From youth to adults: engaging our communities to learn about their water

Abigail Garofalo: 00:07

Welcome to another episode of the Everyday Environment podcast where we explore the environment we see every day. I'm your host, Abigail Garofalo.

Erin Garrett: 00:16

And I'm your cohost, Erin Garrett.

Abigail Garofalo: 00:17

And today, we are here with Peggy Anesi, the natural resources, environment, and energy educator with Boone, DeKalb, and Ogle County, here to chat with us about community engagement and water. Welcome, Peggy.

Peggy Anesi: 00:30

Thank you. It's good to be here with both of you.

Abigail Garofalo: 00:33

And you're a long term friend of the pod. We've had you on. I actually we're in the process of looking back at our old archives, and we're like, Peggy, there she is back in the day. Doing it when we were on our our ten minute, eight minute podcast realm, and Erin and I weren't even here. And so you're not unfamiliar. You are familiar with the podcast and and recording with us, and we're glad to have you. So

Peggy Anesi: 00:57

Long as it's not too familiar. Right? Hopefully, it doesn't turn people off.

Abigail Garofalo: 01:02

No. I think people are like, Peggy's on again. Yeah.

Peggy Anesi: 01:05

I have them all fooled.

Abigail Garofalo: 01:06

Well, you've been with us for a long time, and maybe people know, but maybe people don't know. And so I also think, like, the work of an extension educator is just a little bit ambiguous. People are like, what does that what do what do the educators do even? And so in your own interpretation of what you do, Peggy, tell us a little bit about yourself and and just the work you do in your role.

Peggy Anesi: 01:27

You know, when you said that, my first thought was, who am I? Who am I after all these years? Big picture in a short amount of time. You know, I started out as a naturalist because when you're a kid in the sixties and seventies, we spent so much time outside on the ground. Right? And then I became a scientist when I went to college. I studied wildlife, zoology, later a master's in education. So my scientist person, and now I compare what I do. I'm really a naturalist again. And I think I think being an an extension educator, being our role to di- you know, make science digestible, I think is more of an of a naturalist role. It has a it has that social capacity that sometimes in science, you aren't working on that. You're working on the science, and your capacity to share it isn't as comfortable or easy, but people need that. And I think that now I'm just gonna, I'm a naturalist. I'm not really a scientist anymore, but I'm sharing what I see. But I also have to understand that that social capacity of who who we're talking to to engage them and pay attention instead of just telling them, you know, everything. So I think that works. I've been with Extension for a quarter of a century. I think, yeah, definitely went from scientist to to naturalist in that time and had many different titles.

Erin Garrett: 02:38

That's a great description of what we do. I think that's, like, maybe the best description I've heard, Peggy. I love that so much.

Peggy Anesi: 02:44

Well and I I took a professional development, last January. I did a lot of indigenous knowledge professional development. It was really exciting out of some stuff out of Canada. I was getting I like, in my head argumentative because there's they were saying that our, you know, European settler and science was different. And they're now this, I said and I'm thinking, no. I I teach sci- I I I'm doing what you're doing. I'm doing what you're doing. Then that that's when I realized I was no longer the research scientist person, which we absolutely need. I was the indigenous knowledge sharing person, and that's great. They go together so well. The professional development was kind of a them and us, different different, but really, Extension educators are the perfect blend of science and sharing that knowledge from a natural resource perspective.

Abigail Garofalo: 03:33

Science isn't done until it's communicated.

Peggy Anesi: 03:35

Nice. I like that. I'm gonna have to write that down.

Abigail Garofalo: 03:38

I did not come up with that myself. I stole that from somewhere else. So don't

Peggy Anesi: 03:43

I know, and I never can remember who. It's not anonymous, but it's a piece to me. That's excellent. That's that's an excellent way to book in that.

Erin Garrett: 03:50

Awesome. Well, now that we know a little bit more about what you do, Peggy, when we're talking on this season of the podcast all about water, we've kind of taken some deep dives into different topics about water, talked about how communities handle water issues. And today, we're really talking about how individual people coming together in their communities can really help be involved in their watersheds. So what drew you to engaging and educating your community about watersheds?

Peggy Anesi: 04:18

So recently, I had to talk with my supervisor and, like, okay. If you're gonna do water, that's fine. It's perfect. You know, where did it come from? Like, trying to build a legacy statement. Right? And, actually, one of the things that got me thinking the most and I cannot find it. Maybe you guys could find it. There was a commercial on television years and years ago, and it was it was the the turn of bottled water time frame. And there were these high school kids all hanging out by this flowing beautiful creek. The video was them. They're looking at the water. They're touching it. And one one young man stands up, mister entrepreneur, and he said, I could I could bottle and sell this. And the other young man in the group said, are you crazy? Nobody's gonna buy water. It moved me. I can't find it anywhere. It's like, did I dream it? No. I'm pretty sure it was a real commercial, but I cannot I've searched and searched. So that got my focus.

