Nature's Archive Podcast

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[00:00:00] Michael Hawk: I’ve been looking forward to today’s episode for a really long time.

[00:00:03] And for two great reasons. First, it’s about wildlife forensics, which is an immense field that requires knowledge of everything from wildlife behavior and morphology to DNA, to crime scene investigation and policy and the law. I’ve always been a bit of a generalist who likes to occasionally deeply dive into topics, so this is a field true to my heart and the second reason I’ve been looking forward to it is because of our guest.

[00:00:29] It’s Forensics Wildlife Biologist Ashley Bray. As you’ll hear, Ashley, in addition to being a biologist, is also a podcaster. And her podcast is a unique slant on human wildlife conflict, with, as you might expect from a forensic biologist, kind of a true crime twist. Oh, and it’s called Get Out Alive, so be sure to check that out.

[00:00:52] Today, we take a broad look at what forensic wildlife biology entails and the surprising connection it reveals, such as the connection between wildlife crimes and drug and human trafficking, and organized crime in general, for that matter. Ashley has a couple of nice case examples that we walk through, and hold tight, you’re going to learn about a super cute animal called a vaquita.

[00:01:15] So get ready for a wide ranging discussion with Ashley Bray.

[00:01:19] Ashley, thank you so much for joining me today.

[00:01:21] Ashley Bray: Yeah, thanks for having me.

[00:01:23] Michael Hawk: I wanted to reach out to you because, well, for two reasons. One, you’re also a nature podcaster.

[00:01:29] I find that in speaking to other podcasters, there’s always a really interesting perspective that you bring because you have an opportunity to delve into lots of different topics and stories. And then at the same time, you are studying wildlife forensics, which seems incredibly interesting. So I’m hoping we can get into that, basically most of today’s discussion.

[00:01:49] Ashley Bray: Yeah, for sure.

[00:01:51] Michael Hawk: what I want to do, is talk a little bit about your podcast first, because that’s how I first became aware of you.

[00:01:57] what is your podcast? What’s it called? What’s it about? What do you do?

[00:02:00] Ashley Bray: Yeah, so my podcast is called Get Out Alive in the Animal Attack Podcast. It is about animal attacks, and I started it Gosh, what was it? 2021, I think. It was originally with my very good friend, Nick. He’s no longer like a permanent co host kind of thing, just, and he has no background in nature. So he served as like my member of the public who didn’t really know anything and he could ask questions that I thought other people might ask.

[00:02:25] So I was serving as like the, Wildlife biologist of the show, the quote unquote expert, but we do have experts come on like in different species, like black bear experts, tiger experts, and whatnot. Sometimes we have animal attack survivors come on and basically we just go over animal attacks over like a bunch of different species.

[00:02:43] What happened? Why did it happen? What were the things that like caused it? is there human wildlife conflict issues that are really behind why a tiger attacked somebody, that kind of thing. So. I used to listen to a lot of true crime podcasts, so I was kind of basing it off that a little bit, like that kind of vibe.

[00:03:00] But then I wanted to be like, okay, in true crime podcasts, you leave those podcasts being like, wow, isn’t it horrifying? I could be murdered at any point, right? And there’s like nothing you can really do. But in my podcast, I was like, all right, people are afraid of animals. I know this from my own background as a biologist.

[00:03:17] So why not give people like concrete advice on, Hey, if there’s a black bear stalking you, what’s the appropriate thing to do to keep yourself safe? And how even common is that? So that’s, that is the podcast.

[00:03:32] Michael Hawk: Right. You’re not sensationalizing these stories, at least from the episodes I’ve listened to, I

[00:03:37] so and, you know, I’m glad you bring that up because I have to admit, I was a little bit skeptical at first when, you know, based on the title and Animal Attack podcast, like I was assuming it was gonna be one of these, playing up the fear aspect.

[00:03:50] so, I’ve enjoyed listening to your episodes, because it, it helps, I think it helps people. understand the reality,

[00:03:59] but then why these situations occurred and the context they occurred in and what they can do. And generally I walk away, as you said, feeling like, okay, not, not a big deal.

[00:04:09] I don’t need to worry about these bears so much.

[00:04:12] Ashley Bray: Yeah. And that’s what I really hope for. I mean, I do want to be like, so clear when we’re talking about attacks. , yeah, this is horrifying. Like literally the worst case scenario, you could be attacked by a grizzly bear. And , what is that? And we’ve talked to grizzly attack survivors and like, it is one of the worst things you can experience, of course, but I don’t want people to come away.

[00:04:32] I’m terrified of all grizzlies. It’s like, yeah, being attacked would be awful, but the odds are pretty low comparatively. So, and I try really hard not to sensationalize. I know marketing it as like an animal attack podcast. I wanted to draw in people that normally wouldn’t listen to a podcast like this, where they’re like, Oh, I’m already into nature.

[00:04:50] You know what I mean? So trying to draw on people that might be into true crime and are like, Oh, animal attacks, sure. That’s cool. And then you hopefully learn something. Along the way.

[00:04:58] Michael Hawk: Exactly. you draw them in and then you reveal a new truth that perhaps they wouldn’t have heard otherwise. Have you done any episodes on mosquitoes?

[00:05:08] Ashley Bray: No, but I haven’t done any insects and I really need to, but I’ve been waiting to find someone who’s like a quote unquote expert on like wasps or mosquitoes or something. Because the other thing is, I mean, Like talking about a grizzly attack, we could talk for like an hour about that, you know, but like if you’re bitten by a mosquito, that’s kind of it.

[00:05:26] And then you might get malaria and die. So it’s hard to talk about. So I need to find an expert to be like, Hey, here’s what happens. Here’s the odds of you dying of malaria, stuff like that. So, no.

[00:05:36] Michael Hawk: Yeah. and the reason I brought that up is like, I often hear this stat

[00:05:40] thrown about how the mosquito is the most dangerous animal in the world. And then very often after that, it’s like, in the U S anyway, maybe it’s not the mosquito, maybe it is.

[00:05:49] Ashley Bray:

[00:05:49] Michael Hawk: think it is the mosquito or bees. And then after that, it’s like white tail deer

[00:05:55] Ashley Bray: Yeah.

[00:05:56] Michael Hawk: because of car collisions.

[00:05:57] Ashley Bray: Yeah.

[00:05:58] Michael Hawk: how did you get interested in wildlife in the first place? You mentioned you’re the expert on your show. you’re a biologist. What drew you into biology?

[00:06:07] Ashley Bray: So I can’t tell you, , if there was any inciting incident. I just remember for as long as I have had memory that I’ve been really into animals and I always wanted to do something with wildlife. I was that kid growing up for Christmas. I was like, can I have an animal encyclopedia? And then I would read it religiously and try to like discover new animals and be like, Hey mom, did you know that a jerboa is like a desert rat?

[00:06:29] And that kind of, I was that kind of person. Yeah. so when I was growing up and people would ask , you know, what do you want to be when you get older?

[00:06:34] They would always assume like a vet because I liked animals. So that was the only real option. But I would always tell people, I want to be like Steve Irwin, which maybe some people think is a problematic answer nowadays, since he would just run around and grab wildlife. But I wanted to be a conservationist and he was the only person I really knew that did that kind of thing.

[00:06:51] So that’s, the path I am trying to carve for myself still currently.

