; we hear about sailing the world, Appalachian packrats, firefly folklore, working with David Attenborough, glowing mushrooms, digging mayapple, and stolen sang. Quite the raconteur, Lynn shares multiple stories, the first about her discovery of a synchronous Smoky Mountain lightning bug, another about her granny neighbor who warned of the blue ghosts that haunt Lynn's property, followed by a series of moth synchronicities surrounding her brother's sudden death, and finally, to end this glorious episode, how her son was stalked by an aggressive mountain lion. This one is a must listen!Check out Lynn's firefly guidebook and the BBC trailers for Life That Glows and Seven Worlds, One Planet. Follow Our Numinous Nature & my naturalist illustrations on InstagramCheck out my shop of shirts, prints, and books featuring my artContact: herbaceoushuman@gmail.com 

Michael Fies is a wildlife biologist & the furbearer project leader at Virginia's Department of Wildlife Resources [formerly known as Virginia Department of Game & Inland Fisheries]. Furbearers are defined as animals with commercial fur value ranging from the tiny least weasel, the mighty beaver, and mischievous raccoon, to the elusive bobcat and trickster coyote. Mike shares how his grandfather's love of the outdoors & their rabbit beagle led to his 37-year career in wildlife. This is an educational episode where we discuss a wide range of topics: the little known squirrel-sized spotted skunk; fox-sized weasels [fishers] making their way from West Virginia; restoring river otter populations; scat IDing; skunk essence; a gruesome tree full of coyote corpses; and even eastern mountain lions. Mike clears up misconceptions about trapping; how it is not only humane when following Best Management Practices, but can be beneficial to wildlife management, followed by his thoughts on how Native Americans may have used naturally made traps. Mike tells two fun stories from his career: one about a backyard skunk and the other about dealing with a mountain lion call. And before this educational interview, we read a potent and timely Cherokee legend about the ghostly flower [Indian pipe] that grows where friends and family quarrel. Check out Mike's work on the spotted skunk and the department's nature-loving Instagram. Follow Our Numinous Nature & my naturalist illustrations on InstagramCheck out my shop of shirts, prints, and books featuring my artContact: herbaceoushuman@gmail.com 

Forrest Green Farm in Louisa, Virginia is the no-spray, beyond-organic family farm of Krista & Rob Rahm. They pasture raise cows, pigs, and chickens, and grow heirloom veggies and an impressive array of medicinal herbs. The theme of this episode is family. We talk with Krista about finding their run down farm house and how her son's learning disability led to herbalism & homeschooling. She shares what it's like to raise kids on a farm and her feelings about abandoning a career-oriented life for self-sufficiency and nature. From her husband Rob, we hear about slingshot hunting as a kid, fox trapping with their son, and get a practical tip for folks who want to try farming. Most interestingly is how the Rahms use their intuition: how Rob constantly reads the signs of the farm while Krista receives enlightening information from her plants. We culminate with their experience dealing with the bee stings that nearly took Rob's life. Check out Forrest Green Farm on Instagram & Facebook.Follow Our Numinous Nature & my naturalist illustrations on InstagramCheck out my shop of shirts, prints, and books featuring my artContact: herbaceoushuman@gmail.com 

Edward Clark, Jr. is the president & founder of The Wildlife Center of Virginia, a world-renowned wildlife hospital in Waynesboro, Virginia. Ed - a passionate & gregarious wildlife advocate and a real character - tells us about their 19 orphaned bear cub patients, a brutal case of mange, an ornery bobcat's thrill ride, & how hunting in his youth sparked his love for nature. We hear a handful of potent PSAs: dos & don'ts when handling our wild animal neighbors and the potential of loving an animal to death... Between our fascinating convo Ed recounts two tales: the first about a poisoned bald eagle that blew the lid off a pesticide conspiracy; followed by a deeply personal account he's never shared publicly, the story of his numinous bond with a peregrine falcon that left him utterly mystified. This is an epic episode!!!Check out The Wildlife Center of Virginia on Instagram & Facebook.Follow Our Numinous Nature & my naturalist illustrations on InstagramCheck out my shop of shirts, prints, and books featuring my artContact: herbaceoushuman@gmail.com 

Lupo Passero is a community herbalist, flower essence practitioner and the founder & director of Twin Star Apothecary in historic New Milford, Connecticut. In this free flowing conversation we talk about dreams, the bears and cats that haunt them, elderberry, bear perfume, the spiritual side of herbalism, forming plant relationships, the importance of talking to poison ivy, transplanting lady slippers, dandelion pesto, and much more. Lupo shares the wisdom that she’s gleaned from the gnarled roots of black cohosh: an Appalachian medicinal plant prized for its many uses for women’s health. We end with the story of how her immigrant grandparents' homestead lifestyle lead Lupo to the herbal path.Check out Twin Star Tribe on Instagram & Facebook. Follow Our Numinous Nature & my naturalist illustrations on InstagramCheck out my shop of shirts, prints, and books featuring my artContact: herbaceoushuman@gmail.com 

Roger Flinchum is a fly fisherman, hunter, woodworker and retired English teacher with a deep history & love of rural life here in Virginia. We talk about charming bear encounters, ol’ time ways, & his lessons learned from the woods & rivers. Based on his experiences of solitude in nature, Roger reads us two of his…dare I say…paranormal…non-fiction fishing stories. Quite the honor since he’s never published them before! The second, “Homestead Trout,” is so good my smile stretched from ear to ear. Check out one of Roger’s fly fishing classes [Postponed due to Covid-19]Follow Our Numinous Nature & my naturalist illustrations on InstagramCheck out my shop of shirts, prints, and books featuring my artContact: herbaceoushuman@gmail.com

Deeply moved by The Sacred Art of Hunting by James A. Swan, your host - Philippe - shares why this book inspired the podcast. We read the personal account of a waterfowl biologist's religious experience hunting snow geese, followed by a stirring tale of trauma healed on a moose hunt. While future episodes will focus on our guests, in this first episode, Philippe shares his story of escaping New York City to become a man & a hunter in the Blue Ridge Mountains. His story culminates with his first winter attempting to fur trap & the harrowing first encounter with a trapped raccoon that left him rattled for weeks. [Not a kid-friendly episode. Contains adult language & themes]Follow Our Numinous Nature & my naturalist illustrations on InstagramCheck out my shop of shirts, prints, and books featuring my artContact: herbaceoushuman@gmail.com