Peggy Anesi: 05:10

I did grow up in in a river valley, very aware of the river, not as a pollution free zone, but a food zone. A lot of our a lot of my classmates' friends worked on the barges. Right? It was their income. And we had we still had mussel. We called them clamors, right, that were harvesting clams for food. In that area, we used to have back in the before the 1942 when we started using petroleum for buttons. We had clamshells all over the shores punched for buttons. I never thought anything of it, but it was all about economics. Right? It wasn't about how clean or dirty it was. And it was the Illinois River, so it had a whole lot going on. And then I read an article at one point, and I it was in a really it was a between the lines thing. And, basically, a lot of companies were buying land in other countries that had no petroleum. There was, like, nothing on the landscape. They were buying it because they would have then water rights to sell it back to those people. Now I haven't followed up on that. I have no but it was like, that's horrible. Right? So now there's a control thing going on, and I'm like, we can't control water. You know? It's gonna move and flow.

Peggy Anesi: 06:11

And one scientific journal out of the US said and I quoted I I there's a quote. It said, new water is made daily. And I'm like, holy cow. Well, I know that they were trying to explain the water cycle, but they weren't making it digestible. They just said new water's made every day. So let's go do what we want with that because we're getting new stuff every day. They were just explaining the liquid time of the water cycle. Right? So it just slowly kept building into a concern for water. It just it's coming, you know, and then I would get some support from other journals. Like, this is gonna be the next best big problem as far as not not a problem, but it wouldn't have to be. We just have to care more. So I just have been coming back to water over and over. And finally now, right, we're seeing a huge you guys are focused on it. Thank you so much. Our communities are realizing water is the number one economic driver.

Abigail Garofalo: 06:59

It's where a lot of communities settle. Right? Like, that's where we see we look at the major cities in the US, in the world, and they're all centered around a body of water somewhere.

Peggy Anesi: 07:10

Because they have to have it, and you have to drink it. And if you don't have water, your community doesn't exist. You could have everything, everything. But if you don't have water, the community doesn't exist. It can't.

Abigail Garofalo: 07:20

I remember on a smaller scale even when my first experience with Extension was an internship in Cook County, and I was working with community and school gardens and learning about, like, how does a community garden start? How does it establish? Things like that. And the biggest issue identified was, like, well, what's your access to water? And so, like, hydrant keys were, like, a really big deal in Chicago. Could you get one? Things like that. And so, like, they're like, if you don't have a decent access to a flow of water, you like, your community garden is gonna have a really hard time succeeding. And so just on that minor scale, right, of, like, just even just trying to get this, like, community space where you're growing things. Don't have water? I don't know what you're gonna do. Right? So it's really interesting.

Erin Garrett: 08:01

That commercial that you mentioned reminds me of the Lorax when they bottle up the air.

Abigail Garofalo: 08:05

I was thinking that

Erin Garrett: 08:06

and deliver the air. And they're like, who would buy this? And, like, everyone does.

Peggy Anesi: 08:10

Right. I would love to find that commercial and and use it to teach high school students because it it was just it was very clever. It's very clever. And, you know, and and you think about, like, when Flint, Michigan happened, you know, people thought they were doing the right thing. They didn't know that scrubbing those pipes would release all this lead, and that took if it doesn't happen to us, we just go, oh, poor Flint. Right? We didn't get excited. We didn't go we just went and got a glass of water. And it's it's should be a really good example that and I'm sure other I'm sure communities are, like, looking at their pipes and trying to find grant money. I don't doubt that they're it made efforts, but I was working with a five state group, the North Central Water Region Network, and we had our next grant was a go. The foundation that we were gonna get money from said we can't honor these and honor any grants because Flint might need us. So, yes, that's where it should go to to help people. But it it wasn't just Flint. It affected a whole bunch of clean water actions that myself and many other groups were probably trying to get accomplished. It just halted it and it for the right reasons to help people, but we were gonna help other people too, but it just wasn't an emergency. So things happen and and, you know, it's the same water, same planet, different inputs, Same water, same planet. So we have to think about which this podcast, these things you're doing is talking about those different inputs, right, and how we can support them as a community and maybe make minor changes and make big differences in those inputs.

Abigail Garofalo: 09:35

One thing we talked about in an earlier podcast when we talked about the Chicago River and all the engineering feats that they did that they didn't think about, these are, like, long term changes that we made to our drinking water supply or to our to our water systems that were a hundred years ago changes that we're talking about the repercussions or even just the effects in general of that today. And so what kind of fixes we have or what kind of solutions we have to our water and our community and access and and things like that. Like, these are not, this is gonna be a ten year fix or this is gonna be like, these are gonna be things that we have to think about on, like, this long term investment scale, and that's, I think, really hard for humans to think about and invest in. I mean, we we know that based on a lot of other environmental issues we see, and it's just wild, but also so important. Right? Like, we have to have water.

