#73. Griff Griffith: How One Man’s Journey is Saving Our Forests

Scott Hammond: Ladies and gentlemen, friends and neighbors, Scott Hammond with 100% Humboldt with my new best friend, Griff Griffith.

Scott Hammond: Hi, Griff.

Griff Griffith: Hi. Is that my… Okay, I'm gonna look at that one.

Scott Hammond: You can look at me. You can look at me.

Griff Griffith: Okay.

Scott Hammond: We can look at Nick. And Nick, our producer, what, what's your last name again? I forget. Anyway. Hey, uh, glad to have you.

Griff Griffith: Glad to be here.

Scott Hammond: Tell us, uh, tell us your, uh, your role, your, uh, your pedigree, your job. What, what, what do you do? What's the, uh, what's the Griff story?

Griff Griffith: The Griff story. So right now I'm doing Redwoods Rising, so that is… Redwoods Rising is a project. It's probably one of the coolest projects. It's, like, the third biggest ecological restoration project in the United States probably. We've been saying that.

Griff Griffith: Um-

Scott Hammond: Wow

Griff Griffith: … maybe the biggest forest restoration project ever,

Griff Griffith: ever. So what we do is we take out roads, we recontour slopes, we daylight streams, 'cause a lot of the streams were buried back in the day because it was the path of least resistance and they would just pull the logs down a buried creek.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: So… And it was weird, 'cause most of those guys were fishermen, so I don't know. They didn't make the, uh… I don't know if they connected the dots between this is where our baby salmon come from and now we're burying it. I don't know.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Wow.

Griff Griffith: But they buried a lot of streams.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: Um, and so we're daylighting those, taking out roads. And then also after they clearcut, they helicopter seeded with rodenticide-covered seeds.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: So they kinda, like say, clearcut the forest and they rained, like, poisonous

Griff Griffith: seeds down.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: And everything grew back really, really thick. And so that's the point where we bought it. Well, Save the Redwoods League bought it and then gave it to Redwood National Park-

Scott Hammond: Okay

Griff Griffith: … between the '60s and even up to 2004. So we got all this land that has, like, thousands of trees per acre, whereas in a normal forest you'd have, like, 10 to 200-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … coastal forest. But we have thousands of trees per acre, so, like, they block the sun. There's hardly any undergrowth growing, so therefore there's not as many birds and bees and cool things.

Scott Hammond: Problems.

Griff Griffith: And so it's, like, more like a pseudo forest. It's not even a real forest.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: So, uh, I do social media around content creation around that story.

Scott Hammond: Nice.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Tell us where you were, uh, where, where you were born. Where'd you go to school?

Griff Griffith: Uh, my dad was a cop, a highway patrolman, so we moved around all the time. So, like, I mostly grew up in Fairfield, California-

Scott Hammond: Okay

Griff Griffith: … until I was 18.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: And then I joined the CCC, California Conservation Corps, which you should too if you're 18 to 25, 'cause it's a super good program.

Scott Hammond: That'd be cool.

Griff Griffith: And, um, that's where I started doing my conservation work. Well, I, I volunteered at wildlife care centers, but that's when I started doing the hands-on cool stuff.

Scott Hammond: Sweet.

Griff Griffith: So, um-

Scott Hammond: Where were you sta- Would y- Uh, do you call it stationed when you're in the Ca-

Scott Hammond: CCC?

Griff Griffith: Yeah. I was at station, I was stationed in Ukiah-

Scott Hammond: Oh, wow

Griff Griffith: … which was a good thing, 'cause that's in the Bay Area, and I was a high school dropout and I was a bad kid. I was one of those really bad teenagers.

Scott Hammond: No way, not you.

Griff Griffith: Oh my goodness.

Scott Hammond: Really? What did you do?

Griff Griffith: Drugs.

Scott Hammond: Drugs.

Griff Griffith: Stealing. Dropping out of high school.

Scott Hammond: Did-

Griff Griffith: Fighting. Name it.

Scott Hammond: So you were that guy.

Griff Griffith: Backbone. Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Oh, wow.

Griff Griffith: I was an unhappy teenager.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Ran away from home.

Scott Hammond: Who wasn't?

Griff Griffith: Yeah. I know. Teenagers. Ugh.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Are there generally… Are, are your teenagers unhappy?

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yes.

Griff Griffith: You know, I think there's, um… If you think about it, for hundreds of thousands of years we were all in really small family units, and you had to get away from your family unit. You had to get away from your village, otherwise you're just gonna inbreed, inbreed,

Griff Griffith: inbreed.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Griff Griffith: So I feel like once you're a teenager you just really wanted to be away from your

Griff Griffith: dad.

Scott Hammond: Oh, man.

Griff Griffith: And so you'd go to the next village.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: You'd meet a girl that wasn't your first cousin or half-sister.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And that was better for the gene pool.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: So I almost think that it's, like, a built-in thing almost, where you want-

Scott Hammond: Yeah, migrate

Griff Griffith: … get away from your family.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. I went to San Diego to Humboldt.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: 825 miles. Had to get out.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. You're like, "Bye, Dad. I'm outta here."

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Break away. Yeah, and it's good.

Scott Hammond: It was good.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Met Joanie.

Griff Griffith: Cool.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Life's good. So did you do any college after that, or just-

Griff Griffith: I did. I went to college for 11 years.

Scott Hammond: 11.

Scott Hammond: Who didn't?

Griff Griffith: Well, when you drop out of high school… I got my GED in the CCC, California Conservation Corps, and, uh, got a little college scholarship. And so, um, and then because of the, the job skills I learned in the CCC, I was able to get a job with the Forest Service, and so I had the coolest, coolest, coolest job that doesn't exist anymore. But I did salmon and fish surveys, and then when there was a fire I went on fire. Back then in the '90s there was way less fires.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Griff Griffith: So you went on, like, two or three fires-

Scott Hammond: Right

Griff Griffith: … um, a, you know, a s- a season instead of, like, being on fire the whole entire season like they are now.

Scott Hammond: We should talk about that a little later in the show.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: So you, where did you go to college then?

Griff Griffith: I went to seven different colleges.

Scott Hammond: Okay. 11 years. Okay.

Griff Griffith: 11 years and seven… I graduated from Chico State, and then I went to, um, HSU, back when it was HSU-

Scott Hammond: Right

Griff Griffith: … for interpretation.

Scott Hammond: You mean Cal Poly?

Griff Griffith: Yeah, Cal Poly.

Scott Hammond: Oh, you mean HSU is what you meant.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. And I went back there for, um, interpretation under Carolyne

Griff Griffith: Widener, and learned a little bit about talking about nature. After I got my degree, my degree, I created my bachelor's degree. It was international crop production, Latin American studies.

Scott Hammond: Say it again.

Griff Griffith: International crop production, Latin American studies.

Scott Hammond: Oh y-

Griff Griffith: I'm the only one in the world that has that degree

Scott Hammond: … you wrote your own ticket.

Griff Griffith: I did. I wr-

Scott Hammond: That's cool

Griff Griffith: … I created my degree

Scott Hammond: … about Humboldt. I almost did that.

Griff Griffith: No, that wasn't at Humboldt. That was at Chico State.

Scott Hammond: Okay. Chico let you write yours too?

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Humboldt, the back of the day, you had to propose it and sell it and, and give good reasons.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: That's pretty cool.

Griff Griffith: I did too. Yeah.

Scott Hammond: You're the only guy that's got that degree.