[00:06:55] Michael Hawk: And did you, you know, say once it was time to head to university, was biology just like the default choice or did you have to deliberate a little bit about that?

[00:07:05] Ashley Bray: Yeah, so I originally went to my undergrad as a microbiology student because I knew being a wildlife biologist I would make no money. And that is still true, generally for that field. But when I was doing microbiology, My first year at undergrad, there was so much chemistry and that is not how my brain works at all.

[00:07:24] Michael Hawk: Like I am not into chemistry, physics. It just doesn’t click. So I was like, I can’t do four more years of this. And also being stuck in a lab all day, I couldn’t do it. So I switched to wildlife biology and it just stopped. Everything made so much more sense. I still have done like lab work after that. I’ve worked with rabies, I’ve worked with, HIV, polio, but I would prefer to be outside in the field most of the time, Gotcha. And now that’s led you to wildlife forensics. What, I mean, I can kind of, I can definitely see a connection with maybe some of that introduction to microbiology and lab work and things like that. But forensics is so much more than lab work. So, how did you then land in the field of forensics?

[00:08:04] Ashley Bray: Yeah, so, when I was younger and I wanted to be a conservationist, my big thing was like, all right, I want to stop poachers and I want to stop illegal wildlife trafficking. there was no set path to do that. There was no field for that beyond conservation. And I didn’t even know wildlife forensics was a thing until I started doing my podcast.

[00:08:21] Ironically, I interviewed Jim Crosby, who is the world’s leading fatal dog attack expert. he is getting a PhD through the University of Florida in veterinary forensics. So that is investigating abuse and neglect cases in dogs, cats, other domesticated animals. And as we were chatting and he was hearing about my interests, he was like, I think you’re .

[00:08:41] You would be perfect for the University of Florida’s wildlife forensics program. And the more I looked into it, it was perfectly just encompassed all the things I want to do. So it encompassed conservation because the degree is technically wildlife forensics and conservation because they’re super tied together.

[00:08:56] And it is all about combating poaching, illegal trade. Everything that encompasses that. So it was like the perfect thing. And it’s a very new field. There is not a lot of research in it yet, because a lot of what we have to draw on is cases either from humans or from domesticated animals. So it’s like a really up and coming field if people are interested in it.

[00:09:16] Michael Hawk: And you already answered one of my next questions. Like, is there actually, are there degree programs in wildlife forensics? So university of Florida has one. are there others out there or is that still pretty unique to Florida?

[00:09:27] Ashley Bray: This is literally the only one I’ve ever heard of. I think it is the only one in the US and it is an entirely remote program. There’s different levels. So I’m in a master’s degree. I believe there’s a PhD program and then you can do like degree certificates, which is like shorter than a master’s degree, but you could take like a few classes kind of thing.

[00:09:45] I know there are somewhat similar programs in, South Africa. So outside of the U. S. there might be more, but in the U. S. it is still a very new thing. And the University of Florida seems to be at the forefront of it.

[00:09:59] Michael Hawk: for those, universities that don’t have a full degree program, do you find or see that there are actually maybe individual classes people can take to get a taste of what’s involved here?

[00:10:10] Ashley Bray: Yeah, so University of Florida, I mean, they have the best classes for wildlife forensics because the whole program is based around it. if you want to just take a few classes and get a certificate, there are things like wildlife crime scene processing, which teaches you how to process a crime scene, but specific to wildlife.

[00:10:27] And then there are things like wildlife forensics and conservation. So there’s a bunch of different classes, even if you just took a one off. It would still give you like a great perspective of the field, but there’s just, there’s so many aspects to forensics to dive into. So like, you know, wildlife crime scene processing might be great if you are a conservation officer, but it’s not going to give you the entire background that you might want if you’re trying to like really get into the field.

[00:10:50] Michael Hawk: So then what types of job opportunities are there for people with this background? You mentioned, conservation officer, game warden, like those are pretty straightforward, but what else is out there?

[00:11:01] Ashley Bray: a great question. And because it is such a new field, it’s not really, you know, To be honest, clear. And I’ve found that the more I talk to professionals in this field, the more that they’re like, Oh man, we could really use someone like that with that skillset, but there’s just no set jobs for it. So I think if you are trying to get into this field of wildlife forensics, you have to be like a little bit of a pioneer make a niche for yourself.

[00:11:25] Or put yourself in a position like a state biologist or something and be like, all right, let’s find out how we can use these skills to combat poaching or whatever. But right now it seems like a lot of consultant work. So, going places and teaching people these forensics techniques, like teaching a team of conservation officers, for example, how to process a wildlife crime scene, because that’s not a thing that is very common knowledge.

[00:11:49] But there is one singular federal wildlife forensics lab and it is based out of Oregon.

[00:11:56] Michael Hawk: And they do, you know, like they take in animals or like parts of animals from crime scenes and like do all the forensic stuff there. But as far as I know, they’re the only one really in the U. S. right now. Interesting. Yeah, I definitely could see, you know, as a staff biologist or something like that, where this would come in handy, because even if you’re just researching, a population of, I don’t know, name your animal, bobcats or, whatever, interesting things are going to be found and you might need to understand what happened here.

[00:12:28] Was it poaching? Was it a natural occurrence of, some other, a mountain lion predation or,

[00:12:34] you know, who knows. I heard a very brief interview with a wildlife forensics expert from Australia, I believe it was. And they had a lab there and were affiliated with, the equivalent of, customs and border patrol that they have in

[00:12:52] Ashley Bray: cool. Yeah.

[00:12:53] Michael Hawk: And the interesting thing that she mentioned is when people are, participating in illegal wildlife trade, for example, trying to smuggle something in, that very often it’s tied to some broader crime organization. And it sounded like she would get involved in some really interesting cases that were tied to organized crime or tied to terrorist groups or things like that.

[00:13:17] And they were doing things like shark fin import or ivory import or just, more straightforward animal trade. And that was really eyeopening to me that, I guess where there’s a way to make money, organized crime tends to follow that.

[00:13:32] Ashley Bray: Yeah, that’s so funny that you say that because one of the points I had written down that I really wanted to mention about forensics was, or wildlife forensics specifically. So wildlife crime is, like you said, if someone is involved in it, it is extremely likely they’re also involved in drug trafficking or even human trafficking.

[00:13:49] But of those crimes, wildlife crimes tend to be seen as less serious or less important. So it might be an easy, like, way to get into finding out the players in these games, but the likelihood of people being prosecuted for wildlife crimes specifically is lower compared to, like, drug trafficking or human trafficking.

[00:14:10]

[00:14:10] Michael Hawk: that makes sense. I could also see it, you know, almost like Al Capone, you know, they brought down Al Capone because of tax evasion. Like

[00:14:17] maybe some of these wildlife crimes are easier to prosecute for one reason or another.

[00:14:23] Ashley Bray: I feel like it could really go either way, depending on who it is and what it is.

[00:14:27] Michael Hawk: you know, we’re talking about like illegal wildlife trade and things like that, but what are some other applications for wildlife forensics?

[00:14:34] Ashley Bray: So in the notes that you gave me before we recorded, you hit the nail on the head because you had assumed like legal cases, animal attacks, environmental crimes, and conservation issues. And those are all like primary uses of wildlife forensics. But I think the biggest and most important use of wildlife forensics is the fight against illegal trade and poaching like we’re talking about.