Peggy Anesi: 10:25

Well and I was checking the dates. Like, I don't memorize dates. The Clean Water Act. Now I'm older maybe than you know? But I'm not ancient. Right? When I graduated with my first degree, my bachelor of science degree was the year of the Clean Water Act. It took that long. And I'm like, you know? And here we are still still trying to help people understand what I think because we focus mostly on industry, got focused on the situation at hand, which was the massive amounts of pollution and and need to fix some of that. And we put regulations for the right reasons. It's not about regulating the business, the industry as much as it is about preserving the community that's going to work every day to work there and and to be healthy. But I'd looked at those dates, and I was like, it just seems like it should have been way before my time, right, that we were focused on that. But clearly, it wasn't.

Abigail Garofalo: 11:19

To kinda turn us around a little bit, Peggy, you've been doing this, like you said, for twenty five years. You've been focusing on various topics, but you've really kind of come to focus on water. I know you're like, oh,

Peggy Anesi: 11:29

I think they're gonna be able to hear my face change, like

Abigail Garofalo: 11:32

Yes. We do constantly have to remind ourselves audio medium. You've been doing this for so long, and you've been seeing you've had a lot of different opportunities to engage the community in different ways, in all different stages of of life, in all different stages of community as well. Right? From from legislative professionals to just adults that come into your nature center, to youth, to, like, even youth organizing with schools, things like that. I guess my question for you is I would love to hear some of your, like or even just one of your memorable success stories from your work in community engagement on watersheds.

Peggy Anesi: 12:04

Success stories. I think seeing a kindergartner understand the water cycle using colored little squares and traveling around the room and making a little bar graph and realizing they were in the ocean a lot. I know it sounds like a small thing, but just if we can just start. So, you know, so every we try to have something different for every grade level. It helps them see.

Peggy Anesi: 12:23

They don't have to remember, but, you know, we have to learn things, what, three times. We have to hear it more and more. So in the youth world, I just we focus on water so much, and we I'm sitting on the south branch of the Kishwaukee River in northern Illinois, my nature center. If I could throw well enough, I could hit the water from where I'm sitting, and it's a class A stream. I put kids in that water and teach them about everything in there and the amount of empathy, and then they'll see other people in the river during the week of camp and be very concerned at how they're treating that water, physically treating, lifting up a a mussel and just tossing it back in when they know how to set it back correctly. It's it's engagement. If you're not engaged, how do you know? Right? And so taking that a little farther and knowing I can't make a difference from the bottom up, it takes too long.

Peggy Anesi: 13:09

So last year, was it last year? Or maybe the year be it went into two years, went into 23, 24. I designed a watershed stewardship for leaders. It's an academy for your municipalities. They're reaching out and wanna know how to help with their ordinances, but they're not learning what it is. Right? So having that happen and having people show up and wanna know and then having results come out of that was probably the I mean, I felt like I finally did the one big thing, and now one of my other counties wants it. Even if they don't end up getting it to fly, I feel like I I conquered something. I I finally cut through a barrier to get an average of 32 people at the table four times a month apart. They showed up a month apart to understand what to do and made changes, tangible changes. They calibrated their salt trucks. They quit dumping salt right by the storm drains. They just were doing it because it was they were told to do it. They hired a part time watershed person at the county level to adjust deal with watershed issues. Where does that happen? I didn't do that. I had speakers. Right? I facilitated. I handed them something, but they did it.

Peggy Anesi: 14:21

And I don't know what happened if it took twenty five years. I don't understand what happened, actually. I do kinda know how how we got people there. I did not pay them, just so we're clear. No bribery. I'm just living off of that still. Right? And we finished that a year ago, February. We did that, and now we're ready to start it again. I'm just it's not ego. I thought about that. It's awe. Like, finally. And if one group listened, somebody else next to them because this shouldn't be a county. It should be regional. Right? Cost should be spread out regionally. Money is always the barrier with anything like with water. Right? You can't raise taxes that high, but you don't have the the money regionally.

Peggy Anesi: 14:58

And in that same county, they now passed Boone County, Illinois right up against Wisconsin. I can say this because I'm so proud. They just passed. They're gonna have LIDAR. They're gonna fly the entire county with lidar, which will do groundwater level checks at up to a thousand feet.

Abigail Garofalo: 15:16

Wow.

Peggy Anesi: 15:17

Almost $500,000, and they passed it. And I did ask someone at the instigated this that was the assessed need for this. I said, is there any chance we could say that we got this to happen because of the watershed leadership? And he goes, absolutely. That's the follow up because people voted against it, but the majority, you know, said yes. And those people were in the room that came and understood.

Abigail Garofalo: 15:40

Yeah. The value was beyond a dollar number that, like, you could that was communicated in your class. So that way these these decision makers who were voting on this were able to say, like, I actually can tell you based on the knowledge that I've gained how this is gonna bring value, and we're gonna get the long term payoff for this. And they actually can conceptualize that as opposed to just being like, well, yeah, somebody told me it's a long term payoff, but, like, all I see is the dollar on the paper. And so getting the space for those leaders to to see that, to actually understand that and to bring that into their brains and have that almost be a lens in their decision making is just so incredible.

