Have you always wanted to be one of the worldwide community of voices you hear on Second Nature? Now's the time! We're accepting submissions for season 5 and we can't wait to hear from you. For the best shot at getting on season 5, please send in your submissions by April 3. But feel free to continue submitting through April as well.

Submitting to the show is easy!

1. Fill out this form to start your submission to Second Nature.
2. After you fill out the form, you'll receive questions based on the topics you chose, with details about how to submit your audio.
3. Record your audio and send it our way!

• (00:00) - We want to hear from you on season 5!
• (00:40) - How to submit

All season, we’ve rooted ourselves in community. Inspired by vast, underground webs of mycellium we’ve shared ways to create local networks of support, information, and resilience. We’ve talked about how we can use our collective power to prep for climate disasters, protect the water, and use our dollars to resist consumption and combat greenwashing.

On this episode, we're ending the season by reminding ourselves that we’re part of nature and that we can look to our fellow animals, as well as plants and fungi, at any time for lessons in community, resilience, and patience.

📱 Download the Commons app.

🌎 Find citations and further reading in the full show notes.

📞 Want to submit your Community Classified? We'd love to hear from you!

📷 Follow Second Nature on Instagram.

Episode Credits

• Listener contributions: Amber Sit, Ashley Walker, Grace Hebert, Justina, Leena Joshi, Kasia Hertz, Inanna McCarty, Gabrielle Gustilo, Janna, Hockenjos, Mary Klene
• Editing and engineering: Evan Goodchild‍
• Hosting and production: Katelan Cunningham

• (00:00) - Introduction
• (01:41) - We’re all connected
• (03:40) - What our community has learned from nature
• (09:17) - Tracing back the thread of life with Robin Wall Kimmerer
• (29:14) - Looking back at season 4 and what’s to come

Humans have a way of abstracting nature so far from its source that we take something as huge and powerful as water and isolate it, viewing it only as a resource for ourselves rather than an integral part of something much, much bigger than our sinks, showers, and dishwashers.

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On this episode, we’re going to try to shrink the distance between ourselves and the water that keeps us alive, we’re going to hear how you’re connecting with water, and we're going to take stock of the ecological and financial impacts of trying to control water. Plus, we’re going to talk to journalist Erica Gies about how we need to change our relationship with water for our safety, our health, and the health of the ecosystems we’re a part of.

📱 Download the Commons app.

🌎 Find citations and further reading in the full show notes.

📞 Want to submit your Community Classified? We'd love to hear from you!

📷 Follow Second Nature on Instagram.

Episode Credits

• Listener contributions: Ally, Braden Marazzo-Nowicki, Leïla Six, Louka, Markos Delaportas, Nick Blocha, Sunseed Desert Technology, Tavia, Danielle Bird
• Editing and engineering: Evan Goodchild‍
• Hosting and production: Katelan Cunningham

• (00:20) - Where does our water come from?
• (01:45) - What is water bankruptcy?
• (04:35) - Our relationship with water
• (09:37) - How did we get here?
• (31:48) - How much is our water neglect costing us?
• (34:19) - Community classifieds

The chemical industry is a cornerstone of modern American farming. It helps grow the food billions of people eat. It’s also causing vast environmental damage. In this episode of REAP/SOW, produced in collaboration with WWNO’s Sea Change podcast, you’re going to hear the story of synthetic fertilizer, and how this powerful concoction of chemicals has radically reshaped how we farm and what we eat – and how it’s poisoning communities, upending livelihoods, and choking the life out of a huge swath of the ocean. Reported by Garrett Hazelwood and Eric Schmid, hosted by WWNO’s Carlyle Calhoun and FERN’s Teresa Cotsirilos.

With the price of everything on the rise, can you live sustainably without spending more money? In fact, frugal living has always been sustainable. Clothes drying on the line, a cookie tin reused as a sewing kit, a Cool Whip tub filled with leftovers.

Choosing stuff that lasts over stuff that's designed to be trashed, choosing to reuse before buying new, and choosing to skip stuff that doesn't serve us — these money-saving tips are also tips to live sustainably. Not only that, they liberate us to exist outside a world centered on consumption. In this episode, you'll get all kinds of tips from our community on how to save on everything from groceries to electricity.

🌎 Find citations and further reading in the full show notes.

📞 Want to submit your Community Classified? We'd love to hear from you!

📱 Want to be a part of the Commons community? Download the app.

📷 Follow Second Nature on Instagram.

Episode Credits

• Listener contributions: Amandine Thomas, Amber Sit, Anna, Brian Stancheski, Grace Hebert, Justina, Madeline, Melissa Tan, Nicole Collins, Robbie Ahmed
• Editing and engineering: Evan Goodchild‍
• Hosting and production: Katelan Cunningham

• (00:27) - Sustainable living has always been rooted in frugality.
• (03:30) - One razor is saving me hundreds.
• (05:19) - Our community’s favorite sustainable savings tips
• (23:49) - There’s more where that came fom
• (00:25) - 48 Community Classifieds

[This episode originally aired October 16, 2024] Plant-based cheese is better than ever, but can we expand our expectations of cheese to ease our reliance on Big Dairy?