Griff Griffith: I'm the only one on the planet.

Scott Hammond: That'd be a pretty good resume item.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: I'm the only guy in the world with this thing.

Griff Griffith: I got a job with Wildlife Conservation Society because of that. Like, um, they hired me to do bird surveys just because I created my own degree and they admired that.

Scott Hammond: That's creative.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. But then I wasn't the g- best bird surveyor in the world, so they might've been like, "We'll never do that again." I'm too hyper to sit, uh, there for hours-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Griff Griffith: … waiting, waiting for a bird. I'm like, "Oh, man."

Scott Hammond: You look good on paper.

Griff Griffith: I know.

Scott Hammond: Till you start watching birds.

Griff Griffith: I love bird watching and everything like that, but it's gotta be, like, you know-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Griff Griffith: … I can, I just can't sit there.

Scott Hammond: No, man, the ADD, I'm, I'm, I'm leaning in hard, 'cause that's, that's my gift. That's my superpower.

Griff Griffith: ADD?

Scott Hammond: Yeah. My boss goes, uh, "Hey, you know, on the Zoom calls and everything, yeah, it's really obvious you got ADD." And I go-

Griff Griffith: Mm

Scott Hammond: … "How dare you, Alec? How you, how dare you?" So I, I call another, uh, state farm agent and I said, "Do you know what he said?" She goes

Scott Hammond: Duh.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: I brought it home. I go, "Joni, my boss said I had ADD." She goes-

Griff Griffith: "You got ADD, LMNOP."

Scott Hammond: Duh. So, so you could medicate. You could, you c- but-

Griff Griffith: That's my problem, too. I'm, I'm too hyper for a lot of things, so.

Scott Hammond: I think it's a lot of… If you did a successful, um, survey of success people, you'd see probably a lot of tendencies. Some OCD, some LSD, some ADD.

Griff Griffith: Some LSD and some ADD.

Scott Hammond: And some LMNOP.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: You said, yeah.

Griff Griffith: That's the one I have.

Scott Hammond: So, uh, 11 years, so Humboldt and Chico State?

Griff Griffith: Yeah, and College of the Siskiyous and-

Scott Hammond: Wow

Griff Griffith: … Mendocino College, and College of the Redwoods,

Griff Griffith: and Butte College.

Scott Hammond: So a lot of JC work.

Griff Griffith: A lot of JC work, yeah, 'cause high school dropout, so I had to do my ele-

Scott Hammond: Where's Siskiyous? Is that in Weed?

Griff Griffith: Uh-huh.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Griff Griffith: That was my first one.

Scott Hammond: We should talk about Weed later, too.

Griff Griffith: Okay.

Scott Hammond: And what it's done to the forest and growers. Can we do that?

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: All right, cool. Um, so your role today, then, you were a park ranger. So you graduated there. What did you do with that?

Griff Griffith: All right. So when I was in college, I was a seasonal for 13 years, and so mostly for the forest service. I did four seasons with the forest service doing fish surveys

Griff Griffith: mostly.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Um, and then, and firefighting. And then, let's see, forest service, Wildlife Conservation Society, The Nature Conservancy. I planted trees for The Nature Conservancy and did yellow-billed cuckoo surveys along the Sacramento River.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: Um, what else did I do? I farmed. So I grew the seed for the seedless watermelon for a couple seasons. Um, who am I leaving out? There was a lot, you know.

Scott Hammond: You got a killer resume.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. I had an adventurous life, you know?

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: I, I wanted that. You know, I had my grandpa, who was-

Scott Hammond: You still do, by the way.

Griff Griffith: I still do, yeah. No, it's, you only live once. You know? You gotta make it interesting.

Scott Hammond: That's true. Yeah.

Griff Griffith: So I've, I've been trying to. My grandfather told me that when I was really young. He w- him and I were very similar, and, uh, except for he was, like, the super hardcore version of me-

Scott Hammond: Mm

Griff Griffith: … 'cause he was in World War II and Korean War. He was a wilderness survival-

Scott Hammond: Wow

Griff Griffith: … um, instructor for the military for decades-

Scott Hammond: That's pretty rad

Griff Griffith: … till he got too blown up and was permanently disabled. But, um, he had such an adventurous life that I, I tried

Griff Griffith: to, tried to keep up, you know.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: I loved his stories. I wanted the same kind of stories.

Scott Hammond: My dad was a P-51 pilot World War II.

Griff Griffith: Oh, nice.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, total badass.

Griff Griffith: Huh.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, they were. Those are different-

Scott Hammond: That's cool

Griff Griffith: … that's a different group of dudes.

Scott Hammond: God, he would come to McKinleyville and just tell stories at our big table and, you know, Hiroshima. They, he saw the mushroom cloud. They didn't know what it was.

Griff Griffith: Oh, dang.

Scott Hammond: Uh, Bataan Death March and all these rescue ops, and they would just kinda raise hell with the Japanese in every opportunity.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. My grandpa was one of the occupiers after. Learned how to speak Japanese.

Scott Hammond: Oh, how about that?

Griff Griffith: Loved Japanese people. Ended up having Japanese foreign exchange students.

Scott Hammond: Oh, cool.

Griff Griffith: That rubbed off on me. My best friend growing up was Japanese, and then, um, well, he was half. His mom was from Okinawa.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And then when I went to college at College of the Siskiyous, there was a ton of Japanese students there, and they ha- so they had their own dorm.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: So I asked to be in the Japanese dorm. So I had Japanese roommates for a couple years.

Scott Hammond: That's cool.

Griff Griffith: Poor guys.

Scott Hammond: They got you.

Griff Griffith: Gosh. Oh my gosh, yeah, and I'm all hi-

Scott Hammond: Had you to deal with

Griff Griffith: … I'm all hippied out and, like, drinking beer and smoking pot all the time, and they're studying, and I'm coming in at 12 o'clock at night, "How come you weren't at that party? Come on, it's still going."

Scott Hammond: They're pretty diligent.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. Matsuhira was like, "No, Johnson, please. No, I, I have to study."

Scott Hammond: Good. A cultural, uh, cross-

Griff Griffith: Grif-san, yeah.

Scott Hammond: That's cool. Man, that's, that's great. So, uh, tell us about the fire, fire experience as a

Scott Hammond: firefighter.

Griff Griffith: So I got fire trained in the CCC-

Scott Hammond: Is this in NorCal?

Griff Griffith: … when I was 18. Yeah, all NorCal.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And, um, and so then I fought fires with the Forest Service. Um, mostly did… Like I said, there wasn't a lot of fires back then.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: So mostly I was doing fish surveys, which was the best job in the world 'cause I was just snorkeling.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Griff Griffith: So I snorkeled, and then when there was a fire, I went on fire and made overtime.

Scott Hammond: Sweet. Uh, rivers-

Griff Griffith: Best job ever

Scott Hammond: … or streams or both?

Griff Griffith: Rivers and streams. Um, Salmon River.

Scott Hammond: Cool.

Griff Griffith: Did a lot of surveys in the Salmon River.

Scott Hammond: You wet suited up on those?

Griff Griffith: You wet suited up.

Scott Hammond: 'Cause it's cold, right?

Griff Griffith: Oh, yeah. No, wet suited up.

Scott Hammond: How about the Smith?