Abigail Garofalo: 16:18

That's it's I've been hearing about that program for the last year, Peggy, if not longer, and I'm also in awe of it, so.

Peggy Anesi: 16:25

It's its own monster. I just guide it, honest to gosh. And my program coordinator did the pretty stuff that made all the all the agendas look nice. I just yeah. I'm just really I'm proud of everybody who showed up. I'm over the moon that it worked because I feel like that was a a curtain we just couldn't get through if it's not from the top. So then these children that we're seeing that will have this they won't fight it. Right? They'll come to it and go, yes. I will keep this going. So you're trying to meet people in that middle space so that it's doesn't stop, you know, at some point.

Abigail Garofalo: 16:55

Yeah.

Peggy Anesi: 16:56

And a lot of and a lot of people come back. I remember when we learned about the water because we've got them in the water. Right?

Erin Garrett: 17:02

Mhmm. That's really just inspiring because I feel like with a lot of big issues, we kind of can get discouraged sometimes in reaching adults and say, well, like, people have their what they think about this, and there's only so much we can do to change people's minds. So we just have to start with kids and hope that, right, the next generation can help solve these issues. But you're working on both sides of it. Right? And and working, yes, with youth so that we do raise the next generation to be more cognizant of their water and understand those issues, but then also working with leaders to help them, empower them, right, with the knowledge that they need. So just to see that kinda come together is really awesome.

Abigail Garofalo: 17:43

And to have something that these youth can look up to as well. Right? Like, they can they can see a goal in their head. Like, there's a target now of, like, these is this is what people are doing because we know that doom and gloom can really, like, dampen an interest. Right? Like, well, there's nothing I can do because all the people making decisions that I'm gonna have to clean up later, like, why? And so having that two, like, dual ended approach is just so valuable.

Peggy Anesi: 18:07

I just had a group on Sunday. I came out and met with the the environmental club from one of our local high schools. And I first said, you know, we don't have a lot of time together, but I'd really like to get to know you. And there was maybe 10, you know, 10 kids. And they introduced themselves, told me what I said, then tell me what you're thinking you'd like to do. One of them just was, accepted the day before at at U of I. And she was doing she was interested in urban landscape design sustainability. I'm like, yes. And another girl was between geology and something else. And I said, well, if I could vote for you right now, what you you can do those things.

Peggy Anesi: 18:40

I'd vote for the geology and groundwater. You'll never be unemployed because this is our next big issue. People are talking about setting up you know? There's a a word I couldn't think of this morning when I was just thinking about this. But, basically, groundwater districts, they're trying to set them up and have control, but the water never stops moving. You know? You don't own water no more than you own the air you're breathing. Right? You can write policy to protect it for you. But I said, you know, you're gonna you'd be employed forever, and you get paid a lot of money for it because it is gonna be the next. I mean, we have our population is too high for it not to be, and there's nothing wrong with having a high population. I've read and and heard that we do have enough resources to sustain 8,000,000 people on the planet. It's it's, as we know, not all spread evenly.

Abigail Garofalo: 19:28

Yeah.

Peggy Anesi: 19:29

Yeah. But we can do this, but managing it and trying to control it isn't gonna be it's just gonna start being team sports again. Right? Well, we don't want that. We don't want we want it regional. We wanna take care of it together. Don't start putting, you know, lines where you can't you're that's like a moving target. You can't do that. You know, the Earth doesn't know there's county lines. Right? Ordinances should be regional based on watersheds. Not in my lifetime or not in my career is this gonna happen, but that's what happened up where we did the one county. One of the board members that disagreed and didn't vote for that to that lidar to happen, I agree with him because it shouldn't be one county. He said, other counties around us, it should be regional money. We're you know, they're regionally, they should all be putting in money to see because this he understands. There's no county lines underground. And I told him, I said, I agree with you, and he goes, you agree with me. I'm like, I do. But I'm glad it passed, you know, because we can show. This is a showcase. And we're only that that's only the, what, the third county west of the Great Lake in the middle of the state. You know? So there is more to do, but steps are steps are happening, so that's exciting.

Erin Garrett: 20:36

So we talked about some successes, and we've already kind of talked about some challenges that we've seen. But what are some challenges that you've experienced in getting communities involved in caring about their watershed? And then if you have, you know, successes of how you've overcome them, which we've already shared some, you can share those as well.

Peggy Anesi: 20:53

I think the big thing, and I'll just one thing. Getting for the watershed leadership one, we had their peers invite them to come. Because Extension for the even my entire career, it's still the best kept secret. We work so hard and do so much good work, but we do it with so many partners. We kinda get diluted in the mix. Right? Some people don't even realize that a lot of what's happening is Extension. But what we did is we made us we just made a small committee based on this assess need to do watershed education at this level and had them tell us who to invite. And we sent the invites and said, you've been chosen by your peers. They don't know us. We're doing all the lifting behind the scenes. We don't have to have our face out there. But if we put their faces they know and respect, and by golly, 39 people registered and 32 average at the meetings at the sessions. And I will do it again just like that. And I even told my next county, I said, I'm here when you're ready to start, but you'll need to bring me a committee of your of your local community members. I can't do this without their face and support because that's what made it happen. Who knew after all these years that's what, you know, what we needed to do?

