Drought and Extreme Weather Resiliency

Erin Garrett: 00:06

Welcome to another episode of Spotlight on Natural Resources where we shine some light on what's going on in your environment. I'm your host, Erin Garrett.

Abigail Garofalo: 00:15

And I'm your cohost, Abigail Garofalo.

Erin Garrett: 00:17

And today, we are here with Eliana Brown, who is a water quality and stormwater specialist, and we're gonna be chatting all about drought today. So welcome, everyone. Welcome, Eliana. Thanks for joining us.

Eliana Brown: 00:29

Thank you so much for having me.

Erin Garrett: 00:31

We are talking all about drought today, so why did you choose this topic Eliana?

Eliana Brown: 00:36

Like you said, I'm a water quality and stormwater specialist, so stormwater is rain water and snowmelt, so usually I'm not talking about the opposite thing of drought. However, it is the other side of the coin, and according to our state climatologist Trent Ford, we Illinois is in a drought, and although we have had some storm rainstorms in July, we are still in a drought. So I wanted to come to talk about some of the implications of drought and rain with our landscapes.

Abigail Garofalo: 01:16

Yeah. That's really because a lot of people think, oh, I got some rain. The drought is over. Right? Like, it's it's all gone. It's all done. We're great. But really, that's not always what is defining the end of a drought or what what exactly it is. So

Eliana Brown: 01:30

According to the US Drought Monitor, they are looking at whether they of these these intensities of drought, whether we're just abnormally dry all the way up to a moderate, severe, extreme, and exceptional droughts. So what Trent has said is that with in his blog, he said that we've got some rain in in July, but still more than two thirds of the state of Illinois remains in at least a moderate drought, with 13% of Illinois in a in severe drought.

Abigail Garofalo: 02:09

So there are these different levels of drought. Is that, you know, what, like, D2, D3 is? Is that what we're talking about when it comes to those things?

Eliana Brown: 02:17

That's exactly what we're talking about, that. And if somebody wants to see what level that they are at, the website is droughtmonitor.unl.edu, which is a website that we I'm sure we can put in some show notes, but that will let a person know whether where we're at. Some municipalities will take those levels to make decisions as to whether they need to impose water restrictions and other kinds of restrictions for a municipality or for an area.

Abigail Garofalo: 02:51

Yeah. That's in my area, definitely, we do, like, if you're in an odd numbered house, you water on these days, even numbered as these days, and then at any time, no matter what day it is for you, you can't water after, like, I think it's like 8AM, and then you have to water after at least six or 7PM in my community, so.

Erin Garrett: 03:13

That's how it was for me growing up. We'd always gauge how bad the drought was, by what color the watering sign was, and if we could actually do any outdoor watering, so we don't have restrictions like that in southern Illinois, but familiar with with that definitely. So how do we I know just speaking from my personal experience in southern Illinois, we've had some crazy rainfalls and the storms that have just happened, and, you know, we're talking about drought conditions, how we really need the rain, but, like, how useful is that? Really, like, a lot of rain all at once. Like, how much of that really infiltrates the ground or is it just all running off into the storm sewers, like what is, is there like an ideal amount of rain that we want to help get us out of drought conditions or how are we doing with these storms that are coming through?

Eliana Brown: 04:05

Yeah, that's a great question. Gentler storms are going to be better, and what really concerns me with a drought is one of the other things that Trent has put in his blog, which is that as of June 28, the eight inch soil moisture at the Illinois Climate Network Station in Champaign was at its driest point on record, and that record goes back to 2004. So what we are what we can glean from that is that with the soil being so dry, it's not going to be able to soak up that water very well so that when we get that big hit or storm, it's going to run off not be able to soak in, run off, it can impact our ability to for our homes that we may be taking on flooding. There's downstream water quality implications of that sharp kind of runoff with those big, quick storms that happen with that kind of intensity. So, that's why it's the two sides of the coin, that when we have those drought conditions, our soil is impacted in a way that makes it less helpful for us for the times when we have the big storms.

Abigail Garofalo: 05:28

Makes me think of, like, when I water my plants and I dump too much water on it at once, and all the water, it doesn't get time to actually infiltrate it, most of it's just going to run off right away so.

Eliana Brown: 05:38

And we have some great resources from Extension, as you all, I'm sure, know about how to deep water. That's the kind of watering that we want to do when we are, say, watering our food gardens. We want to do that deep watering so that the plant can uptake the water better, and that the water is going to be a better kind of watering.