Griff Griffith: Uh, a little bit in Smith, but not too much. Mostly Salmon River, mostly Klamath National Forest, especially eastern Klamath, so a lot of the, um, the creeks and stuff that just end up in sinks. They don't end up in any rivers. They're just creeks that run into these, like, sinks and then dried up.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: So really cool stuff, you know, like spadefoot toads and fairy shrimp in some of them, and then others had fish and freshwater mussels, just amazing high desert creeks.

Scott Hammond: Sweet. So really remote stuff.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, really remote stuff, and then a lot of, like, salmon-bearing streams and stuff in the Klamath.

Scott Hammond: So you live on the land, ca- camp. Do you have a camper or…?

Griff Griffith: I spiked out a lot. So most of my life has been spikes, which-

Scott Hammond: Mm

Griff Griffith: … where you go out for, like, eight days at a time.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Then you have six days off. So that's what I did in the CCC. That's what I did in the Forest Service a lot.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: Um, we had barracks. I was at the Grass Lake B- Barracks, which is an amazing place.

Scott Hammond: Where's that?

Griff Griffith: Um, what highway is that? It's, uh, Highway 97 towards McDole.

Scott Hammond: That's way out there.

Griff Griffith: Oh, it's so beautiful.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: It's crazy by Sheep Rock and stuff.

Scott Hammond: So beyond where you've been.

Griff Griffith: There's all these lava tubes.

Scott Hammond: Up that way? Ninety… Is that 97?

Griff Griffith: Oh, yeah, way farther east, so more by, like, Mount Shasta.

Scott Hammond: Oh, you're way over there.

Griff Griffith: Up on the way to Klamath Falls.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Griff Griffith: I def- Oh, well, Sp- Did that fighter, spider fall off me?

Scott Hammond: I don't know.

Griff Griffith: I hope so. That'd be cool.

Scott Hammond: Oh, cool. There he goes.

Griff Griffith: I love spiders.

Scott Hammond: Hey, there's a spider in the room.

Griff Griffith: I f- I think it fell off me. I think I brought it in here.

Scott Hammond: It's a little guy.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: He's fine.

Griff Griffith: I was at, I was up by Sumeg today, so maybe, hopefully that's not a Sumeg spider, 'cause he's gonna be totally out of his element.

Griff Griffith: But

Scott Hammond: Do you wanna cap-

Griff Griffith: He's like, "Where is this?"

Scott Hammond: Maybe we should capture him. Um, so yeah, thr- throw me off my game. If you're just joining us, my new best friend, Griff Griffith, here talking about,

Scott Hammond: uh, nature and conservancy and all kinds of cool stuff. So, uh, so you're a frontline fire guy?

Griff Griffith: I was for a while, yeah.

Scott Hammond: That's pretty brutal work.

Griff Griffith: It was, but I thought I was tough. Oh, I forgot one of my seasonal jobs.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: I also worked on a commercial fishing boat in Alaska.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Griff Griffith: And the reason why I remembered it now is because I thought I was badass when I was a firefighter.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: I was young 20s, and I was all buffed out and stuff, and so I thought I was really

Griff Griffith: tough.

Scott Hammond: And they throw you on the boat.

Griff Griffith: And they put me on the boat, and I realized I wasn't that tough and I wasn't that

Griff Griffith: badass and-

Scott Hammond: That's tough work

Griff Griffith: … goodness.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, I did that.

Griff Griffith: Uh, kicked my butt. That's the only job I've ever had that, like- I only did once, and I would never do it again.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: It was beautiful. There was orca all around us. We were never far out the ocean. We're always around these islands.

Scott Hammond: Far out.

Griff Griffith: It was incredible-

Scott Hammond: Huh

Griff Griffith: … optically, but the work was long, and the dude whose boat, it was a two-man troller, and he was way tougher than me. I thought I was tough, but he knew he was tough.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: And just trying to keep up with that dude, I, like, crawled home. I, I was gonna go backpacking in Alaska when, when the season was over, but I, I got on, quietly got on the plane, you know-

Scott Hammond: Could-

Griff Griffith: … just, like, smelling like fish and smoke.

Scott Hammond: Couldn't move.

Griff Griffith: I mean, "Where's my mom?" You know? I wanna go home.

Scott Hammond: I wanna shower.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. It's only… It kicked my butt, but it was beautiful, and it was amazing.

Scott Hammond: My dad said, "Go to Alaska. You gotta go. It's supposed to be ma- magic land-"

Griff Griffith: Yeah

Scott Hammond: "… in every way."

Griff Griffith: Did two summers in Alaska-

Scott Hammond: Huh

Griff Griffith: … because it was so magical.

Scott Hammond: Did you ever work in a, a cannery?

Griff Griffith: No, no, always on a boat.

Scott Hammond: Remember at, at Humboldt-

Griff Griffith: Or always on a boat, and then also I was inland one time, so I didn't work on-

Scott Hammond: Okay

Griff Griffith: … salmon.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, at Humboldt State, a lot of guys back in the day would work at a cannery for s- eight weeks and make bank.

Griff Griffith: Oh, yeah.

Scott Hammond: Li- live on the cooler inside, and I'm going, "What? It's like prison."

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: It's like slave labor. And I… He goes, "No, I put together 20 grand. It got me through sc- another year of school." I go-

Griff Griffith: And some-

Scott Hammond: Hmm

Griff Griffith: … some young men need to be isolated for portions of their lives so they don't ruin it. You know, a lot of, a lot of the guys-

Scott Hammond: I like it

Griff Griffith: … a lot of the guys who worked on commer- on commercial fishing boats were like me. They were wild, and it was good that they were stuck on the boat-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Griff Griffith: … made a bunch of money for the summer instead of being in the bars getting in fights and getting thrown in jail.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Griff Griffith: Which happened to me once, and I wouldn't recommend it.

Scott Hammond: Really?

Griff Griffith: My 21st birthday.

Scott Hammond: Tell us that story. That's, we're s- we're talking about.

Griff Griffith: Oh, God, this is a stupid story. So I, it was in Weed, California, and, um, it was my 21st birthday, and someone said they had homemade whiskey. I don't know what that means. I didn't know what it meant at the time, but I didn't ask too many questions back then. I was like, "Ooh, alcohol, yay." So I, uh, drank a bunch, and then, um, I got in a fight over The Spotted Owl.

Scott Hammond: Really?

Scott Hammond: With-

Griff Griffith: 'Cause it was during The Spotted Owl time.

Scott Hammond: Right, with some local?

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: He just talked sh- talking crap?

Griff Griffith: Talking crap.

Scott Hammond: And you were talking homemade whiskey.

Griff Griffith: And I was talking homemade whiskey.

Scott Hammond: I bet you were.

Griff Griffith: And so, and so when the cops came, I was on top, and when the cops came, and they grabbed me from behind, and I thought I was getting jumped, so I responded accordingly.

Scott Hammond: Oops.

Griff Griffith: And, um, but this is back in the day. Things were different in the '80s and '90s than they are today. You could get forgiven for a lot more.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: You know? So especially when you're a big white guy in Weed, you know, it's like I looked like I belonged there and stuff, you know?

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Griff Griffith: It was, they're like a training… It was like a training police kind of thing, so there was young guys, and so they, like, were probably glad that I fought back. Probably the most interesting thing that happened all night.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Didn't get charged for it.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: Um-

Scott Hammond: Walked away.

Griff Griffith: Uh, no, I got thrown in jail, but I didn't get charged for resisting or anything

Griff Griffith: like that.