Abigail Garofalo: 22:01

Well, you have to have some kind of buy in. Right? Like, it's if there's no buy in, then my so and so doesn't think it's important. Why would I think it's important? Right? And so there was this value communication that was occurring that was really, really cool.

Peggy Anesi: 22:14

And that's with any program. You see you see schoolyard spaces, gardens, or natural spaces. And if the janitor and maintenance people aren't on board, they don't last. You know? And here we we just had to get the right mix, and somehow that was like I don't know if it was out of here we go again, and I how am I gonna get these people? Tell you what, I don't wanna do it. You get it. You get them. You know? And it worked, and they did pick. We had to, you know, we had to make sure they understood that if too many people showed up from the board, it could be a quorum. So let's you know, here. You're all invited. First come, first serve. We're only taking so many. Oh my gosh. You know? Yeah. It was pretty cool. I was pretty impressed.

Peggy Anesi: 22:49

And even the people on the committee, when it was over, you know, we'd done our fourth one. The engineer said, you know, he was all for it, but he didn't think it was gonna work as well as it did. He thought there was too much redundancy. But if you don't start the next session, bring in the last session. Start the next session, bring in the last two sessions. And he didn't he but he doesn't program. You know? That's why we do what we do. He didn't have faith in the style of programming and how to program for public audience, in this case, leaders. And, he goes, boy, I didn't think that was gonna work that well. But he's he never said that through the whole process that he didn't have faith in it. And then after, he's like, which makes me now understand what I have to explain to the next group. You know? You may not see this working, but it worked really well. We've tested it. We've piloted it.

Abigail Garofalo: 23:35

That's what I try and communicate that to people all the time. You know? They're like, well, I don't I I have the information. I just need to get it out there. And I was like, and that is what we do best. Like, we are really good at figuring like, we'd spend a lot of time just thinking about, like, what is the best way? What is the science backed way to even just communicate this information? Not just the information is science backed, but, like, what does the science say about how people learn? Right? And the best way that people get this information and the best way to change behaviors or attitudes. I feel like Extension is really good at evaluating that and saying, like, we know that changing attitudes and behaviors can't just come from me telling you information. You know that you should eat so many veggies a day. You know that you should exercise thirty minutes a day. How many of you all do that? Right? We don't.

Abigail Garofalo: 24:22

So just knowing information doesn't change behavior. And so us as Extension professionals, like, we know, like and we a lot of us are really good at this, and that's why we do our jobs. And that's why Peggy's been in her role for so long because she's good at it of, like, how do we change attitudes? And there are different strategies for doing that and how do how we communicate the information, how often we communicate the issue information. The methods in which that's done is all very carefully thought about with our audiences and who the audience should be in the first place and getting to the root of of where behavior can actually change. And I'm really nerding out because that's what my master's was about was, like, how people learn, and I love seeing the different ways that we do that to really change those attitudes.

Peggy Anesi: 25:04

A funny example that is just it's cute, and it's it was harmless because it was sixth graders. I spent a day with every sixth grader at this time back when it happened in in DeKalb School District, which is our largest school district. So I saw so many sixth graders, and I was teaching watershed before anybody was teaching watershed. And I decided to make it fun and funny. Instead of just holding a funnel, I talked about a toilet bowl. Right? Because it's holding water. It's a watershed, and all the water that goes in it goes down. Right? It was the perfect example. And what if your parent goes in with a can of Lysol to clean the seat and spray it? Does all the spray just touch the the seat? And they're like, no. It goes all over the room. I said, does it go in the water? Yes. It was the best day. Everybody was on. They were they were laughing. I'm like, it's funny.

Peggy Anesi: 25:51

Right? Anything icky you put in there, and they're like, oh, you know, it was just a great day. Every thank you note I got. Thank you for teaching us that toilets are a watershed. I don't think it worked. And I think some of them probably knew I think some of them probably meant that they weren't you they weren't Extension educators yet. I think some of them meant that that example. Right? That that is

Abigail Garofalo: 26:12

Yeah.

Peggy Anesi: 26:13

But they just thanks for teaching us that toilets are watersheds. I went, yeah, that backfired. But they weren't going to let their parent put junk down the toilet. Cleaning stuff should be on a rag and wiped, not poured into the water. At least I'm sure that got through.

Abigail Garofalo: 26:29

We've been talking about, like, over time, have you seen any community attitudes and behaviors towards watersheds change over your career?