Abigail Garofalo: 06:07

Yeah, because the roots will go essentially where the plant or excuse me, the roots will go where the water is, and so if you're only watering a little bit essentially is what you're saying, the roots are gonna stay nice and shallow versus if you water them nice and deep, the roots are gonna grow deep, and then they're even long term gonna be more protected from those drought conditions because those roots are deeper down, more buried, less susceptible to those dry conditions that are happening.

Eliana Brown: 06:36

Exactly. And when we have those kind of deeper roots like that, just exactly what you're saying is it's going to be better for the plant, but it's also much better for the soil. And what I want to get across today is what we're trying to do is really build that soil so that it can be there for us when we have the range so that we can have, so we can act kind of like how a wetland does. So, can act like a sponge, and that's the condition that we want. We don't want a wetland in our yards, obviously, but we want there to be that resilience, and building our soil is one of the best ways to get there. It's one of the reasons why it is recommended that with our turf grass lawns, we want to mow at the three inch level instead of much shorter, because we want the turf grass to have that ability for the roots to grow as long as they can. With turf grass, there's a limit to that, so that may be a segue into talking about other plants and grasses that naturally have longer root systems. But even with our turf grasses this is, these longer roots for better soil, this is something that we want to have in the forefront of our minds, even with that kind of plant.

Abigail Garofalo: 08:03

So how else can we build resiliency for these droughts in our landscape? So we wanna, like, mow at three inches, we wanna water deeply when we do water. What are some other tips for us?

Eliana Brown: 08:15

Well, I am so glad that you asked that question, because we do happen to have these so well, the answer to everything today is gonna be native plants, but I know.

Abigail Garofalo: 08:27

You're in the right podcast, Eliana. This is the crew for that.

Eliana Brown: 08:32

Yeah. I mean, yeah, that's the that's the really that's a really amazing thing is that anymore with and and I'm not talking about our plants that we're growing for food, any of our, you know, in our in our small gardens that we have, watering would be needed for that. What I'm really thinking about is with our ornamental plants that we have in our landscapes, where we're at right now in facing a reality of, wow, we're in a drought. Wow, we do have these severe storms that are happening intermittently. So, now is the time that we really want to be thinking about resiliency of our own properties. And if only there were plants, some very beautiful plants that can withstand drought and even flood, and that is so many of our beautiful Illinois native plants.

Eliana Brown: 09:38

Now, not all native plants can do that as well as some of the other ones, but what we're learning at the Red Oak Rain Garden is that learning with that demonstration project that's on campus. We're noting which plants have done well this year and which ones haven't, so that we can have a better idea of what kinds of native plants that we can support well at this garden, which may give us some indication for what people can do with their own homes.

Erin Garrett: 10:15

Definitely. I know in my gardens with my native plants, you know, as we were getting into June and the drought was, you know, really starting to ramp up, I wasn't doing any additional watering except for ones that I had in pots. Because I do have some in pots and those you could tell they were stressed. Right? But everything planted in the ground was doing fine. Didn't I didn't add any additional water and everything was great, which is wonderful for me because I hate watering. So I kinda really, listen, I get eaten by bugs the whole time. And so I can put plants in the ground, you know, obviously water them to get them established. You know, that first year, maybe two years is really important. But after that point, I'm finding at least the selections that I have in my yard have been doing really, really great. And it's just nice because I get to enjoy them and don't have to do the work and don't have to worry about losing my favorite, you know, plant during this drought. I don't know Abigail, how's your native plant garden been doing?

Abigail Garofalo: 11:13

It's been doing great. I mean, I I think we've been getting a little more rain, and like less of those drastic ones. We still get that that we've gotten a few of those, like, big drastic storms, but it there hasn't been time much for them to dry out in between. But even during that really long drought, I was like, man, I just got, like, I was annoyed because I planted like 30 plants this spring, and I'm never doing that again. But I definitely, like my established ones that are about three seasons old, have been doing amazing, and they've actually been protecting my yard from flooding during those really big storm events.

Abigail Garofalo: 11:52

So I used to have what I call the Garofalo Creek in the sidewalk in front of our house between the parkway and my yard, and this season, even in these drastic storm events, I haven't been getting that. And so maybe there's some other things going on, but I'm attributing it to my pollinator garden in front of my house, and so, yeah. And honestly, I'm a lazy gardener. Erin talks about she hates watering. I personally am like, if I don't have to do it, I won't, and that's what I love about, a, perennials. It's gonna come back every year, right? And b, natives, because, like, they're meant to be there, I'm like, oh, well, it's meant to look like just a little messy, you know? That's fine. And all I have to do is kind of weed the things I don't want, and even then, you know, I'm like, well, you know, it's not really hurting anything by being there, and so, I don't know, it helps with my wallet, it helps with my time, and all the things, and so, I'm a big native proponent.