[00:14:57] And right now the big push is to teach these forensic techniques to people like conservation officers or anti poaching rangers. Because they’re the ones at the forefront who are stopping it, and they’d be the ones finding these crime scenes or collecting evidence. So it’s really important that these people, know what quote unquote good evidence is, how to collect it, how to not contaminate crime scenes, and the broader implications of stopping, poaching, But then we’ve also seen it used recently in the U. S. because the U. S. Now I’m seeing a lot when an animal attack happens, like a person is killed by an animal, things like DNA are taken from the person to identify the animal that attacked them. you can take DNA from the attack, figure out the animal species, but then you can also get Even down to the like individual level and get DNA testing done to the point that you can find out, okay, this is the specific mountain lion that killed this person.

[00:15:52] So now what are we going to do with it? So there’s a lot of different ways that it could go, but right now, at least in the U. S., I’m seeing that as like the primary use.

[00:16:00] Michael Hawk: I find this all really interesting because My background is not in biology. I am still relatively new to the field of, nature conservation and I don’t have a formal education in it. But my education and career up until recently was based in, technology, data networking, cloud computing, these

[00:16:20] sorts of things. And one of the things I learned along the way was, computer forensics, data forensics, and I’m seeing lots of parallels in what you’re talking about

[00:16:29] because we have to train people. If something has happened, if something seems amiss, you have to train them what to do so they don’t contaminate the scene of the crime.

[00:16:38] In this case, like in computers, it’s kind of a virtual scene. And, and then maintain a chain of custody, you know, so that, that we know that things are still, are clean, you know, when they get to the proper authorities

[00:16:51] Okay.

[00:16:55] Ashley Bray: a class in cybercrime and wildlife forensics. So I feel like we could have a whole other conversation about that specifically,

[00:17:01] Yeah.

[00:17:02] Michael Hawk: So as we kind of continue our broad overview of, of what is wildlife forensics, can you tell me a little bit about some of the methods, some of like, what’s in your toolkit to assess a scene? and obviously this is extremely broad, so take it in whatever direction you feel most comfortable in.

[00:17:21] Ashley Bray: Yeah. So forensics, really starts with crime scene investigations, right? Before you even get into collecting the evidence, though, you need to know what good evidence is, which involves knowing, how evidence is going to be used in court and what it means to serve as an expert in court if you are a forensic biologist, how to properly collect it without contaminating a scene, how to document a crime scene with specific crime scene photography methods, and so on.

[00:17:45] So like that in and of itself is already a lot. And then you’ve got testing evidence or performing necropsies if you have a corpse. And a necropsy is, to animals, what an autopsy is to people. Starting with necropsies, from my very limited experience, I can tell you knowing how to do necropsies on wild animals is so hard.

[00:18:05] I have so much respect for veterinarians and like anyone that can do it because, and humans of course, we all have the same parts and there’s hundreds of years of research we can go through about like what is and is not normal in a human. But there are so many different species of wild animals ranging from manatees to California condors, like we’re going to talk about a little bit later, to sea turtles and bears.

[00:18:27] So like you need to know whatever animal you’re looking at and their basic anatomy, but then you also need to know, okay, what is a normal sea turtle throat? And I say that because if you’ve never seen the throat of a sea turtle, it is deeply unsettling. The first time I saw Necropsy performed on one, I was like, If I was the first person to open up a sea turtle, I would be horrified.

[00:18:47] Michael Hawk: can’t just leave it there. like what, what’s going on there?

[00:18:50] Ashley Bray: Okay, it looks as if their throats have like teeth in it. And I don’t know how to describe it better than that. I highly encourage everyone to look it up if you have. The, courage, I guess. It’s pretty spooky, but it’s basically to just like keep food down and then also regulate the fact that they are consuming water.

[00:19:09] So like you need to keep stuff going down your throat, but it’s, it’s horrifying. It looks like teeth in their throat, which I can imagine would be upsetting if you cut them open for the first time and had no idea. Yep.

[00:19:19] Michael Hawk: inducing, I think.

[00:19:20] Okay, as you might imagine, I had to look this thing up and I found a lot of pictures out there. It really looks like something straight out of sci fi. Maybe it’s that creature that lives in the sand in, Star Wars Return of the Jedi or Sandworm or something from the movie Alien, but check it out if you’re brave enough.

[00:19:39] I have a picture in the show notes.

[00:19:41] Ashley Bray: from the necropsy, you’re also collecting evidence. So like, whether that be weapons, for example, lodged in an animal, like a bullet or an arrowhead, to actually taking samples of different organs, sending those off to pathologists who will look for disease or contaminants.

[00:19:55]

[00:19:55] Michael Hawk: Well, there could be poisoning,

[00:19:57] Ashley Bray: Yeah, no, there’s so much that can go into it. So like, you know, to start, you could be someone that investigates crime scenes, like kind of a detective, or you could go the necropsy kind of route .

[00:20:07] If you have, for example, just parts of an animal or, you know, you’re dealing with a human that has been attacked and you need to use DNA and genetics, that’s a whole other thing too, because we’re talking wildlife. So you’ve got to be species specific or even subspecies specific if you’re talking about conservation, because sometimes a subspecies is threatened or endangered, but the entire species is not.

[00:20:29] So getting that granular and then to get to a species ID, you can use a lot of different techniques depending on the situation. like using antigen antibody reactions, mitochondrial DNA, the cytochrome B gene for mammals and so on. And those are all their own really complicated, specific thing.

[00:20:47] Michael Hawk: I’m guessing that maybe some of that information isn’t even well known. There’s just so many animals out there.

[00:20:52] Ashley Bray: Well, and that’s the problem, right? Like if this is such a new field, there’s not the research to really back these things up and yeah. So , we might be investigating dead manatees, but what isn’t, isn’t normal for a manatee. How long have we been cutting open manatees and keeping track of different things that could be wrong?

[00:21:09] that’s where it gets hard. And then, you know, of course, outside of wildlife, you have classic human forensic techniques. Like. Ballistics, blood splatter analysis, and bite mark analysis. And those all can be applied to wildlife as well. So it’s a huge broad thing that we’re talking about.

[00:21:25] Michael Hawk: So no shortage of interesting rabbit holes to go down if you’re in this field.

[00:21:31] Yeah, I was also thinking about how, in recent years, plant poaching has really become a big, problem, especially for some of the succulent plants, the rare succulent plants.

[00:21:41] So I could see even overlap, even though we’re talking wildlife here, with, some botanical forensic work, there’s probably some overlap there too.

[00:21:48] Ashley Bray: Yeah, so I mean, and that’s the thing that we’ve touched on very lightly in my degree. So we’ve talked about the fact that orchids are the most illegally trafficked plant in the world, but it’s a plant. So it’s not like a sentient thing that people necessarily are going to be like, Oh my God, this plant is suffering.

[00:22:03] You know what I mean? But like you’re saying, I mean, it’s easy to just look at a plant and be like, Oh, Hey, you’re not supposed to have this. But If you’re detached from where that plant is being taken from and like the devastating effects of not having that plant where it’s supposed to be. Yeah.

[00:22:16] So I’m assuming I’m not a plant person by any means, but the whole field of like plant forensics has got to be like leagues behind wildlife forensics.