Peggy Anesi: 26:36

Kids are always the same. They're excited. They're interested. Water's fun. Water you know? That's whether they take it with them, who knows? But they all get some form of water education through activity and kinesthetic learning and but there has been a big shift because of watershed planning has gotten bigger when people are realizing that they need to take care of their personal full watershed because whatever's in it is theirs.

Peggy Anesi: 26:58

Locally, I'm an associate director on our soil and water conservation district board. We are trying to do all the I think they're HUC 12 hydrologic unit. What is a HUC? I can't remember. I'll have to figure that out again. But, basically, the Kishwaukee River size, we are doing all eight watersheds of that size in our county using EPA grants, local funding, and focusing on education. We do a bus tour of each one. The community is invited. They do amazing stuff. My part is because I work with them and have a an agreement to be their educator, I do education. Right? So we get to count our education for the grant. And when they're here on the bus tour, this last one, I did education here in the building.

Peggy Anesi: 27:40

But seeing that more and more people, more and more groups, whether they are the county themselves or an organized grassroots group, they are building. Watershed management plans are building. People are seeing very much more than when I started. When when I tried to get people to do water education with me at the adult level, people were like, why? And now here we are. I have people that took the master watershed steward program, and I did the pilot for Illinois this last year. They wanna do more. Where can I help? So we give them places to go do it. We're not they're not volunteering for us, but they wanna participate. Some of them wanna help the next class and and be a part of the next class as a support person. So that interest has never been there at that level. So we're starting to do enough programming. It's on us. We're doing more. So they're seeing it from Extension's perspective with all these different things, and they're seeing it in these organizations that are like, we gotta do this. Because quite frankly, soil and water conservation districts have the same cloak. We're sharing that cloak of invisibility. We do all they do all good work, and yet until it's a problem, we're not paying attention.

Erin Garrett: 28:43

Mhmm.

Abigail Garofalo: 28:44

Who do we call? I don't know. Well, now it's a problem. Let's just Google who comes first.

Peggy Anesi: 28:49

Yeah. Let's hope it's Extension. Right? Either answer it or get them to the right space. And I think people need to know that Extension is not is also not, you know, the know all stop site, but our job is to find that and to help you, with resources. Right? If we don't have those resources, we usually know someone who does or can get you there.

Abigail Garofalo: 29:06

That's usually my standard answer as well. I may not know, but I know someone who does.

Peggy Anesi: 29:11

Mhmm. Yeah.

Erin Garrett: 29:13

I'm willing to find out. Yes. Alright, Peggy. As we kind of start to wrap up today, are there any upcoming projects or initiatives that you're particularly excited about that you'd like to share with our audience?

Peggy Anesi: 29:26

When you said it, I decided I'd wait till the first thing that popped in my head, and it's my paddle and learn year two two point o. So I started last year with a grant doing what I call the paddle and learn, and it's taking teachers, anybody K through 12. And last year, I actually had a high school counselor sign up, and he was the most engaged student of all of them and took it back to his science teachers within his building. So but, basically, it's a professional development opportunity for teachers up here in my unit. And day one, they get certified by an organization on in kayaks on a little pond over in, in one of the towns right by here in DeKalb, and then we learn all week. The key is I told them, this is not your usual teacher workshop. I'm not gonna tell you how to teach. That would be ridiculous. I am not a public school teacher. I'm a professional educator, but I don't do your job. But I I'm gonna teach you all about watersheds as a community member because this will give you the most support to go in and be willing to teach watersheds to your children. And then if you want me to help you, I will come up with activities. But that was the one thing they were shocked because usually that's like, and here's this lesson you could do. And here what do those do? You guys, they'll sit on a shelf if and if you give them a whole book, they do the ones they do in the workshop.

Peggy Anesi: 30:39

So I would rather open their mind and spend we spent three full days learning from myself, from a soil scientist, from water scientists, from a hydrologist till they were aware as a person in their community about their watershed. And then we paddled the Rock River so we could get more of the best management practices or not. So bookend to bookend, they learned. And in the water here, they got to study mussels from a guy who's a mussel specialist in our area, and they got to do macroinvertebrates. And then it was so exciting, and I'm gonna I get I got grant money again. We're gonna repeat it. Now I know to have some certain speakers take more breaks. Right? Because people are even my speakers came back to hear the other speakers. So this is building this ripple effect.

Peggy Anesi: 31:25

The best quote, and I'll leave it with this, was day two. So we had the the certification day, then we had a whole day of education starting with hydrology. Day two for learning was Tuesday morning. I'll just say Becky came in, fourth grade teacher, got her bagel. I fed them well. Got her bagel, got her juice, sat down with her fruit and bagel, and went, so Peggy. I'm like, oh, here it goes. Because it was an all day hardcore learning, and it was not typical teacher workshoppy stuff. She goes, so Peggy. I said, yeah. She goes, until yesterday. This is a seasoned teacher teaching fourth grade where human impact is a focus. She said, until yesterday, I didn't even know what a watershed was, let alone that I lived in one. So thank you. Throw the mic. Right?

