Show Notes
In this episode, the series shifts from ocean to rivers and lands as we explore the science and stories behind freshwater restoration and ecological connectivity. Host Marea Gabriel is joined by Alison Bowden and Herring Commission and Assawompset Pond community member Tom Barron for a boat ride in the Taunton Watershed of southeastern Massachusetts. Together, they reflect on the relationship between people and rivers, community safety, local history and the ongoing work to reconnect waterways across the watershed.
Host: Marea Gabriel, Senior Freshwater Manager
Also featuring: Alison Bowden, Director of Conservation Science and Strategy; Tom Barron, Middleborough Lakeville Herring Commission
Learn more about TNC and partners' work in the Assawompset Ponds Complex and Nemasket River. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
More from Nature is the Solution
Exciting news! Nature is the Solution is a finalist in the 2026 Signal Awards' Science category for Brand Storytelling.
In this final episode of the season, we speak with Senator Bill Frist, Global Board Chair, and Catherine Machalaba, TNC’s first planetary health scientist, to explore how environmental change is becoming a defining public health challenge—and how nature can help protect people. We then travel to Lynn, Massachusetts, to see how the environment is affecting community health. Together, the episode connects local lived experience with global science to show why a healthy planet is essential to healthy people.
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Meeting our climate goals means building more renewable energy. But expanding that capacity requires land and careful navigation of competing needs across energy, housing, conservation and communities. With so much of our landscape already supporting critically important forests, farms and wildlife habitat—and many communities already doing their share—figuring out where everything fits becomes a real puzzle. In this episode, we’re joined by solar operators, an agrivoltaics farmer, and a local planning and energy official to explore how we can expand clean energy while protecting the nature we rely on and communities we live in, and what makes a good solar site for people, nature and the climate.
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