Eliana Brown: 12:52

Well, and it can relieve us of some guilt. It used to be the goal was that we would try to have the most, I don't know, exotic plant because it was this beautiful ornamental, and then if we didn't have all of the time that would require remembering to water it and remembering to do all the things that you needed to do to baby that, then it would die or not do well. Well, I have none of that in my own house and garden.

Abigail Garofalo: 13:23

There's no time for that, Elliana. We have things to do.

Eliana Brown: 13:27

I literally don't have time for that. But really, for me, it's a big relief to have the goal be, wow, we want to have a resilient, sustainable landscape that we can take care of, that doesn't use so many resources. It can be as beautiful as what some of the gardens of the past were, it's a different kind of beauty but no less important or valid of beauty. And we need to also remember that water is a resource but our time is also a resource. So what I'm promising here is that we can have it all. We can beautiful gardens.

Abigail Garofalo: 14:11

Eliana, don't tease me with a good time.

Eliana Brown: 14:15

No, we can have really beautiful gardens that build our soil, relieve ourselves of guilt, and there are things that I think can be very in line with our values, so that our kids and grandkids can be proud of the kind of gardens that we are establishing now, and summer right now is a good time to be thinking about what we might want to be doing with some of our fall plantings, because right now it's way too hot to plant. Even those 30 plants that you put in, or what? The plants that you put in

Abigail Garofalo: 14:51

I put them in in the spring, I just was annoyed that I had to water, and honestly, the ones in my shade garden I didn't really water. I was like, they'll be fine there.

Eliana Brown: 15:00

Well so, this is the thing, when you are establishing native plants, there is watering that you do have to do. And you may have to do it definitely the first year, some even the second year, you have to watch to see how that is going. With the Red Oak Rain Garden, with this drought that we had at the end of June, before we got rain, things were changing very quickly. We decided to do one watering so that we didn't have, we didn't want to lose a number of plants, but we noted which ones were not doing as well, which was going to go into some thinking about what we might be doing differently or changing this fall. We did one watering, but it's still a relatively young garden. And so some of our shrubs in particular were the ones that were showing some signs of drought that we needed to pay attention to. Just, you know, it's a much bigger plant, going to take a longer time to establish.

Eliana Brown: 16:01

But some of our well, one of the other plants, I think, that surprised me up there, and I had the same thing happen in my own garden, was wild ginger. So, it went flat as a pancake in June. Was not looking good at all, just down to the ground. And that was happening in my own garden, except for there were some areas where it didn't happen in my garden. Now, at the Red Oak Rain Garden, happened around trees, and in my garden it was happening around trees. Where it wasn't around trees, they were fine. So, we're thinking that it might have something to do with the trees really needing that water wild ginger, right?

Abigail Garofalo: 16:44

I was just gonna say that, was like, I wonder if those trees were just really retaining.

Eliana Brown: 16:49

Interesting. Yeah. After it rained, they popped right back up. So they were resilient, and that, to me, you know, keeps their place in the garden. This is a plant that's still going to do well, and that's good. These are things we want to be thinking about. We want to know what's doing well, what's not doing well so that we could make some decisions. Other plants that did really well were wild petunia. Wild petunia growing out of ground that was cracked. Yes.

Erin Garrett: 17:23

It's amazing. Yes. I just dug up a bunch of plants in July because I moved and they hated me because it was 90 degrees and the wild petunia is like, you took me out of the ground and put me in a pot, can't even tell. It's amazing. Amazing. I can't believe it. And it just pops up little babies all over the place and makes a big clump. I love it. I love it.

Eliana Brown: 17:44

And it's so pretty. The flower's gorgeous. The color is this beautiful lavender, and it's just it's it's such a wonderful plant. Our so there's a glass of salt also did really well.