Scott Hammond: Oh, good.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: They char- did they charge you?

Griff Griffith: For drunk in public.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Well-

Griff Griffith: Yeah, but not for fighting, not for resisting arrest, nothing.

Scott Hammond: That's something.

Griff Griffith: Thank you, Siskiyou County.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: And, um, but I, they put me in jail in a jail cell with one other guy, and him and I fought for a little while, and they watched.

Scott Hammond: Huh. Isn't that interesting?

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: The early-

Scott Hammond: Cage fighting.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, because there wasn't the internet and stuff like that, so you had to get live entertainment. So this guy was just as drunk as I was, so we boxed a little bit, and then we became best friends and hugged, and I think he cried, and we talked about his girlfriend, and then I passed out, and that was my jail experience.

Scott Hammond: And a little hug and kiss good night. There you go.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, hopefully not a kiss, but yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. I like that.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: It's funny how, um, some re- resolution goes that way.

Griff Griffith: Drunken fights usually go that way.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, it's funny.

Griff Griffith: Especially when you're trapped in a-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Griff Griffith: … cell together. Yeah.

Scott Hammond: I guess rugby's that way. Somebody I talked to that played rugby, was that the last guest? He said, "Rugby, everybody gets… Uh, there's a kegger afterwards. Everybody drinks a keg of beer and is all bloody, and the guy that just beat the crap out of you, you sit having a beer, and he's your new best friend."

Griff Griffith: I think that's a Gen X thing too. Like, my best, one of my other best friends that I met growing up, we met

Griff Griffith: fighting.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: Fishing. We were fishing.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And we got into a fight while we were fishing.

Scott Hammond: Still friends?

Griff Griffith: Became best friends after that. Yeah, we're still friends.

Scott Hammond: That's pretty cool.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, since we were 12.

Scott Hammond: Like, that says a lot about you.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. If you ever want to be my best friend, let's fight, you know?

Scott Hammond: Let's get in a fight. Nick and I fight all the time.

Griff Griffith: I wouldn't want to fight.

Scott Hammond: Best friend.

Griff Griffith: I would not fight him at 54.

Scott Hammond: No, no, he's, he's pretty young and-

Griff Griffith: Kick our butts. Probably kick both of our butts. We better be on our best behavior.

Scott Hammond: Might, might hurt me, man. So if you're just joining us again, this is my friend Griff Griffith, and, uh, tell us more about, l- let's, uh, so you have this k- uh, ranger,

Scott Hammond: uh, career.

Griff Griffith: Kind of, yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, you did. Tell us about that. How many years were you with State of California?

Griff Griffith: So I, after I got done with my 13 years of being a crazy

Griff Griffith: seasonal-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … I finally grew up, got mature. Um, so how old was, how old was I when I finally was grown up?

Griff Griffith: 31. And I became a supervisor for the California Conservation Corps.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: And I had an amazing career at CCC. I don't know why everybody doesn't want to be a CCC supervisor. I'm so confused about that.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: Everybody's like, I was in college with all these people who were like, "I want to work outside forever. I want to save the Earth. I want to blah, blah, blah." Become a CCC supervisor.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: Then you're always outside. You're camping all the time. You're, like, fighting fires. You're, like, planting trees. You're doing salmon habitat restoration. You're pulling invasive plants. You're doing really cool projects.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: You're doing trails all, every single-

Scott Hammond: Everywhere, right?

Griff Griffith: Trail… Yeah. All over the place with young people. It's super fun.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: I don't know why everybody doesn't want to be a CCC supervisor. I would, I would still be a super- CCC supervisor if I could get a body

Griff Griffith: transplant.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: So.

Scott Hammond: 'Cause you gotta be young.

Griff Griffith: If you know of anybody who's giving body transplants.

Scott Hammond: I don't. I, you know, it's a medical desert out there.

Griff Griffith: Especially here. Good Lord.

Scott Hammond: That's… Poor Humboldt.

Griff Griffith: Can't even get a-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Griff Griffith: … can't even get a hair transplant and-

Scott Hammond: Yeah, tell me about it

Griff Griffith: … at least I haven't been able to get one, so.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, I've really, uh, voted Most Beautiful Hair in San Diego.

Griff Griffith: Were you?

Scott Hammond: In high school, yeah.

Griff Griffith: Oh, I was gonna say it wasn't-

Scott Hammond: Sweetwater High School

Griff Griffith: … anything recent.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, no, no, no.

Scott Hammond: It w-

Griff Griffith: Unless they were talking about-

Scott Hammond: Thank you

Griff Griffith: … the hair on your back or something.

Scott Hammond: Okay. There's that. You know, it's funny, uh, times change. My kids go, "You were really cool, huh?" I go, "Yeah, and then you guys came-"

Griff Griffith: You were.

Scott Hammond: "… you guys came along and messed me up."

Griff Griffith: I was until you were born. Yeah, that's what I would've said.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Pretty, that's p- pretty much the answer. So, uh, working with the state, how did that change your- Perspective, um

Griff Griffith: Working for the California Conservation Corps was kind of like a dream when I look back on it now. I stopped in 2020. Um, I, um, I just… I have had s- neck surgery. I've had three hernias. I've had all kinds of stuff, like this carpal tunnel, hands ruined.

Scott Hammond: How are your joints? You have all your original joints?

Griff Griffith: Uh, yeah.

Scott Hammond: That's good.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. Smoked a lot of joints when I was younger, but I ha- still have my original ones here. Yeah.

Scott Hammond: So we're, we're gonna do … Oh, yeah, he, he brought the guns.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, so, uh, we do have to come back to weed, by the way. I, I do wa- I'm kinda curious about how-

Griff Griffith: The joints comment reminded you?

Scott Hammond: Yeah, it's-

Griff Griffith: About weed, California?

Scott Hammond: Well, weed in California.

Griff Griffith: Oh, weed in California.

Scott Hammond: So, so let's just go there. So marijuana has been a, um, an interesting, uh, phenomena and it, and now, you know, it's the boom and bust, the green bust.

Griff Griffith: I know.

Scott Hammond: The green-

Griff Griffith: I know

Scott Hammond: … uh, gold rush, the green rush.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: But as a, a conservationist, as a guy who loves the Earth,

Scott Hammond: um, you can't help but see the damage that everybody in SoHum have brought up.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. And in, in the California Conservation Corps, we did pot cleanups.

Scott Hammond: Probably saw a lot of crap, right?

Griff Griffith: Yeah, we did pot cleanups.

Scott Hammond: So there's trash, there's, uh, insecticide and, and-

Griff Griffith: Chemicals that you can't buy in the United States.

Scott Hammond: And so-

Griff Griffith: You can only get in, in Mexico.

Griff Griffith: Yeah

Scott Hammond: … these are felons that are destroying the Earth.

Griff Griffith: These were illegal grows. Yeah, these were all illegal grows, and this is before it was legalized. And I'd go up with, take my crew up with the BLM

Griff Griffith: Rangers.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And, um, fascinating because-

Scott Hammond: 'Cause they had guns, right?

Griff Griffith: They had guns. It was a- after they already scared everybody away. We just wanted to go get all the irrigation tubing and stuff like that.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: But what's weird, because a lot of people,

Griff Griffith: like, in my experience, and I don't want to speak for all illegal grows, but in my experience in Southern Humboldt and with- and Northern Mendocino County, I think it was mostly Northern Mendocino County, with these, these cleanups, the… And I was with the Rangers that did a lot of the busts.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: You know, the BLM Rangers and stuff, and the, the law enforcement. And they said sometimes they'd get these guys who were from Mexico who had no idea where they were.