[00:22:26] Michael Hawk: All right. So I know that we’re going to talk about a couple of case studies that you’ve prepared to kind of make this more real for our listeners, but before we jump into that, I’m wondering, is there anything else about wildlife forensics in general that you wanted to say?

[00:22:38] Ashley Bray: So I guess as a formal definition of what we’re talking about, because it is so broad and could be confusing According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, which has the best definition I’ve seen so far. It is that wildlife forensics is a field that applies scientific analysis to support wildlife law enforcement using forensics techniques, which is a mouthful.

[00:22:59] if you know anything about human forensics, it is basically that, and we’re just applying that to wildlife. But the important part is that wildlife forensics is often involved with. Conserving species that are protected or preventing poaching and things like that.

[00:23:14] Michael Hawk: So we’re going to, the first case we’re going to dive into is like a really blaringly obvious case of why forensics is pretty important and how scary, frankly, it can be to combat it. If you’re also dealing with people who are involved in Drug trafficking and human trafficking. And I think that case from what you were telling me before I hit the record button here is about the

[00:23:33] vaquitas. So, so why don’t we jump in? You know, what’s a vaquita?

[00:23:36] Ashley Bray: Yeah, so I’m really excited about the fact that you don’t know anything about them because that is like a perfect reason for me to bring them up. So if you haven’t looked them up, please look up the vaquita. It’s spelled V A Q U I T A. They’re so cute. So they are a species of porpoise, so they are the most endangered porpoise in the world, so like a type of dolphin.

[00:23:58] And They are so unfamiliar or like endangered to the point that some people in Mexico believe that they were like a mythical animal made up by the government to criminalize fishing and whatnot. a survey conducted this year by the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society observed only six to eight vaquitas, none of which were new calves, which is down from spotting the eight to 13 last year.

[00:24:22] And this survey didn’t encompass their whole range, but there’s only thought to be around or less than 20 individuals left in the wild. So like devastating. We could get into like genetic bottlenecking and stuff like that, but it is, it’s not great to have that few of individuals and we don’t know like how related they are and whatnot.

[00:24:39] So there have also been attempts to capture them before and like try to keep them in captivity. One vaquita was caught and tried to, they tried to keep her in like an open sea pen so that they could further protect her, but then also like do some breeding.

[00:24:55] And she ended up dying. So they aborted the entire program because they were like, it’s not worth another vaquita dying. There’s already so few.

[00:25:02] Michael Hawk: Yeah. You’re talking, if one dies, that’s like 5 percent of the global

[00:25:05] population.

[00:25:06] Ashley Bray: Which is horrifying.

[00:25:08] Michael Hawk: Yeah.

[00:25:08] Ashley Bray: yeah. And these vaquitas only live in the Northern Gulf of California, also known as the Sea of Cortez. The thing that has driven down their numbers isn’t even direct poaching of the vaquita, it’s the illegal poaching of a fish called the totoaba.

[00:25:23] Have you heard of the totoaba before?

[00:25:25] Michael Hawk: No.

[00:25:26] Ashley Bray: Okay, so the totoaba is a fish and they are poached for their swim bladder, which is sold on the black market for Chinese traditional medicine, and that is why this all ties into forensics.

[00:25:39] Michael Hawk: So

[00:25:39] the totoaba is found beyond the Sea of Cortez.

[00:25:42] Ashley Bray: yeah, so the totoaba is found like Exactly where the vaquitas are as well and like slightly beyond, but the fact that it’s, so the totoabas are like kind of like a little bit closer into shore. It’s not like they’re like a deep sea fish and same goes for the vaquita. They’re not like a deep sea animal, so they’re found in the same areas.

[00:26:01] So what ends up happening is people who are poaching the totoaba use gill nets, which are nets that are just set and left in the ocean, and the vaquitas become bycatch in those nets and end up drowning. gillnets have been outlawed by the Mexican government in an attempt to save the vaquita, but because the swim bladder of the totoaba can fetch so much money and because fishermen went out of business because they could no longer use gillnets, even if they were not trying to take the totoaba, if they were just doing, you know, normal fishing.

[00:26:31] So now they’re not allowed to do that. And then the Mexican government tried to subsidize money and like, you know, tried to, you know, Compensate for making gillnets illegal, but it was not nearly as much money as they would have made fishing. So a lot of people started struggling and then actually turned to poaching the totoaba because they can get so much more money. So where this gets even more complicated and we’ve touched on it. But the people that are involved in Totoaba poaching are also involved with the Mexican cartel. And the cartel is the one making contact with Chinese nationals to purchase the swim bladders and then export them to China. So as you’re trying to combat this illegal poaching of this fish and thus the death of vaquitas, you’re also going up against the Mexican cartel.

[00:27:17] pretty big deal. To put it lightly, and if anyone wants, any more context about this or they want to actually see it, there’s a fantastic documentary called The Sea of Shadows, and I highly recommend everyone watch it because It’s about a journalist who is on the forefront of videotaping what it’s like to save Vaquitas, what it’s like to talk to people who are involved in the cartel, like informants.

[00:27:42] it’s a crazy documentary. it’s very upsetting, frankly, but it gives you an insight into how serious this can be. So. Organizations like the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society that I mentioned before are really doing some great and hard work in the Sea of Cortez, specifically by having boats and drones out in the ocean nearly constantly, trying to find and dismantle gillnets.

[00:28:07] And then also find and chase down people who are actively poaching the totowabas. And they’re also trying to keep an eye on vaquitas and, you know, like keeping track of how many there are and whatnot. So the Sea Shepherd, this ship, is doing exactly that, in the Sea of Cortez, where they are chasing down poachers and running them out of the area.

[00:28:25] A lot of times these poachers are armed, so it’s like a very contentious situation.

[00:28:30] Michael Hawk: got to be extremely brave because if the Mexican cartels are backing these people, You would be fearing for your life, I think

[00:28:38] Ashley Bray: Constantly.

[00:28:39] exactly right, and that’s, that was my biggest takeaway coming from watching that film. I was like, these are the bravest people I’ve ever seen, because you’re trying to conserve. This creature where there’s like less than 20 of them and you are against impossible odds, seemingly, because you’re not only up against the Mexican cartel and frankly, the Mexican government, you’re also up against China and all the people they’re involved in traditional Chinese medicine.

[00:29:04] And that is like a whole huge thing. So it’s a very scary. thing to be involved with. And I’m sure a lot of the times it seems pretty hopeless, but if it wasn’t for these people, we would not have vaquitas anymore. So the Sea Shepherd also, because they are chasing these poachers, they’re collecting evidence.

[00:29:23] So when they’re stopping poaching boats or, you know, they’re calling in the Mexican, like Navy or Coast Guard, they’re collecting evidence. So whether that be Totoabas themselves, either live or dead, Totoaba parts, so swim bladders. gillnets, because if you have a gillnet on board, first of all, it’s illegal, but that’s like presuming that you’re going to send it out to try to poach a totoaba.

[00:29:44] that is where forensics also ties in because, you know, gaining evidence to make criminal cases against people. Right. But you also need people to be doing detective work to try to figure out who the main players in this are so that the supply chain can be cut off. Which is, of course, like we’ve been talking about, very dangerous.

[00:30:03] And in that documentary, Sea of Shadows, they speak to two informants from the cartel and they said that the cartel has so much firepower in the town of San Felipe alone, which is where a lot of this conflict is happening, that they could literally wipe out the entire town. And it is a very popular tourist destination too.