Cheese is delicious. Even aspiring vegans find cheese hard to quit. But making dairy cheese is not only rough on the planet — the dairy cows’ lives aren’t great either. In this episode, we’re getting the full picture of the impact of dairy cheese, including the United States’ decades-long surplus cycle with the cheese industry and how it’s connected to Pizza Hut’s Summer of Cheese.

We’re chatting with famed vegan chef and cheese icon, Miyoko Schinner about how far plant-based cheese has come and her favorite plant-based cheese bases. We’re learning practical tips to learn to love plant-based cheese, and having our very own cheese taste test.

🌎 For photos of our contributors and further reading, check the full show notes.

📞 We'd love to hear from you! Submit to the show.

📱 To join the Commons community, download the app.

📷 Follow Second Nature on Instagram.

Episode Credits

• Listener contributions: Amea Wadsworth, Diana Holguin, Drew Crabtree, Kenzie Rattray, Melissa Athina, Miriam Jornet
• Editing and engineer: Evan Goodchild‍
• Hosting and production: Katelan Cunningham

• (01:41) - Our community loves cheese
• (03:28) - Big Dairy, cheese caves, adn America’s decades-long milk obligation
• (07:35) - We’re drinking less milk than we used to, but we’re eating more cheese. Let’s talk about it.
• (10:54) - If one person can teach us to learn plant-based cheese, it’s famed chef, Miyoko Schinner
• (25:37) - How does cheese production impact the planet?
• (33:50) - Is it all or nothing?

In the midst of the one-year anniversary of LA’s devastating, off-season wildfires, we’re reminded that to live in a time of drastic climate change is to prepare for the improbable. From bigger tornadoes and more severe floods to prolonged droughts and deadly heatwaves, no region is immune to the increasing intensity of natural disasters driven by climate change. The rest of the world is coming face-to-face with the brutal reality that people in the Global South have faced for years — when it comes to climate disasters, it's not a matter of if they'll hit you, but when.

But there are things we can do at home and in our communities to adapt before, during, and after disasters. On this episode, we hear from community members around the world about the climate disasters they’ve experienced and how their communities are adapting. We’re speaking with meteorologist Chase Chain about how discussing the weather means discussing climate change. And, we’re talking about how to make ourselves and our communities less vulnerable to the effects of climate disasters.

👉🏽 And don't miss Chase Cain's on-the-ground, behind-the-scenes coverage of the LA wildfires.

🌎 Find citations and further reading in the full show notes.

📞 Want to submit your Community Classified? We'd love to hear from you!

📱 Want to be a part of the Commons community? Download the app.

📷 Follow Second Nature on Instagram.

Episode Credits

• Listener contributions: Airlea Rasul, Anandi Yadav, Anna , Elisabeth , Tessa Maurer, Tiffany, Zayna Zubair
• Editing and engineering: Evan Goodchild‍
• Hosting and production: Katelan Cunningham

• (00:09) - No one is immune to natural disasters.
• (02:40) - How can we better prepare for climate disasters, at home and in our communities?
• (05:52) - How people around the world are adapting to a new normal
• (12:44) - Interview with meteorologist and climate reporter, Chase Cain
• (36:15) - Your prep to-do list.
• (38:00) - Community Classifieds

Do you feel like you’re drowning in advertisements, clutter, or debt? A no-buy year could help. In a capitalistic society, we're brainwashed to default to buying our way out of our problems. That's what makes a no-buy challenge so much more than a New Year's resolution or an extreme budget.

A no-buy or low-buy challenge not only gives you permission to hop off the buy-buy-buy hamster wheel — it also makes you more privy to sneaky marketing and helps you put your money toward what actually makes you happy. These are the kinds of mental shifts that could stick with you for life.

In this episode, we hear from listeners about the different ways to do a no-buy or low-buy year, and what they've learned about themselves and their finances in the process.

🌎 Find citations and further reading in the full show notes.

📞 Want to submit your Community Classified? We'd love to hear from you!

📱 Want to try no-buy challenge join the Commons community, download the app.

📷 Follow Second Nature on Instagram.

Episode Credits

• Listener contributions: Amandine Thomas, Cara Sanford, Daria, Justina, Melissa Tan
• Editing and engineering: Evan Goodchild‍
• Hosting and production: Katelan Cunningham

• (00:00) - What is a no-buy year?
• (03:18) - A no-buy new year’s resolution made Amandine more stylish and saved her lots of money.
• (06:43) - Melissa has found freedom and simplicity in her no-buy challenge.
• (11:20) - Daria’s secondhand challenge rippled out from clothes to other parts of her life.
• (13:15) - After switching to part-time work, Cara was still able to live comfortably due to the success of her no-buy challenge.