Scott Hammond: No way.

Griff Griffith: So they didn't even know they were, like, in California, in the United States.

Scott Hammond: Just air dropped them in, yeah.

Griff Griffith: No. So these were like… And the way they described them to me, these were like, like if you took, you know, guys from the Appalachia in, in 1920.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Like, they didn't know where they were. They were dropped on-

Scott Hammond: Dropped them in somewhere.

Griff Griffith: And they, and, and, and the Rangers were under the impression that a lot of these guys, not all of them, you know, there was, like, people who knew where they were and blah, blah, blah. But, like, there was some… The, the grows that we were going to-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … were these cases where the guys were like, these were like Hicks. Like, M- Mexico's version of Hicks.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: You know, these were like Appalachia dudes, Mexico's version of Appalachia dudes-

Scott Hammond: Sure

Griff Griffith: … who had, you know, little education, sixth, seventh, you know, education. Didn't know where they were, and were afraid that if they didn't bring in a crop, that their family was gonna get hurt back home.

Scott Hammond: Whoa.

Griff Griffith: So when I heard that story and we were going up there, it was like an emotional thing for me because I felt really sorry for them now.

Scott Hammond: It's not-

Griff Griffith: You know?

Scott Hammond: It's not a paid gig. It's, it's-

Griff Griffith: Yeah. I was like-

Scott Hammond: … black men

Griff Griffith: … man, they were prisoners. Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Griff Griffith: And so then we went up to these… And, and it was this… You know, I don't know how widespread this was. It was just the cleanups that we went to. And, um, and we got up there, and they had these beautiful… Like, they took branches and weaved them and put Mary in the middle and had beads.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: Like, they had altars. They'd carved into trees, these beautiful altars.

Scott Hammond: Like icon. Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Like, beautiful religious-

Scott Hammond: Huh

Griff Griffith: … altars.

Griff Griffith: And, um, and I've been bothered by that experience ever since.

Scott Hammond: That's a good, that's a good paradox.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, that's a trip.

Griff Griffith: So there's like, when people think about illegal pot grows and stuff-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … you know, I've been up in Northern California my whole entire life just-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … you know, except for a little bit in my childhood, but… And that's not who we usually think about when we think about, um, illegal pot grows, but I think that was a lot more common than most people realize.

Scott Hammond: So when you were at SoHum, uh, was Northern Mendocino was, um… It's that area that's east of, say, Laytonville. Pretty… That's, that's like no man's land. I've heard that's really, like, the dark, the, the dark 40 out there. There's no… It's a lawless place.

Griff Griffith: That's where we did a lot of our cleanups.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Was around Laytonville.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Griff Griffith: East and west.

Scott Hammond: I've heard that. It's a pretty scary place.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, especially back then.

Scott Hammond: My friend Mark Totten was a principal at Covelo, and, uh, he said, "You know, it's just a real diverse mess. You know, a lot of, lot of trouble."

Scott Hammond: Um,

Scott Hammond: yeah. And I-

Griff Griffith: I have a weird Covelo story too.

Scott Hammond: Go for it.

Griff Griffith: Um, so when I was 18, I got involved with… Or 19. 18, 19, I got involved with Redwood Summer.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Do you know what that is? It was like the big protest against the logging and stuff.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, with Darryl Cherney and-

Griff Griffith: Earth First, Darryl Cherney, Judy Barry, um, before she was bombed.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Griff Griffith: You know, and during.

Scott Hammond: Was that before Julia Butterfly Hill?

Griff Griffith: Long before Julia Butterfly. Julia Butterfly was probably still in elementary school when we done this.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, we lived up here, Redwood Summer.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. So Redwood Summer, 1990.

Scott Hammond: Just a lot of acts of defiance and equipment-

Griff Griffith: Yeah

Scott Hammond: … shit was broke.

Griff Griffith: And I was in Ukiah at the time, the CCC, and went to the Mendocino Environmental Center and met Betty Ball. Betty Ball is kind of this legendary-

Scott Hammond: Mm

Griff Griffith: … conservationist, environmentalist. She w- was running, um, Mendocino Environmental Center at the time. And she was like… And I told her, I was like, "Yo." I was in the Corps member, and I was like, "Yeah, we planted trees in this one spot, and it was clear-cut," and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And she's like, "Do you want us to come talk to you?" So she sent some Earth First! over. And this is funny 'cause it's a state facility, and we had these Earth First! speakers, which would never happen today.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: So, um, and they recruited a bunch of us, and we were all game for it. And except for one of my f-

Scott Hammond: Huh

Griff Griffith: … one of the fellow Corps members there was like, "My dad's a logger." And, um, he, he told some other people. He didn't tell me that, but he wanted me to go home with him the weekend, so we went to Covelo, and his dad was a logger in Covelo. And, um, I walked into the house, and there was this poster on the wall, and it was this hippie crucified to this redwood tree with a spotted owl shoved up his

Griff Griffith: ass.

Scott Hammond: Whoa.

Griff Griffith: And it said, "The proper way to spike a tree."

Scott Hammond: Whoa.

Griff Griffith: And I spent the whole weekend there. And praying that my friend wouldn't tell his family-

Scott Hammond: You were-

Griff Griffith: … that I was an Earth Firster. And I had all these shirts-

Scott Hammond: Judy and Daryl

Griff Griffith: … and stuff that I couldn't wear, so I had to wear his T-shirts and stuff 'cause I

Griff Griffith: was-

Scott Hammond: I might get… I might, something might happen.

Griff Griffith: And it was a really interesting experience, and that's how… And, and so I had to stay around his logging. It's like hardcore anti-Earth First logging family for the whole weekend.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: And he wanted that for me. He wanted me to have that experience.

Scott Hammond: Huh. How was it?

Griff Griffith: He didn't tell me. I got ambushed.

Scott Hammond: Beside being scared, how… What-

Griff Griffith: Super eye-opening.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. It, it de-radicalized me, and it put it, like, it helped

Griff Griffith: me,

Griff Griffith: um, it helped me understand the human stories on, on all sides. That's, that's why I liked Judy Bari-

Scott Hammond: That's good

Griff Griffith: … 'cause Judy Bari was more into, like, you know, s- unionizing loggers and stuff like that, and that's-

Scott Hammond: Uh-huh

Griff Griffith: … kind of the route that I went after that experience.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Like…

Scott Hammond: And she died a long time ago, right?

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: And is Daryl still alive?

Griff Griffith: Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, he's alive. He just did something in Arcata recently.

Scott Hammond: How about, how about, uh, Julia?

Griff Griffith: Julia's still alive too.

Scott Hammond: She's not ne- in… from here though, right?

Griff Griffith: She just spoke in Scotia a little while ago.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: That's kinda rad, actually. It's just that.

Griff Griffith: I know. I wish I could've saw it, yeah.

Scott Hammond: Oh. How long did she live up in a tree, a year? A little over a year.

Griff Griffith: Little over a year, yeah.

Scott Hammond: That's kinda rad.

Griff Griffith: In Luna.

Scott Hammond: And never came down that we know of.

Griff Griffith: No, never came down that we know of.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: That'd be rad in a, in a hard wind, in a storm.