Abigail Garofalo: 17:55

What I love that you're talking about too, Eliana, is, like, you approached the drought and the way the gardens were reacting from a scientific perspective. I feel like people think science happens in these labs, and it's like, no, we are all scientists when we're in our garden, and like, taking that quote naturalist perspective of, okay, there's a drought, I wanna know, like, I'm not just gonna freely water everything, I'm gonna be like, this plant's struggling, this plant's doing well, this one's struggling, I'm gonna remember that, I'm gonna note that, or I'm even gonna write it down in a journal or something. And so, I think that's really important when it comes to, like, gardening, and even just preparing for drought, or just being, like, building resilient landscapes, it's paying attention and noticing what's happening, and so I'm so glad to hear that that's happening, and something really cool, I think, that kind of makes you feel a little nerdy. Like, so

Eliana Brown: 18:51

Oh, it's a lot nerdy. Yeah, it's a lot nerdy over at the Red Oak Rain Garden, my house, for sure.

Erin Garrett: 18:59

But even that being said, there are lots of other, you know, we're approaching this today from picking plants that withstand drought. Right? That's a really great way that we can add it. But when I we have this one difficult spot at my parents' house that they never been able to grow anything. It's super dry, hot, and sunny, and I was like, we could put native plants there, and my parents were like, it's not gonna work, nothing ever grows there, like, wait, I will show you. And my mom just texted me this morning, her brown eyed Susans that I gave her are starting to bloom and they're doing amazing. Swamp milkweed, even swamp milkweed, yes, in that dry spot. Prairie dropseed, those grasses, some of those other like really resilient plants are doing amazing and she wanted them because she saw them in my garden, saw how beautiful they were and how well they were doing, and so she's getting the added benefit of they're actually growing in that one landscape bed, that nothing grew for like twenty years, like

Abigail Garofalo: 19:57

You're like, look how green my thumb is, your mom says, she's like, wow, I just had to find the right plant,

Eliana Brown: 20:04

Exactly, and that's it! Go back to right plant, right place, the best way of looking at things, and it is so, it's just, it works. And you do get to feel like a garden genius when you're like, wow, this thing, it's beautiful, it's thriving. Oh, Erin, good job.

Erin Garrett: 20:28

I'm very excited. Beautiful things too, right, that don't need as much work. So, you know, I encourage people to find a native plant, a place that's selling native plants. Look online, just explore, dream, get excited, find things that look beautiful, and then look at the what conditions they can withstand and test them out. Like, we can you can approach it that way too, definitely. Like, more traditional gardening. Right? I wanna find the most beautiful plant that none of my neighbors have. Right, Eliana? Except it's a native plant this time that we're gonna add in, rather than the ornamental that we're gonna bring over.

Abigail Garofalo: 21:04

And you're honestly less, like, more likely to have something unique if you do that, right? Like, if you're trying to find I get so many comments from my neighbors about my Illinois bundle flower in my front yard, because it's like a little weird, but I've grown it with three together, so it's like, looks like a giant bush, but it's sensitive plant essentially, and so it's like, so I went, oh my gosh, that's so cool, and I'm like, I have seedlings here. Like, I'm the star like I want.

Eliana Brown: 21:34

So, at the Red Oak Rain Garden, that was Purple Poppy Mallow. People would just stop and say, What is that? Because it's so gorgeous, it blooms for a super long time, it's a ground cover, it has multitude of uses, and it's just jaw dropping right beautiful. So, you can have it all.

Abigail Garofalo: 21:59

Speaking to my dreams, Eliana.

Eliana Brown: 22:06

I guess I'm speaking to all the beautiful nerds out there, right? The people that love beauty, want to be successful, have that sense of accomplishment, and be able, if you want to nerd out to the science of it, you can nerd out to the beauty of it too. There are multitudes of ways to nerd out to all of this, but it kind of all comes down to that discovery of what is really meant to be here. There's really nothing more satisfying, I think, than having a little piece of the Illinois prairie or the Illinois wetlands or whatever biome that your own landscape is going to support the best and bring that back to what we have in your own little patch of or your own patch of lawn or your own little patch of ground that you have.

Abigail Garofalo: 23:07

And also too, I mean, all your neighbors have brown grass from the drought, and you're like, my thriving garden is looking great, so come on over to my house, like.

Eliana Brown: 23:21

That is true, that is true. I think one of the things that surprised me the most was that did really well was cardinal flower, and sedges and grasses are in the basin of the Red Oak Rain Garden, because one would have thought that some of those plants that can survive the deluge of big rains, and that's what you have at the bottom of those basins, one would have thought that, wow, those probably wouldn't do as well in a drought, but they are. And, again, I think that does come back to the idea of resiliency. And we know our turf grasses just don't have that same resiliency that the native plants are going to have because they're not from here, they're not of here.