Abigail Garofalo: 32:09

That's like your heart just, like, flutters when you hear that.

Peggy Anesi: 32:12

Because we're doing something they've never I'm not gonna hand them a lesson even if I know it's good, but if but I opened it up. And so and I also said, you know, field trip. Come up to my center. Part of what they get for coming to the professional development is a free field trip for their kids. So we can embed all that same water education for them, and they can use it as it. And then one of the teachers, when we got out of the kayak on the last day, I didn't see him after that. Right? They already did, you know, the eval and such with it would be online, and then they had to do their one for the for the professional development. One of the fourth grade teacher, in a group who was the science person, she said, well, she's taking off her life jacket. She was like, yes. I'm gonna have to spend some of summer rewriting the science curriculum. And I'm like, may I ask why? She goes, well, I usually use California mudslides to explain erosion, but now I'm gonna talk about cover crops and different things that have to do with our area here, you know, different best management practices. I'm like, score. Right? Check.

Peggy Anesi: 33:06

So we get to do it again, and this time it's not a pilot. I have I it's very stressful when you do one of those as you guys know for the first time. And now it's gonna be like, this is how it is. You know? So very excited.

Abigail Garofalo: 33:18

Whenever I do a program I've been doing for years, I actually feel like an unreasonable amount of stress that I don't I can't quite place. And I'm like, is it just I, like, know what I'm doing? I don't understand that feeling. And so I hope you don't have that this season because

Peggy Anesi: 33:31

I have it all the time, and I've had it for twenty five years. And I think it's because we care. We always wanna make it better. And sometimes we don't have the time to upgrade or tweak it, and so we get stressed because we really thought of things we could've done even better, but they don't know. They're still learning really great information.

Abigail Garofalo: 33:48

Well, Peggy, thank you so much for sharing your knowledge about community engagement. It's such a wealth and such a a breadth of knowledge between all of the different audiences you address and the different topics. And, I mean, did you ever think, you know, studying your wildlife classes back in the day that you'd be this leading community engagement expert on water? So

Peggy Anesi: 34:10

Of anything. I didn't wanna talk to people. Are you kidding? I wanted to do I I thought I'd be in the field working with animals and not and by myself. I'm never by myself.

Abigail Garofalo: 34:19

Yep. You you're I mean, even always surrounded by animals as well, but you're always surrounded by something.

Peggy Anesi: 34:24

Yep. That's true too.

Abigail Garofalo: 34:26

Now we are going to finish today's episode with everyday observation where we highlight the mundane and normal of our environment that is actually really interesting. Erin, you wanna kick us off?

Erin Garrett: 34:36

Sure. So as we've been recording this season, you probably heard a lot of us, mention we're recording in the wintertime, so some of our everyday observations don't necessarily match the season we're in now. But I wanted to share just kind of a crazy weather day that we had this winter. So with me being in in far, far, far southern Illinois, we had, some freezing rain come through and woke up and all the trees were covered in ice. And that same day, we had a thunderstorm come through and melt all of the ice. It was very strange to have ice outside and then hear a thunder and go, what is that sound? That shouldn't happen in the same day. And then overnight, we had snow again. So it was just like a crazy day of we had no idea what was going on. I was very fortunate to be able to just be in my house and just watch it the whole day and not have to travel anywhere. But that was something I had not experienced before was freezing rain, a thunderstorm, and snow in the same day. So it was just kind of a crazy weather phenomenon that was kinda cool to experience, to be honest with you. But it was just very interesting. So I just wanted to kinda highlight that on the podcast.

Abigail Garofalo: 35:50

Yeah. We're gonna throw that clip on over to Duane and see if he can just write about it in his weather blog and just be like

Peggy Anesi: 35:56

Right? Yeah. The perfect the perfect mix.

Abigail Garofalo: 36:00

Amazing. Wonderful. Well, Peggy, what's your everyday observation?

Peggy Anesi: 36:05

So I got to spend a little bit of time. I'm getting ready to do a big presentation, and it's on beavers. And I decided because I like beavers be have become very popular with what they're, you know, they're doing what they do. And please remember, beavers don't know we care. Right? And I got to go see a spot in one of our local forest preserves with the ecologist. We looked at it on a map. I could not believe it. The beaver are taking it's like it's a drainage creek, right, from from tiles from agriculture. But they're taking advantage of when it gets high, and they've made this pass over. They're berming. They're swimming tunnels and kicking mud and making monstrous berms as big as what humans could make to so when the creek goes up, it floods and makes a pool. And in that pool are sand are sand willows, which they love, but they saw them all you know, they chewed them all off. And whether they know it or not, when they do that, all the sucker shoots come up. So they've got a field of food with these soft tender tidbits, and they like, one of them is, like, square. Like, they made a, like, a rice field.