[00:30:22] And I don’t think a lot of people realize, like, when you go there, there’s this huge conflict happening behind the scenes, but the cartel has said that if anyone tries to come forward and, you know, prevent them from poaching totoapas, that they will go up against you with all of this firepower. So it’s a very scary prospect and it’s all for a fish, a specific part of one fish.

[00:30:47] Michael Hawk: I was just listening to a podcast episode about some of the very first, game wardens in florida

[00:30:54] And in that scenario, I mean, it was similar but different, where, in the era of the early 1900s, bird adorned hats were very popular, and the plumes of egrets were often placed in hats as a fashion statement.

[00:31:09] and they decided that, okay, well, we’ll start to enforce some of these new laws and prevent people from poaching all the egrets. you find a rookery of, Birds and there could be thousands of these birds in one place. So it’s easy pickings. and people could make a lot of money from it.

[00:31:26] And the Game Wardens, some of them were actually killed by the locals because they were a threat to their livelihoods. and you know, who are these people coming in to enforce these laws, taking away my livelihood. That’s kind of The gist of what was going on, but ultimately what solved it was the supply chain was cut off most of the processing of bird feathers was in new york

[00:31:47] And they passed a law in new york eventually saying you could no longer process these feathers and put them in fashion garments And so it basically broke the supply chain.

[00:31:58] instead of going straight for The people doing the shooting they were able to solve the problem that way now here you’re talking about multinational conflict. It’s a little more difficult to break a supply chain there.

[00:32:12] Ashley Bray: yeah, and that’s such a good point too. And that’s something I really like to touch on a lot when I’m talking about poaching is like, all right, it’s easy enough to say like, I hate these poachers. Let’s stop these poachers. But the people that you’re looking at who are actively the ones like killing this animal.

[00:32:28] are at the bottom of this chain, and they are people who are probably, , in the most need of money and, like, who are the least financially stable. And you’ll see in the Sea of Shadows, a lot of the people that they speak to, the ones that are saying about the gillnets, they’re like, I have no income besides this, and this is the easiest way for me to make money.

[00:32:47] I have no other support from the government. There’s no other jobs. Like, I need this. And of course, they’re going to be the ones who are like first prosecuted because they are holding the evidence unless they sell people out. And then you’re combating selling out members of the cartel. And there’s even one informant in that film, spoiler, I guess, who ends up, they interview him at the beginning and then he ends up being killed by the cartel.

[00:33:09] So it’s, yeah, it’s tough. It’s easy to hate these people, but a lot of the times we don’t really understand their circumstance. it’s easy enough to pass judgment when we’re not the ones who are, like, suffering, and you’re like, Well, it’s just a fish, and you might think that as one person, you’re not gonna make this species go extinct, but when there’s hundreds of you suffering and needing to get money quickly, then, tragedy of the commons, you’re all killing this fish.

[00:33:34] Gathering evidence and making a criminal case against people is one thing, but a large part of forensics too is knowing laws. And when you’re talking about international trade, like between Mexico and China, you also need to understand international treaties and the regulations in other countries.

[00:33:49] The biggest international treaty about wildlife that we have is called CITES, which is the Convention on the Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna, which seeks to control international wildlife trade and prevent things like illegal trade and the decimation of species, like the vaquita in this case, because of trade and trafficking.

[00:34:10] So Mexico and China are both signed on to CITES. But due to the wording incitees, if either of those countries do not deem wildlife crime as like a quote unquote, serious crime, they actually don’t even have to cooperate in foreign investigations if they don’t want to. Which is especially a problem if you have corrupt governments who are involved in this trade.

[00:34:32] the informants for the cartel even said that they are bribing their way up the chain. They’re bribing people in customs so that they can smuggle these things across countries. It is a very complicated problem and we don’t have great regulations when you’re trying to combat it between countries.

[00:34:47] And then even among different countries, there’s varying legislation and it’s all very new. So I think the U. S. has some like pretty decent laws like the Lacey Act and whatnot, but there’s still plenty of work to be done in the U. S. and outside of the U. S. for sure.

[00:35:02] Michael Hawk: Yeah, I think it’s easy to be dismissive of the problems of, say, Mexico or China or other countries not knowing the realities on the ground. but even in the United States, things like political action committees and lobbying and, everything else goes on.

[00:35:18] Probably can fit into the category of bribe as well. It’s, it’s a little less direct. so it can, it can happen here too. and then as you’ve pointed out, overlay that with lack of resources,

[00:35:30] other priorities, different priorities, and it’s pretty easy to see how people can just get away with some of this.

[00:35:35] Ashley Bray: yeah, no, it’s really tough. And like you were saying, it’s the U. S. We have our own problems for sure, but I mean, when you have other countries who are, they have so many other struggles besides this endangered porpoise, I understand if it’s not on the top of their priority list. So it’s, that’s why we need more people who care and are brave.

[00:35:54] Like the people who are on the Sea Shepherd doing this kind of work, because it takes a lot. It takes a village, more than a village, but yeah.

[00:36:02] Michael Hawk: All right. Well, I’m going to. work on my own personal bravery just to watch Sea of Shadows. It sounds like I’m going to have to prepare myself a little bit before watching it, but I will watch it. I promise you that.

[00:36:14] Ashley Bray: perfect.

[00:36:15] Michael Hawk: All right. so I have some homework to do. I need to find some nice pictures of vaquitas because it sounds like it’s really worth seeing and maybe understanding a little bit more about why these animals are important.

[00:36:25] and of course the documentary. so thank you for enlightening me on several different new things just in that one story. and next on your list, you said you had a story about California condors. So can you tee that one up for us?

[00:36:39] Ashley Bray: Yeah, for sure. So California condors may be a little more recognizable, especially for listeners of your podcast. And probably a little more well known than, than the Vaquita, like their story of what has happened to them. But I’ll go over quickly the plight of the condor. I won’t get too in depth, but I wanted to touch on them because there’s like a really recent, extremely recent example of how forensics can be used.

[00:37:01] The california condor is the largest land bird in north america they weigh up to 25 pounds which might not sound like a lot but i’ve worked with a lot of raptors like birds of prey and a bald eagle on average is like 10 pounds And they’re huge.

[00:37:15] So 25 pounds is an incredibly large bird. And they have a wingspan of up to nine and a half feet, which is also insane. And they used to range from Western Canada all the way down to Northern Mexico. And their range in the U S was between California and Florida. And they’re a species of vulture. So if you have never seen one, imagine a giant bird that is mostly black and they have some white on the underneath of their wings and tail, and they have a bald pink head that is somewhat reminiscent of a turkey.

[00:37:44] Cause everyone knows what a turkey looks like. So kind of like that, but by the 1960s, they were listed as endangered by the federal government. And they were actually the first ever officially listed endangered species due to a very dramatic decline in their numbers. And their decline was due to a lot of things.

[00:38:01] It included habitat degradation, poisoning, shooting, and like you said, collection of feathers and eggs. a relatively recent study published in 2022 found that in California condors that live near the coast, particularly in Southern California, they had high levels of DDT in their system. That was seven times more than condors that were inland.