Abigail Garofalo: 24:11

They've been babied for so long.

Erin Garrett: 24:13

Well that root length, I mean, as someone who just tried to dig some native plants, there are some that I could not get out of my garden because the roots were so deep, that bundle flower, don't ever plan on moving it, because I tried one year and I got about 16 inches deep and then I broke the root off and then I did replant it and it's fine, it made it, but I knew I was not gonna try to move that one again, so just those crazy root systems that they're able to develop. That's why, right? They're doing so well in these in these drought conditions. And so word of caution, make sure you like where you plant these native plants, but then they will be there. Right? They will be there and they will do amazing over time and really be able to withstand all of these different conditions that our our climate is throwing at them.

Abigail Garofalo: 25:02

That's a good point. I was also gonna add too, is, you know, we're speaking to the nerds, but let's take a minute to speak to the lazy people out there who just, like, want a nice garden don't know how to do anything about it.

Eliana Brown: 25:14

I know it's mutually exclusive.

Abigail Garofalo: 25:16

Yeah. True. I am not a landscape designer or a landscape architect, and I do not find joy in being like, oh, I'm gonna put these colors here, and these colors, like, that's not my vibe, and so I used some really handy resources from the Red Oak Rain Garden and just took their designs that they give freely, and they're totally Eliana, I'm assuming you're totally cool with, and that's what they're for. And so, I'll let Eliana pitch those, but, you know, those those resources, I hand those out constantly in my work, and people love them, and I'm like, you know what? You don't even have to come up with a design. Somebody made it for you and wants you to use it. So I'll let you talk about those a little bit.

Eliana Brown: 25:56

Oh, absolutely. Thanks so much for thanks so much for mentioning it. So I am the director of the Red Oak Rain Garden, and when we first started thinking about native plants and how to best encourage other people to use native plants and to establish their own gardens, we were it kind of came from some experience that I had from going to a native plant sale, and my background is engineering. I am a Master Gardener, but I am not a landscape designer. So I would go to the native plant sale and one of two things would happen.

Eliana Brown: 26:30

I would either come home with every plant that the native plant nerds, the beautiful native plant nerds had talked me into because they're gorgeous, I just, you know, like, I just bought them all. And then they sit in my driveway because I didn't know what to do with them, and, you know, this is a lot of that was and I'd feel shame, and that was just not a good way of approaching it. Or I would go to the native plant sale, and I would end up with nothing because I would be super overwhelmed. And that's not good either, because what we really need to do is we need to buy the native plants. We need to get them in the ground. That's like right? That's the idea. And so the the I thought, you know, if somebody would hand me just a a plan or a kit, be like, this is what you need to do with this patch of ground. This this is this is where you need to go.

Eliana Brown: 27:19

Then I started hanging out with landscape architects. I figured out how I can start working with them to make this plan happen, and that's when I met Layne Knoche, who was a student at the time, and I saw some of his work that he was doing as a student, because he was studying landscape architecture, and he is a native plant aficionado. We had a lot of things in common, hired him, and we created the first of those native plant brochures. He, of course, as you as Erin and Abigail, as you both know, he's been working with me at Extension ever since then and has just expanded the number of these brochures so that it can work and represent the many different biomes that are in the Red Oak Rain Garden and can work in different parts of yards, no matter what kind of conditions that they have. So, you can find them at the Red Oak Rain Garden website, and you can download them for free. Abigail, thank you so much for giving them out to people. I know that they are available from a lot of the the Extension county units, and we we just really appreciate that they have worked so well for so many people. Get those plants in the ground so that we can be more resilient, so we can build that soil.

Erin Garrett: 28:44

Awesome. Thanks so much, Eliana, for chatting with us today all about native plants and how they can withstand drought. But we got slightly off topic, but I love it. That's totally where we were going.

Abigail Garofalo: 28:57

Talking to the right crew, honestly.

Erin Garrett: 29:00

Native plants, tying in drought. We got it. So now it's time for our special spotlight. This is the point of the show where we each shine a spotlight on something cool that we saw in nature this month. So, Abigail, do you wanna go first?