Peggy Anesi: 37:05

So we got to go out there when it was frozen last week and walk on the ice and get to all these spaces. So we had this huge cool discussion as they're doing it to every living thing, plant or animal. It has to all they wanna do is eat enough to reproduce, right, and keep their population going. So we were talking about, like, not being able to let it go because it's heading toward this remnant habitat. The best way to see what was here or is here is to have that remnant. So how do you allow them to do what they do without losing a remnant? And and then they created this flooded space that shouldn't have been, and then we had this beautiful excess of tadpoles, they told me. So now if you're having a population decrease in an amphibian oh my gosh. My world was, like, so convoluted. I couldn't even write it down. I was so overwhelmed with thought. You know? So, yeah, it was just so impressive. It was just so impressive to see. We know they do stuff. I didn't know they did large scale activity to provide for themselves by berming, and they made pass throughs. Like, you could just walk right over where they would have swam over, walk on the ice where they and it's channeled, like, straight and pushed. It's incredible.

Abigail Garofalo: 38:11

Yeah. I mean, it sounds like farming. Like, it's like, that's wild.

Peggy Anesi: 38:15

They're farming food for themselves. Mhmm. Rodent agriculture. Right?

Abigail Garofalo: 38:20

Weirdly playing that in my brain, Peggy. I'm blown away.

Peggy Anesi: 38:23

That stall in your voice is the awe. And they don't even know who we are, what we are, or that we care. They're just doing what they know how to do, and it's for as small as their brain must be, it's impressive. And they used to be diurnal, but the pressures were too high of getting, you know, consumed and used for pelts and such. They're nocturnal. They've just they they have the fact that they can do that, but they aren't thinking. We cannot anthropomorphize this. They are not going well today. I'm not going to go out in in the daylight because I could get harmed. You know, they're not it's just unnatural.

Abigail Garofalo: 38:56

Yeah. Selective pressures to have behaviors in a certain way and also to the successes of of the ones that could breathe.

Peggy Anesi: 39:04

And to solve situations you need to be better by making a berm and making a flooded field to get the right food. Alright. I'm done. I know.

Abigail Garofalo: 39:12

Yeah. If you all need to pause the episode, that's

Peggy Anesi: 39:15

Take a deep breath.

Abigail Garofalo: 39:16

To to take a breath because that's how I might need it. Mine is much less exciting. It's not nearly as cool. I feel like I'm like, can we end it now? No. But I'll share. I am just like I I am thinking truly about, like, everyday observation and just, like, what is, like what do I see every day? And I just love my backyard, and I go out there just, like, missing summer and spring, thinking, like, are they gonna come up? And, like, when's gonna when are things gonna come up? But there's still life out there. And so it was really exciting to see with the, I have quite a bit of raccoon activity in my backyard. And so my everyday observation is about poop and scat, because that's how I know, like, what's in my backyard. And so I I noticed the, like, the digging up of my backyard grass.

Abigail Garofalo: 40:00

Like, it's just a lot of digging, a lot of there's something out there, and I know we've had possums and things like that. So there's something out there, but I noticed scat or wildlife poop the other day. And I was like, huh, like, what is that? And I looked into it, and and I was like, that's raccoon poop in my backyard. Now granted, they're in my backyard, not in my house, so I'll take that for now. So I was it was just kind of interesting to see. So I'm interested to see how my grass rebounds in the spring. But then another, I had noticed another gap observation of just, like, little pellets, and then the snow allowed me too to get, like, a little more information. And so I was like, those are rabbits. And I know I had bunnies in my backyard and rabbits.

Abigail Garofalo: 40:39

Like, that's not surprising because I see them, and they eat my purple prairie clover in the spring, and that's upsetting. But it was just kinda cool to see the evidence of that wildlife around and and to even just be able to, like, document the activities of them and and to see the squirrels too. Like, I love watching them hop up and down our tree and use our fences, like, nice little highways to each other and then kind of mess with each other. And it's breeding season right now at least for for our squirrels, and so some interesting wildlife observations are going on as well. So, yeah, just kind of looking out the wildlife and so and just seeing, you know, what do I notice? What are they doing? Why are they doing it? Asking those questions, and it's just kinda cool. So not nearly as cool as beavers, but generally

Peggy Anesi: 41:23

No. But you know what? But if everybody did that, think of how in tune they'd be with their natural resources. We don't we we don't make time just to note. Right? So that's really the most that's a critical piece to future care of the planet.

Abigail Garofalo: 41:38

Alright. Well, this has been another episode of the Everyday Environment podcast. This is our last episode of season two where we were all focused about water. If this is the first episode you've enjoyed of this series, definitely go back and check out the rest of the season. If you've been with us all season, thanks so much for joining us on this wild wandering journey through the water of Illinois. We'll be back in the fall for season three, and definitely subscribe to our newsletter to get updates of exciting Extension content in the off season.

Abigail Garofalo: 42:09

This podcast is a University of Illinois Extension production, hosted and edited by Abigail Garofalo, Erin Garrett, and Amy Lefringhouse.

Matt Wiley: 42:20

University of Illinois Extension.