[00:38:23] And if you haven’t heard of DDT before, it was a pesticide. I’m sure you’ll touch on it at a later point. So that’s a whole other thing, but

[00:38:31] Michael Hawk: Well, yeah, we can quickly, like, just to put a couple other things out there.

[00:38:35] Um,DDT, I think it was really brought to light through Rachel, Carson’s Silent Spring, and one of the impacts it had on birds is it made eggs softer. So there is a lot of nest failure that happened with osprey and eagles and condors and other birds as well.

[00:38:50] so as a result, the eggs would fail they would crack under the weight of the birds or it just didn’t have proper protection.

[00:38:57] that’s kind of the 10, 000 foot summary

[00:38:59] Ashley Bray: Yeah, and why we were seeing it more in things like eagles and falcons and condors is because they’re at the top of the food chain, so they’re eating, A deer that was eating plants that had had a bunch of DDT. The deer wasn’t having enough of DDT to like kill it, but these animals that are eating a ton of animals that all are infected, so to speak, with DDT, it accumulates in their system more.

[00:39:22] So it was affecting them more. And like you said, it wasn’t directly killing them, but killing their offspring by crushing their eggs. So that’s what was happening to condors as well. And as the 1980s, there were only 22 condors, California condors left in the world. So they were all captured and brought into captivity for a captive breeding program.

[00:39:40] it was incredibly successful. And is the reason that we still have condors today. And they began releasing in the 1990s. So part of this California condor recovery program is monitoring existing condors because they’re all fitted with ID tags on their wings. And also some have radio transmitters on them.

[00:39:56] So biologists can like. Go out and track them. And if one stops moving for a while, they can go to it and be like, all right, is it dead? Is it sick? What’s going on? So right there is already an example of forensics, because if you’re finding a dead bird and you have to conduct a necropsy, you need to potentially collect evidence if it’s thought to be a crime, because as you can imagine, killing an endangered species that the government has put a lot of money and time into saving comes with some hefty fines and also potentially jail time.

[00:40:24] . Back to my reason for bringing all this up. In March of this year, 2024, biologists in Zion National Park noticed one of their more iconic condors had stopped moving. This bird was known as 1K because he was the 1000th California condor tagged as part of this recovery program. And he had hatched in May of 2019 and was the first California condor to successfully fledge in Zion, meaning that he was born in the wild and successfully got out there.

[00:40:52] And he was the first to do so in the park. And he was really like an icon of hope for the species in the park. And like, you can find his picture on informative signs there on merchandise for the park. He was really beloved by everybody. when biologists this year reached his GPS location, they found him dead in a remote Canyon in the park, which of course was devastating for everyone.

[00:41:15] Necropsy results as of this month revealed that 1K died from lead poisoning just before his fifth birthday, which means he was just a year or two away from finding his lifelong mate in breeding.

[00:41:28] So he wasn’t even at maturity yet. So it takes them quite a while to mature and so, as you can imagine, devastating to get almost to five years and then just not make it because of something that us humans caused. Where does forensics come in more to this? So, you know, finding him dead, doing a necropsy, already a forensics.

[00:41:45] But wildlife forensics also encompasses environmental contamination, and that is exactly how condors and other birds die of lead poisoning. So it’s not necessarily that they get shot by lead bullets, like obviously being shot would be a whole other thing and would be a crime. But When hunters use lead ammunition on deer or waterfowl or even livestock and California condors being vultures or scavengers, when they go to eat those animals and the lead bullet is left in them, they can eat the tainted meat and become contaminated themselves.

[00:42:17] Michael Hawk: So I think that when we release this episode, I will have recently released a different episode with Sophie Osborn, who’s a wildlife biologist and was involved with, some California condor reintroductions. And she talked more in depth about lead and the problem of lead.

[00:42:31] And one of the really interesting things is she shared a study that is linked in the show notes that has photographs. Basically x rays. of what it looks like inside an animal that’s been shot with a lead bullet.

[00:42:43] Because a lot of people ask the question, well, aren’t the condors smart enough to avoid the lead or spit it out? Or, you know, something like that. Well, actually it fragments into so many tiny little pieces that, very often it’s totally impossible. And then the thing I wanted to point out was these x ray photographs make it very apparent.

[00:43:01] some of these photographs were taken of meat that was being sold to the general public. So even us as humans have a risk of eating lead shot meat. the problem with lead is not just a condor problem. It’s also a people problem.

[00:43:18] Ashley Bray: Yeah, and it’s such a huge waterfowl problem. So I’m up here in New Hampshire and that is something that they talk a lot about with loons, because if people are using, , lead bait for fishing and they leave that, it takes such a small amount to kill loons, or really any other bird. So, yeah, it’s interesting you say that.

[00:43:34] Right. Just recently finished a class called Skeletal Trauma Analysis. And we went over that specifically, like, what is, what happens to an animal’s body when it’s shot by a bullet, you know, or a human’s body? Like, how does it fracture? How does the bullet go through the body? And like, does that bullet, there’s different types of bullets, of course, but like, how do the different types of bullets, you know, go into the body and how can you find, like, traces of what it is.

[00:43:59] So that is also a whole forensics thingUsing those techniques to figure out like trace amounts of things in the system. And that’s what I meant by like environmental contamination things, because you can use forensics techniques to discover like companies that are dumping VOCs into the environment, volatile organic compounds, or like even the BP oil spill in the ocean from like years and years ago, that could technically be considered a crime scene if you really think about it.

[00:44:26] A lot of different applications, but yeah, so for California condors, them being infected by lead, definitely a whole forensics issue. And of course, like wildlife forensics could play more of a part if there were suspected poisonings or outright poaching of condors. For example, if biologists keep finding poison carcasses, you’ll need to utilize all the forensics methods that we’ve talked about at your disposal to build a case against somebody.

[00:44:48] But for now, it seems like a lot of these lead poisonings are unintentional. And it seems like there’s been a ton of good outreach in the area to talking to hunters about like not using lead shot for things. And especially if you. are shooting an animal that you’re not sure you can retrieve it. Like, definitely don’t use lead and just leave it out there.

[00:45:08] So just to kind of summarize one K, it was lead poisoning. It was found to be lead poisoning. and since it’s not a direct, it’s not like a hunter shot the condor with lead, it was scavenging on other animals that they had lead poisoning.

[00:45:21] Michael Hawk: so is basically the gist of this story that wildlife forensics was able to help, determine that, okay, yeah, lead is still a problem.

[00:45:29] Ashley Bray: Yeah, basically that, lead was the thing that killed him. So, you know, ruling out that it wasn’t a crime, but if it becomes, more of a consistent problem, we’re building a case against, like, Okay. Let’s try to find these contaminated meat piles. And if there’s some legislation passed about not using lead ammunition and it becoming like a criminal offense, then using forensics techniques to, take a deer carcass that was left out that contains lead and holding somebody accountable for it, essentially.

[00:46:00] Michael Hawk: Gotcha.

[00:46:02] So condors, as I understand it, they have, pretty large foraging ranges.

[00:46:07] Do you happen to know like how big of a range that they may follow?

[00:46:12] Ashley Bray: I don’t know off the top of my head, but I mean, because their wingspan is so huge, I can imagine they can cover, a crazy area. So, it would be hard, to point out, like, okay, they’re consuming this one carcass that’s contaminated. I guess you’d have to find them pretty close to it, but, yeah.

