You're listening to native America calling. I'm Sean spruce. We're focusing on the effects of the Shasta dam on tribes in Northern California, especially the winter tribe. A new podcast, a prayer for salmon tells the story of the tribe's connection to the land and wildlife. If you have a question or comment, join our conversation at one 809 9 6 two 8 four 8. That's also one 809 9 native. I'd like to bring in our second guest now, Judy, silver reporter for the podcast series. Judy, what led you to this story about the minimum win to? Yeah, so led me to the story as I was sort of hunting around for stories. I was interested in water and the connection to spirituality. And someone referred me to the winning moment too. And so I talked with two tribal members have an extensive conversation by phone, and they said, hey, you know, you should come out to our runs for salmon ceremony. Which was in September. This was September of 2017. And so that year, this month for salmon is a two week ceremony. At that time, it was going from the Bay Area all the way up to the mccloud river, which is a 300 mile journey. And participants run, walk, bike, boat, paddle, and so the first couple, the first couple days is walking. And so I went out and did the walking portion of the run. And just immediately was really taken by on several levels. You know, as a reporter, I'm always taken by story. Like I'm always impressed by good stories, and I knew right away, oh, my reporter instincts those kicked in right away, like this is a great story. You have a non recognized tribe who is fighting for salmon, fighting for their rights fighting for justice. And they faced incredible hardship and are also incredibly resilient. And so I just knew, right away, okay, story wise, this is great. And then just the people and the people really impressed me. I was really just taken by how strong their convictions are and sort of how righteous their convictions are and I just wanted to learn and know more. And so we almost immediately started talking about a podcast and I wrote a grant FC got the grant and then started by reporting. Wonderful, wonderful. Let's go ahead and hear now from another one of the collaborators on this podcast series. Doctor Lila June and Lila, I know you're traveling right now. I think you're in an airport, but I really appreciate you being able to join us today and tell us more about your connection to the winner and win two people and this podcast. Well, it's hard to believe it was about 12 years ago. That I approached Kalin at a fundraiser in Berkeley at the time I was a junior at Stanford University and I wanted to do an honors thesis report and I remember praying to the creator I said, okay, creator, can you help me do some research that's not just going to sit on a shelf and no one will ever read it? Can you help me do a research report that's actually going to help going to effectuate change? And then someone sent me a video of calling speaking in front of the Sacramento capital and my whole body just reverberated as oh, there it is. That's where I'm doing my research project. I think if they'll let me. So I approached her and I said, hey, I'm just describing Navajo, but I want to help, I'm just kidding. But I offered her offered her a barrette, a beaded barrette of a dragonfly, and I said, well, you know, the dragonfly, their eggs are in the water, and then they hatch and they arise out of the water. And I'm hoping that, you know, this is a metaphor for us to arise out of the waters of this reservoir of this dam. And she said, yep, let's do it. So then I got to live with the minimum on and off for about two years. Row of 50 page report on the network of their sacred sites, their altitudes, which ones would be flooded by how much feet I also did some anthropological work on what each sacred site means and we really just created a map. We mapped out the whole network of sacred sites and we concluded that over 50 sacred sites would be flooded or otherwise affected by the raising of the shots of them. Now, doctor June, how similar are these issues with regard to this fight, this environmental fight of the winter, and other environmental issues that you're familiar with? Well, I think as a native person, there's always, there's always the company, the CEO, the greed, that sees the living earth as an object to be bought and sold rather than a living, breathing mother, to be honored and respected. They want to be the masters of nature rather than the children of nature. And so I think it's just that paradigm that when Europeans were in 2000 years of warfare, they got really messed up, you know? They've got a lot of trauma and they were having a really open dog eat dog warfare for 2000 years. They start to want to hoard everything and amass wealth. And it becomes normalized through this thing called the company. It becomes normalized through this thing called business. It becomes normalized through this thing called profit maximization. And all of that is the same old story of folks doing this when our paradigm as native people is closer to reality where we recognize we're in a sacred place. This whole earth is sacred and we are sacred and so we have to act sacred, but to the businessmen, you have a hard time explaining what that word sacred even means. Now, doctor June, in the podcast, we learned that the tribe is ignored, not recognized by those who have power in the Shasta dam issue and earlier we heard chief siskin. Alluded to those same issues. Why is that? Why aren't more people paying attention to what this research as well as chief siskin and others are trying to say? Well, I actually think she's cis and correct me if I'm wrong, but has been very successful in saving off the dam raise. I mean, 12 years ago, they were doing EIS reports environmental impact statements. So they haven't been able to do it in 12 years. And I honestly feel like a lot of that has to do with chief Colleen and her nation who have done the war dance at the dam and said no. And that ward ends with so it's not just important from a media standpoint, but spiritually it reverberated throughout