Abigail Garofalo: 29:17

I will. I'm just racking my brain. I know I promised something earlier. Now I'm like oh. No, so I am my job is constantly having me ask, like, see things in nature and go, oh, I could I could use that for a class, or that would be a really good item for my my library of items. And so, there's this silver maple in front of my neighbor's house, and he was like cleaning it up and stuff, and a branch had fallen like this, like I would say, I don't know how thick around, like a six inches, something like that around, maybe even a foot, and it was just so cool because it had a bunch of woodpecker holes in it, and I just loved the idea of, like, being able to keep that, because I do activities, I train the Master Naturalists in my county, and I do an activity that I stole from our colleague Peggy Doty, in which she gives everybody a random nature item and has them ask as many questions as they can about it, except for what is it. So they can ask, you know, where did it come from, who eats it, you know, how how does it grow, if it's a plant, whatever, but they can't ask what is it. Because essentially what our Master Naturalists are learning is that ends the conversation. They learned it's an oak, but they don't know anything about oaks, that person who asked that question. So you you don't get to talk about it anymore. And so I was really excited to add that item to my library of that kind of activity because it's interesting, it's got some lichen growing on it, it's got just some really cool different things that you can ask about it, and I just I just find that really cool, and I love nature stuff like that, so it's added to my library.

Erin Garrett: 31:01

That's awesome. I love that. Eliana, what's your special spotlight?

Eliana Brown: 31:07

Well, my special spotlight has just been looking out my back window into my backyard just as dusk is starting from this conversation. It's probably a surprise to no one that I have. I have a full prairie in one swath in my backyard, and on the other swath of my backyard, I have native shade garden. And there are so many well, what we call them in southern Illinois is lightning bugs, but I know other folks call them fireflies. It is just filled with fireflies, and just as dusk is happening as it started, as the sun is really starting to come down, it is it's just a little light show back there, and it's just such a delight to take a look at.

Abigail Garofalo: 31:52

Magical. I love that. Mhmm. Alright, Erin. Take it away.

Erin Garrett: 31:58

Alright. So mine comes from last week. For those that don't know, the last week in July every year is National Moth Week.

Abigail Garofalo: 32:07

Oh.

Erin Garrett: 32:08

Well, it's very exciting time. We get to focus on very cool pollinators that are usually ignored, are our moths. And we had several different programs that we put on last week. And one that I went to was a nighttime moth hike that Kevin Rohling, one of our colleagues out of Dixon Springs Ag Center led.

Erin Garrett: 32:34

And so we were out at nighttime going through the forest to these moth light traps that he had set up, and it was just very cool. First of all, how many people came that were interested in going out to hike in the woods to potentially get as many chigger bites as I did, which was not the fun part. But to see really cool moths and just we didn't see like the big magnificent silk moths. Right? They were like tiny little guys, but we saw tons of other beetles, and just being out at night and hearing just the sounds of nighttime of the forest, and not being scared and just being with a big group of people and right experiencing that and of course seeing moths was just really special. I encourage everyone, it's a great time to just leave your like light on your back porch and sit back there and see what comes and flutters by your windows. I have had Luna moths come up to my house before where you hear a little thump on the window and then you look and it's this big green Luna moth. So take some time, make some observations, and you'll be really surprised what you can see. But moths are awesome and we need to appreciate them a little bit more. So that's my special spotlight.

Abigail Garofalo: 33:48

I love that. And if you're feeling a little more inspiration as you hear Erin's special spotlight, you can go back a few months in the in the archives and listen to Amy Lefringhouse's Nature at Night episode. So some really good stuff, and there's actually around me, there's a lot of night hikes going on right now, because it's so hot during the day. Everyone's like, let's do night hikes, and I think we're seeing some really cool things. So definitely encourage to do it safely, but even just your backyard seeing some cool things, like, really awesome. So great.

Erin Garrett: 34:17

And bug spray.

Abigail Garofalo: 34:18

Yeah. And bug spray. Please bug spray.

Eliana Brown: 34:20

Definitely bug spray. Is it is it do you call them night butterflies? Because that's how I think of moths is night butterflies.

Erin Garrett: 34:30

No. But I love that.

Abigail Garofalo: 34:32

Rebranding. Everybody, we're rebranding butterflies now. It's no long because they're all Lepidopteros, like, night butterflies.

Erin Garrett: 34:40

Taking it. Thank you for that. I love it.

Erin Garrett: 34:44

Alright. Well, this has been another episode on the Spotlight on Natural Resources podcast. Check out our podcast next month, where we talk with Rachel Curry and Nicole Haverback, who are our watershed outreach associates, and they're gonna be talking all about nutrient loss. So join us then, we'll see you all.

Erin Garrett: 34:59

So join us then. We'll see you all.