Griff Griffith: Except for the part where you have to poop in jars and lower that down and have someone carry it out for you, I would be uncomfortable with that.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, that'd be-

Griff Griffith: I, I actually helped some tree sits, and that's what happened

Scott Hammond: The bucket, the bucket brigade.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Well, there's that.

Griff Griffith: But-

Scott Hammond: I remember, I remember she walked in. I worked for a newspaper. She walked into place a classified ad one day. I think that's her. It's Julia. That's kinda different.

Griff Griffith: It helped that she was good-looking and female-

Scott Hammond: Yeah, she was-

Griff Griffith: … for, to get the press on there. I mean, un- unfortunately, this is the world, the way the world is. If it had been me and me up in the tree, the tree, they probably would've cut it down while I was still in there.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, you're done.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. They'd been like, "Screw this big old guy."

Scott Hammond: An animal, man. Let's get rid of him.

Griff Griffith: He'll survive the drop. Look at him.

Scott Hammond: They're not gonna cut a beautiful young woman-

Griff Griffith: No

Scott Hammond: … out of a tree.

Griff Griffith: No.

Scott Hammond: Yeah, no.

Griff Griffith: And she was great, and I'm grateful for her bringing attention.

Griff Griffith: Um,

Griff Griffith: and it, it, it's, it's really sad 'cause during that time when she was up in the tree, uh, there was a logging, um… Maybe it was right after she came down. There was this logging show, and I went there, and it showed all this automation-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … and logging automation.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Griff Griffith: And I was like, "Julia Butterfly Hill is not the threat to your jobs. This automation is the threat." And so now in, um, if you look at how they log today, it's completely different than how they logged-

Scott Hammond: Go to the shows, yeah

Griff Griffith: … in the '80s and '90s. Yeah. Completely.

Scott Hammond: Log- You ever go to a logging conference here?

Griff Griffith: Uh, not for years.

Scott Hammond: They rotate it between here and Ukiah.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: It, you're right. It's, it's, it's equipment laden.

Griff Griffith: I-

Scott Hammond: It's heavy co- hardcore

Griff Griffith: … I got on one of, what's it called, a Ponsee? Ponsee harvester, I think it's called. But we use them in Redwoods Rising 'cause we thin the forest in Redwoods Rising because there's way too many trees.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: After we clearcut, we planted way too thick.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And so you're never gonna have a for- 'cause forest isn't trees. Forest is a bunch of things.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Okay? The, um, trees are just, like, the main backdrop of a forest, and but when you have eight million trees, you have a tree plantation.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: That's mostly what we have up here in the north coast now-

Scott Hammond: Mm

Griff Griffith: … 'cause we logged all but 4.6% of the original forest. So we have to go in there, and we have to thin it out. And so when we do, we use a Ponsee, and it's amazing because three

Griff Griffith: dudes or three people can log a forest.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: You know, they can do, they can-

Scott Hammond: They thin it out with that equipment.

Griff Griffith: They can thin it out with that equipment. It's, it, it's amazing. I, I-

Scott Hammond: Is that on a big track like a tank and with a-

Griff Griffith: Yeah, and then it cuts it, and then it grabs in it. It sizes it, cuts it to size. It is amazing to watch.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: Amazing to watch.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: But it got rid of a lot of jobs. Automation killed a lot of jobs.

Scott Hammond: And y'all own one.

Griff Griffith: Um, do we own it? I think our contractors own it.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm. Let's finish up the state park duty and then go into your current-

Griff Griffith: Okay

Scott Hammond: … duty. Can we do that?

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: So what, what did you, uh… Were you stationed up here?

Griff Griffith: Yeah. So in 2020, I got a job at Humboldt Redwoods State Park.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And I lived out at Bull Creek in that house that has no neighbors for five miles, and I absolutely loved it. And it was-

Scott Hammond: Bull Creek's cool.

Griff Griffith: Oh, man. Bull Creek is like magic.

Scott Hammond: Is that apple groves out there?

Scott Hammond: Are they-

Griff Griffith: Oh, yeah. I could stay out there for the rest of my life.

Scott Hammond: Is there a bear?

Griff Griffith: A bear?

Scott Hammond: Is there bear in general?

Griff Griffith: Oh, yeah. I was gonna say there's way more than a bear.

Scott Hammond: A bear.

Griff Griffith: There is bear.

Scott Hammond: There's multi bears.

Griff Griffith: All those trees are bear pruned. If you look at all the trees, they're all , and that's because bears pruned all, got up in there and ate all the apple. I call them bear pruned.

Scott Hammond: Uh-huh.

Griff Griffith: But it's also across the street from one of my very first salmon restoration sites.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Griff Griffith: And so, and that, and the, the one I learned on happens to be the one that's in the best… So my first one, this is bragging right now.

Griff Griffith: Um, so if I'm gonna, I, if I'm gonna brag, I'm gonna-

Scott Hammond: Do it, man. Brag

Griff Griffith: … do the brag voice and the brag face and everything. Um, so the first one that I did, that I

Griff Griffith: supervised-

Scott Hammond: Doing great

Griff Griffith: … is the only one that's doing great.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna say that.

Scott Hammond: The o- the only one that's doing great?

Griff Griffith: Yeah, the only one out of, like, 30, yeah, that's doing great.

Scott Hammond: Really? That's got salmon.

Griff Griffith: Oh, man. Yeah, 'cause when I, when I was there, because all that area landslid and it buried the creek. So the creek was under wa- under the gravel for a while.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Griff Griffith: And then it just barely above the gravel, and it was all algae and gross, and I was like, "Fish are never gonna come here." And they're like, "Well, we gotta keep doing this." Rocco, the famous geofluv-

Griff Griffith: fluvial morphologist. Geofluvial morphologist, yes. He was actually the equipment operator. Um, I didn't really talk to him at the time, but someone just told me that was Rocco that was doing all. So he placed the rocks, and me and my crew, like, put them

Griff Griffith: together.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Griff Griffith: And there's, and I didn't kn- I wasn't sure what it was gonna do. I'd done salmon surveys, and I had done salmon in the classroom when I was, when I was a student. I did salmon in the classroom.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: So I'd take salmon to different classrooms in Chico.

Griff Griffith: Um,

Griff Griffith: so this was- At the time, hard for me to fathom how this was gonna turn out. But what happened is those rocks constricted the, the water the way when you put your thumb over the hose.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: It's like shh. So it goes from like just coming out and then shh. So that's what these rock weirs that we put in. And so it created this pool, and now… And it became this… So 20 years later, 30 years later, I moved out there, and I went swimming in this pool that I created with my

Griff Griffith: crew.

Scott Hammond: Wow. Huh.

Griff Griffith: And it was full of salmon.

Scott Hammond: Whoa.

Griff Griffith: So I'd jump in the water, and I'd be like, "I am your creator." It was awesome. I loved it.

Scott Hammond: You're welcome.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. Yeah. So I swam out there, and I felt like everybody's grandpa. Yeah, it was really cool. All the fish's grandpa.

Scott Hammond: So swimming with the fishes has a different meaning in this case.

Griff Griffith: Oh, yeah.

Scott Hammond: So you retired then from the Park Service?

Griff Griffith: I re-

Scott Hammond: I keep saying Park Service. That's federal.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, State Parks.

Scott Hammond: It's a state park. Yeah.

Griff Griffith: So I, um, yeah, I retired from State Parks a little bit too

Griff Griffith: early and became a private contractor for Redwoods Rising, so I'm doing the same job, but now I'm just doing it as a private contractor.