[00:46:30] Michael Hawk: and the reason that where my mind was going with this is I know in California, there are some laws that outlaw the sale of lead ammunition. But where I was going with it from a forensic standpoint was I guess depending on knowledge of the individual animal you might find that Well, this animal could not have strayed beyond the borders of California. It just is not capable. And then now, you know, someone was using a legal lead shot, in California, potentially, now that would be extremely costly to figure out exactly what happened and where.

[00:46:59] And, you know, but, it’s interesting to think about how this might evolve in the future as we learn more about, specific behaviors of animals and how it ties into, you know, in this case, like lead poisoning.

[00:47:12] Ashley Bray: Yeah. And if, you hearken back to the Endangered Species Act, it could tie into that too, because there’s been a lot of discourse within the last few years in my life, I’ve had people complain like, Oh man, if an endangered species shows up on your property, you no longer own that property, it’s habitat for that endangered species and, companies being upset if there’s endangered species found because they don’t want to have to, deal with the Endangered Species Act.

[00:47:36] So. It’ll be interesting as time goes on and, you know, obviously lead is so much of an issue. If lead is straight up banned, like the use of ammunition is banned in California, it’ll be interesting to see how they go about prosecuting people who use it. Because, in theory, if a condor feasts on a carcass that has been killed with lead, And they find the person who is accountable for it.

[00:48:01] I think there is a path there to making the person accountable for like a condor, aka an endangered species dying. And then they’ll be held to the Lacey Act, the Endangered Species Act, like a ton of more things. Which sounds scary, but I think could be a good thing. , yeah, you know, it’ll be a lot of work, but it might be the thing to push people to like really start caring more.

[00:48:23] Yeah, you use the, concept of tragedy of the commons earlier, and that’s very often what we’re dealing with. And I think that’s why it’s so hard. it’s an indirect effect.

[00:48:33] Michael Hawk: And as the individual who’s perpetrating this potentially crime it’s hard to see it.

[00:48:38] It’s hard to see the actual impact. And I think That’s why it continues to happen in a lot of cases. And

[00:48:44] of course there’s also people who are like, you know, who are you to tell me what to do? And, you know, they’re just going to go do it. which is another story altogether. It’s very interesting.

[00:48:52] and yeah, the other, the other tidbit that I took away from some of the Condor conversations I’ve had in recent months. so first of all, I live like as the condor flies, maybe 70 miles from Pinnacles National Park. And they have a program that’s been successful down there in reintroducing condors.

[00:49:13] So

[00:49:13] Ashley Bray: It’s so cool.

[00:49:15] Michael Hawk: And, where I’m going with this is that there’s still a lot of handholding that has to happen. As you mentioned, there’s a lot of monitoring. and very often. most condors end up back in captivity briefly for, lead chelation and, different things to help, keep them healthy to make it to breeding age so that, you know, that can actually be breeding populations in the wild.

[00:49:38] but it is generally a positive story. And I just want to mention this because it’s personal to me. So of course it’s important because it’s, it’s me, but, so I’m in San Jose, California, and I mentioned this population they have now going down in the pinnacles and there are now periodic flights that they can track of condors coming all the way up to the, there’s this area called Mount Diablo here in the Bay Area that was historically a, you know, a condor.

[00:50:08] I don’t know if I want to say haven. I don’t know that anyone really knows how popular it really was, but they’re starting to see condors straying further and further afield, kind of look, you know, potentially looking for, new nesting locations, new

[00:50:22] territories. we’re all eagerly awaiting for the first condor couple to make Mount Diablo, its

[00:50:29] Ashley Bray: It’d be

[00:50:29] Michael Hawk: a solid like a hundred, a hundred plus miles, I think, from.

[00:50:33] Pinnacles, which, you know, it’ll be a big day when that happened. It seems to be getting closer because these flights are happening more and more

[00:50:38] Ashley Bray: Oh, that’s so exciting. Yeah. And to the, to your point about, you know, having to bring them in for medical care, that seems like a band aid for the larger issue. Like we’ve been talking about, you know, forensics cutting off the supply chain, so to speak, and it seems like there needs to be more done to cut off the quote unquote supply chain to DDT and lead poisoning.

[00:50:59] So it’s like, yeah, you know, caring for these condors and their poisoning right now is the, We’re doing triage, basically, like trying to stop the bleeding. But the overall issue is we need to really get DDT and lead out of the environment, which is like way more of an issue than just fixing the one condor right now.

[00:51:17] But yeah, it’s, there’s so many. Birds that are affected by lead. And I mean, we haven’t even touched on like rodenticides and rat poisons, but that’s another huge issue for all types of raptors and, I mean, other mammalian predators too. so there, there’s so many things out there that could be harmful to them.

[00:51:37] It’s like, it feels like a losing battle a lot of the time.

[00:51:40] Michael Hawk: That reminds me, , you mentioned in some of that early investigation that DDT was found in higher concentrations on the coastal condors. why was it more often seen on the coastal condors? Do you know?

[00:51:57] Ashley Bray: so I can give you the study that specifically talks about it But from the gist that I got there was a lot of dumping into the ocean marine mammals that they would scavenge on were consuming things that had been contaminated with DDT or Run off into the water from like more coastal areas just like made it accumulate more in the water so that the marine mammals ate it.

[00:52:19] if the marine mammals, like seals and whatnot, are also bioaccumulating the DDT, it’s already at high levels in those animals and the condors are feeding on even higher levels. So it just seems like a perfect storm over there.

[00:52:31] Michael Hawk: Yeah, that sounds really familiar. that seems right from, the deep recesses of my brain from what I’ve heard before. and I think that’s actually where some of the DDT still makes it into the environment today. this whole conversation has been a lot of fun and I, appreciate you and the energy that you’ve brought to it and the preparation and everything else.

[00:52:49] equally fun, I think, is I always like to ask some standard wrap up questions of my guests. I never know what kind of response I’m going to get. And, they’re almost always really enlightening. So if you’re ready, we can jump into the wrap up.

[00:53:04] Ashley Bray: Mm hmm.

[00:53:05] Michael Hawk: , So thinking back, do you have a top of head event or it could be a specific wildlife encounter or book or mentor?

[00:53:12] Something like that that really stands out to you as escalating your interest in your care for the natural world.

[00:53:18] Ashley Bray: Yeah, I have so many examples. The first one that comes to mind. Jane Goodall’s book about studying chimpanzees, which is ironic because if you know anything about me, I am horrified of chimpanzees. They scare me to no end. I do not like them, but I love Jane Goodall because she was one of the first people or the first biologists conservationists I heard about.

[00:53:41] And she was a woman and she’s one of the very few women who were doing it very early on. That was huge for me early on. I also, I was really into, like I said, Steve Irwin, but also Jack Hanna and Jeff Corwin were some other conservationists. And I actually got to see Jack Hanna in person when I was younger.

[00:53:59] He did like a talk and he brought a cheetah on stage, which was like mind blowing to eight year old Ashley that that could be happening in front of me. So that was cool. And then just, you know, Another time in middle school, we got called in for a program and this person brought in a bunch of birds of prey in my area and he brought out a saw-whet owl.

[00:54:22] I don’t know why that one specifically stuck out to me, but saw-whet owls are like these tiny little owls. They’re so sweet. Yeah. And. I just like was so in love. I had no, I had never seen that bird before. Even to this day, I have never seen a saw whet owl in the wild. it’s crazy to me that like, these animals probably live in my backyard and I had no idea.