Griff Griffith: And, and I love it. I love the project. The project's amazing.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Like, I'm so happy that I get to introduce people to it because it's, it's the kind of solutionary project that I think is gonna become the norm.

Scott Hammond: You talking about Jumpstart? Or you talking about-

Griff Griffith: Uh, Redwoods Rising

Scott Hammond: … this pro-

Griff Griffith: We can talk about Jumpstart Nature if you want.

Scott Hammond: And social media here in just a sec.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: Got it all lined up.

Griff Griffith: Okay.

Scott Hammond: We're gonna talk about social media. That's always fun.

Griff Griffith: Okay.

Scott Hammond: So, uh, I see you on LinkedIn. I'm sure you're on other platforms, but LinkedIn's an interesting choice because, um, you don't do a lot of video. You were a vi- early adapter.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: So I see your video a lot on LinkedIn-

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm

Scott Hammond: … which is, is fun. So t-tell us about your social media journey.

Griff Griffith: So I was a Luddite.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: I didn't want anything to do… My last semester in college, they made us get an email, or last year, and I was so mad 'cause I never wanted an email. I prided myself on not having one. I didn't wanna ever have a computer.

Scott Hammond: You have a cellphone?

Griff Griffith: I didn't want a cellphone. I didn't want anything like-

Scott Hammond: I've heard yours. You have one now.

Griff Griffith: I, I, yeah, I have one now. I have… Like, you'd be amazed what I have now.

Griff Griffith: But I didn't want anything to do with social media. Nothing. I wanted nothing to do with it. But I worked with all these 18 to 25-year-olds, and I did take pictures of our projects for the sponsors, you know, like Fish and Wildlife or the CCC or whoever I was working with. You know, whoever we were doing projects for at the time.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: CCC does projects for everybody. And they're like, "We want our moms to see those pictures."

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: And you can't just be like, "Oh, your moms are gonna have to use their imagination," you know? Like, you can't do that.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Griff Griffith: You, you gotta let people's moms see stuff.

Griff Griffith: So I was like, "Well, what am I, what do you want me to do?" And they're like, "We created a MySpace, a Facebook, and a YouTube for you."

Scott Hammond: Whoa.

Griff Griffith: "And here's your passwords."

Scott Hammond: Good luck.

Griff Griffith: And I was like, "All right, I-"

Scott Hammond: So they did it for you.

Griff Griffith: They did it for me.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: And our fifth or sixth video went super viral. This has been 2013 when, you know, now 50,000 things go viral every day. But back then, there was like 10 to 20 viral videos a year.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: And we were one of them.

Scott Hammond: That's cool.

Griff Griffith: And it was a dance video.

Scott Hammond: Really?

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm. Yeah. You couldn't tell by looking at me that I was a dancer?

Scott Hammond: I could guess.

Griff Griffith: Okay.

Griff Griffith: So no one ever does.

Griff Griffith: But,

Griff Griffith: um-

Scott Hammond: Did you wanna do a quick dance?

Griff Griffith: I could, yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Oh, maybe a little-

Griff Griffith: I'll just do a, I'll do an arm wave for you.

Scott Hammond: That's pretty good.

Griff Griffith: That's pretty good. Yeah. It was pop…

Griff Griffith: I was-

Scott Hammond: I do a little bit of, I do a little bit of mime.

Griff Griffith: Oh, do you?

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: I was a breakdancer in the '80s. I was white boy fresh.

Scott Hammond: I was a mime at Humboldt.

Griff Griffith: Were you really?

Scott Hammond: Recreation major.

Griff Griffith: Oh, dang.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Wow.

Scott Hammond: Nothing to do with my scripture.

Griff Griffith: We could, we could take this act on the road.

Griff Griffith: I don't…

Scott Hammond: Back-

Griff Griffith: Two older bald guys dancing. I think- … we'd go viral again.

Scott Hammond: Again and again.

Griff Griffith: And again and again. So anyways, this-

Scott Hammond: So you went viral with this dance?

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: What's that about?

Griff Griffith: It's called The Boss Dance, Dances Like a Boss.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: And we were cleaning up a remote facility.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: So I worked with 18 to 25-year-olds, so you gotta… You know, and, and I'm this big white dude.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And so imagine being a young, urban Black guy.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And you are, never been, like, outside of LA or

Griff Griffith: Oakland-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … you know, for any long period of time.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Griff Griffith: And then you join the CCC, and right away they tell you you're gonna go camping for

Griff Griffith: eight days.

Scott Hammond: That'd be cool.

Griff Griffith: And you've never been camping before in your life.

Scott Hammond: Terrifying, probably.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: And then you look at who's taking you, and it's a big, giant, hairy white dude.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And you're like, "I don't really… I don't even know if I'd feel safe with this dude, let alone in the middle of the woods with him."

Scott Hammond: Right.

Griff Griffith: Looks like, you know, Jason and Freddy, you know, all those guys wrapped up into

Griff Griffith: one.

Scott Hammond: All the guys. Yeah.

Griff Griffith: With a little bit of Grizzly Adams.

Griff Griffith: So the older folks got that.

Griff Griffith: Um,

Griff Griffith: so-

Scott Hammond: That's aging yourself big time.

Griff Griffith: I, um-

Scott Hammond: Grizzly Adams

Griff Griffith: … that was my man. Loved Grizzly Adams.

Scott Hammond: That was a good show.

Griff Griffith: Um, and Ben, isn't Bear? But so we… So I always try to, like, help people feel comfortable-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … with me, you know, to be able to relate to me and stuff. And I grew up in the Bay Area, and I used to be a breakdancer, so I'm, like, not a stranger to hip-hop culture or urban stuff, you know?

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Griff Griffith: I just seem like it, but I'm, I'm-

Scott Hammond: You're, you're a good-

Griff Griffith: I get it. I get it

Scott Hammond: … you're a good guy. Yeah.

Griff Griffith: So we were in a remote facility down in Leggett, and by the CAL FIRE station, and we were cleaning up, uh, breakfast, and we had some music on. And one of them said, "Get in there and dance," and I did.

Griff Griffith: And, um, later on that day, and I had this little recorder 'cause this is what, you know, I was using to, so their moms could see the videos.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Griff Griffith: And so I looked at it, and I was like, "Man." I was like, "I look stupid." Like, "I look like an idiot."

Scott Hammond: Perfect. Perfect.

Griff Griffith: Big old fat white guy dancing with these-

Scott Hammond: We-

Griff Griffith: … athletic, young, you know-

Scott Hammond: We were breakdancing?

Griff Griffith: Kind of.

Griff Griffith: And, um-

Scott Hammond: You might call it that

Griff Griffith: … and so I was gonna delete it. I was like, "Check it out before I delete it." And Antoine McCoy, who's still a good friend of mine, he was like… He's also in the video, and he's like, "No, I want my mom to see it." 'Cause, you know, at the time everybody was trying to hook me up with their mom.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Griff Griffith: Like, everybody was trying to hook me up with their mom. So, um, I was like, "All right. Tell your mom she's got two weeks 'cause I'm not leaving that up there 'cause no one needs to see a fat cowboy dancing."

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: So I put it up there, and at the time I was working with Rue Mapp from Outdoor Afro.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: And, um, Akima Price, who worked on the, like urban community. Uh, we, we were working with the National Association for Environmental

Griff Griffith: Education-

Scott Hammond: Hmm

Griff Griffith: … on a project, and they saw this. Akima and Rue saw this, and they're like, "Do not take that down. It shows cultural competency."