[00:54:43] So, seeing animals in person is something that like, I think, can really trigger a love and passion if you didn’t already have one. So highly encourage everyone, see as many animals as you can. If you’re someone trying to make people care about animals, like showing them the thing is what will get them to care.

[00:55:01] And that’s why I recommended Sea of Shadows. Cause like, you’ll see the vaquita and I promise you, you’ll come away being more enraptured with them than you were before, or just knowing literally anything more than you knew about vaquitas before.

[00:55:12] Michael Hawk: Yeah. It’s easy for me because I knew nothing

[00:55:13] yeah, there you go. Yeah. That’s, I mean, so true. showing people these connections, showing people these animals, you know, so important.

[00:55:21] The other question that I’d love to ask you is if you could just say, snap your fingers and magically impart one ecological concept to help the general public, see the world like you see it.

[00:55:32] What might that be?

[00:55:33] Ashley Bray: So I have one, but like some points under that one,

[00:55:37] Michael Hawk: We’ll

[00:55:37] Ashley Bray: Okay,So my main point is that each species is worth saving and it is our duty as humans to do everything that we can to save them from extinction, especially if their oncoming extinction is caused by us. And then to piggyback on that, I also would like people to know that all animals are also individuals and it may sound like really obvious to be like, well, yeah, all people are individuals.

[00:56:02] So every animal is an individual too. But even though like, for example, all American Robins look the same, they all have their own personalities. Although they may not feel things exactly the same as humans do. All animals still have emotions and feelings and can experience things like grief.

[00:56:19] Michael Hawk: And I think it’s easy to pretend that some animals aren’t as sentient as we are, but the more that we learn and research, the more that we find that that’s really not the case. Yeah, they might manifest in different ways that are foreign to us and harder for us to recognize. And I think, you know, when this topic comes up, I always immediately think of Ed Yong’s book, An Immense World, where he talks about animal senses, and he goes through all these amazing ways that different animals perceive and sense the world.

[00:56:46] And to me, it was a huge, huge eye opener as to why it’s hard for us to relate to other animals. Uh, so I see you writing that down. Have you,

[00:56:57] Ashley Bray: Yep. I haven’t heard that. And

[00:57:01] Michael Hawk: fun read. It’s informative. and yeah, I can’t recommend that book enough.

[00:57:05] Ashley Bray: Nice. Yeah. And you know, the more I work, I’ve worked with a lot of different kinds of animals and the more I do, the more I’m like, it is crazy how like, even in a wildlife rehab setting where you’re taking care of animals that are injured, like each animal has their own preferences. One skunk may like blueberries and the other might like marshmallows.

[00:57:23] each animal really is different, no matter what the species looks like as a whole, even though they all look the same and act generally the same, they are different.

[00:57:31] Michael Hawk: Yeah, when I do interpretive talks and things like that, I often bring up house cats or dogs, as an example, dogs are a little harder, I think, because they can look so different. So you can imagine that, all these dogs are going to, behave differently or have different personalities, but cats, maybe they have different colors, but they’re still kind of the same physical morphology.

[00:57:52] so it’s easy to think that they’re all the same and they’re all Going to eat the same thing, act the same way, do the same thing. But once you own two cats and you see how different

[00:58:01] they can be, and it’s like, why, why would that not extend at least to other mammals,

[00:58:07] if not beyond.

[00:58:09] And same goes with birds, you know, people that have owned pet birds, they see it, they see the differences and preferences, personalities, behaviors.

[00:58:17] So totally makes sense. And I think it just needs to be more on the forefront of our minds.

[00:58:21] Ashley Bray: Yeah. I mean, even recently I had a job where I was working with, an endangered species of cottontail rabbit here in New Hampshire, and I had to take care of some of them who were in quarantine for tularemia, which is like a whole other thing, but even among those few rabbits, some of them, every time I would come to feed them would come up to the front of the cage and wait for me.

[00:58:41] And they’re wild animals. And some of them would hide in these little boxes. Some of them were afraid of the boxes and would hide on top. even among them, like those. Rabbits who have very short lifespans. They all look the same. Even they had preferences and different little personalities. And I could tell which one was which based off of like the way that they preferred things.

[00:58:59] So it really, the more you look, the more you find that they are all different and also like a little more like us than I think that we may like to realize sometimes.

[00:59:07] Michael Hawk: Do you have any upcoming projects that you want to highlight? maybe it’s podcast episodes, maybe it’s something else.

[00:59:15] Ashley Bray: By the time this comes out, I will have released an episode on my podcast with Dr. John Goodrich, who is a worldwide tiger expert, lived in Russia, worked with Siberian tigers, was at the forefront of a lot of that early conservation work for Siberian tigers. And he works for Panthera, which is a conservation organization that does a lot of big cat stuff.

[00:59:35] But he was actually attacked by a tiger. So not only is he an expert in tigers, but he also is a survivor of an attack. So that was a really exciting episode. Highly encourage you all to listen to that. He’s knows so many things and has lived such a cool life. So I would say that, but then on a more personal note and a personal project, I’m actually getting married at the end of September.

[00:59:57] So I’m going to be taking some time off from the podcast so I can focus on getting married because it’s a lot of work to plan a wedding.

[01:00:06] Michael Hawk: Well, congratulations.

[01:00:07] That’s,

[01:00:08] obviously big news

[01:00:09] Ashley Bray: yeah, ironically, I’m actually getting married. I was talking about how I just took care of some animals before. I’m getting married at the place where I’ve done wildlife rehab. They have like a botanical garden. So I’m getting married around animals, which is pretty fitting. So I may have fun wedding pictures with animals.

[01:00:23] You can follow me on socials and maybe you’ll see them. We’ll see.

[01:00:26] Michael Hawk: speaking of that, where can people follow you?

[01:00:28] Ashley Bray: Yeah, so my podcast has a website, getoutalivepodcast. com. That’s where you can find pretty much everything. But for me personally, you can follow me on what is formerly known as Twitter, but I refuse to call X at theangryologist.

[01:00:43] I just post random stuff, mostly animal related. And then on Instagram, getoutalivepod. com.Is where all my animal related or animal attack related things are, and where you can be updated on the pod. We have Facebook, Get Out Alive podcast. Uh, TikTok is mostly about my pets at this point. I’m not even going to pretend that it’s about the podcast anymore, but that is Get Out Alive.

[01:01:03] So,

[01:01:04] Michael Hawk: I’ll make sure to link to, to all of that, the documentary, some of the people and other things that you mentioned in the show notes, of course. So before I hit the stop button here, is there anything else that you’d like to say?

[01:01:15] Ashley Bray: Just thanks for having me. This was great. I really loved being able to dive into forensics and I want to say it made me like a better forensic biologist to have to condense all of this and talk about it in such a broad way. So thank you for having me.

[01:01:30] Michael Hawk: That’s great to hear. You’ll have a nice little sound bites now at parties when people ask about it. So.

[01:01:34] Ashley Bray: Thank God.

[01:01:35] Michael Hawk: All right, I’ll take care. Thank you again. And I appreciate you and the work you do and best of luck with your upcoming marriage.

[01:01:45] Ashley Bray: Thank you so much.