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: And I was like, "Cultural competency, what is that?"

Scott Hammond: They like that.

Griff Griffith: And, um, they're like, "You're a big, fat, old white dude, and you can relate to young Black men." You know, this is not-

Scott Hammond: People are having a good time together.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. This is, this is perfect. Leave it up there. And so I was like, "Okay."

Scott Hammond: And this is on Facebook?

Griff Griffith: It was on YouTube.

Scott Hammond: YouTube.

Griff Griffith: And so, and then one day my boss meets me at work. This is a hardcore dude. You know, his name was Mark. He was a… What's his last name? He was like a CCC legend, but he was a har- he was a hardcore dude. And he looks frazzled, and he's like, "It's about time you're here." I'm like, "I'm 15 minutes early, bro." And he's like, "Headline News is on the phone. Good Morning America's on the phone. Today Show's on the phone. They're all waiting for you. Your video's going viral."

Scott Hammond: Really?

Griff Griffith: And I was like-

Scott Hammond: Heck yeah

Griff Griffith: … and the night before, Rue Mapp called me and told me it was going viral, but I didn't know what viral meant meant.

Scott Hammond: Because you're a Luddite.

Griff Griffith: And yeah. And so Rue Mapp from Outdoor Afro, she's also a state park commissioner. Um, she's the founder of Outdoor Afro. She, she, like, coached me the night before, and she's like, "You're gonna be on… You know, they're gonna wanna interview you, and they're gonna wanna take you aside. And it's this race thing, and so, like, they're gonna bring up the race thing, and, like, I just wanna make sure that you, you're ready for this." And so she walked me through-

Scott Hammond: Huh

Griff Griffith: … like what to say. So I'm like, "Okay, thanks, Rue." And I was like, "Man, Rue's awesome. Like Ukiah Daily Journal, I'm sure I could've handled that." Like, that's what I'm thinking.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Griff Griffith: And then I got to work, and my boss is like-

Scott Hammond: Time stamp

Griff Griffith: … "'Good Morning America,' 'Today Show,' 'Headline News' is on the phone."

Scott Hammond: So these cats are interviewing you on the phone?

Griff Griffith: Yeah, so all of a sudden I'm on, like, on TV and-

Scott Hammond: On camera.

Griff Griffith: Oh, yeah. And I was on tons of shows.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: I was on the news in Russia.

Scott Hammond: Oh, wow.

Griff Griffith: Like, yeah. I was, like, in Australia. Like, it was-

Scott Hammond: Like, "Yo, comrade."

Griff Griffith: Oh, man. Everybody saw. Like, it was on, it was on TV, it was on MTV, it was on everything, and, um, it led to me… And so the, so… I should've known I was gonna tell the story and thought about it before I got in front of the microphone.

Griff Griffith: But the director of the CCC called me, and I thought, "He's either gonna fire me for dancing in uniform-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … or he is gonna be cool." And he was totally cool.

Scott Hammond: He's in Sa-

Griff Griffith: David Meraki

Scott Hammond: … Sacramento?

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: And he was like, "You re- you inc- you increased the CCC recruitment by 1000% with that video. Thank you very much."

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Griff Griffith: 'Cause we were having a recruitment crisis at the time.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: And so I went, "Wow, social media. I wonder if I talked about conservation issues. I wonder if I, I wonder if I told people to plant native plants. I wonder if I told people to keep their cat ins- inside as much as they possibly can. I wonder if I told people, you know, plant these native plants in these areas to attract these things. I wonder if that would get out there."

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: And so I started having my corps members do videos.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: And those videos all did really well, and I've been doing social media ever since.

Scott Hammond: Wow. Never looked back.

Griff Griffith: No, and now I get paid to do it. Now it's my, my job.

Scott Hammond: That's cool.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Do you have a producer and a guy that films you and the whole nine?

Griff Griffith: Yeah, we all look exactly the same, and our name's Griff.

Scott Hammond: Oh, so it's you. You're a one-man team.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: So you had to set up your own lighting and do the whole nine?

Griff Griffith: Yeah, but I do it, like, redneck style. I just-

Scott Hammond: Ru-

Griff Griffith: I don't think too-

Scott Hammond: Griff is better sometimes.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. I'm just like a-

Scott Hammond: Yeah

Griff Griffith: … "Oh, blah, blah, blah." I'm not, like, fancy-

Scott Hammond: Oh, yeah

Griff Griffith: … like some other people are.

Scott Hammond: Do you have a, a stick?

Griff Griffith: It works.

Scott Hammond: Do you do the stick?

Griff Griffith: Sometimes. Yeah. Sometimes I put… I have a tripod, too. Sometimes I stick with the tripod, but I'm really, really

Griff Griffith: basic.

Scott Hammond: So let's call out your, all your channels real quick. So if we wanted to find you, how do we find your stuff?

Griff Griffith: So Redwood Rising on TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube. My own stuff, @GriffWilds. You can find @GriffWild on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok.

Scott Hammond: LinkedIn?

Griff Griffith: LinkedIn.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Um, and then Jumpstart Nature is a pod- my podcast. So I host a podcast called Jumpstart Nature.

Scott Hammond: Talk about that.

Griff Griffith: It's in Radiolab style-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … so it's not me interviewing, like what we're doing right here.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: It's not live.

Scott Hammond: So you're just talk, you're just talking.

Griff Griffith: Um, it's, I, it's a script, and so we interview… So we have, my partner Michael Hawk was a global Google engineering manager.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: I know. Isn't that an impressive title?

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: So it's, like, the most humble dude, too. Never even got a college degree.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: He did that job, and he never had a college degree.

Scott Hammond: No way.

Griff Griffith: Isn't that crazy? Wouldn't you assume he had a PhD or something?

Scott Hammond: He's a Google dude, though.

Griff Griffith: He's the, was, like, the Google dude.

Scott Hammond: Really?

Griff Griffith: Yeah. So then he retired, and now he's going back to Google, but, um, he retired to get Jumpstart Nature jump-started. So, and he's got Nature's Archive, another podcast where it's just, like, a deep dive into ecological topics. But Jumpstart Nature is kind of just, like, more action-oriented, action inspiring. Like, so here's what you as a normal person could do. So you don't have to be a biologist to understand it.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: We don't use any fancy jargon. We have, like, experts on. Because of his

Griff Griffith: title, a lot of people say yes when we ask them. So we've had Doug Tallamy, we've had Ben Goldfarb. We've had, like, authors of books. We have, like, major scientists on because, you know, they're like, "Wow, can't be too bad if it's a dude from Go-" You know.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: So-

Scott Hammond: Knows, knows what he's got going.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. And so, um-

Scott Hammond: Is that up here, or was it elsewhere?

Griff Griffith: The podcast?

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Uh, I do my part up here.

Scott Hammond: Gotcha.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. So, and then it's like a story, and it's wove. And so the idea is basically to inspire action for conservation, to, like, get people to… Like, 'cause there's little things you can do that can, uh, translate into major help for

Griff Griffith: wildlife.

Scott Hammond: Top three takeaways, what are they?

Griff Griffith: To ex- to, uh, expound on the little things you can do?

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Or maybe you got 10, I don't know.

Scott Hammond: How many?

Griff Griffith: I got a million if we sat here. Um, so the most important to me is planting native plants.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Griff Griffith: 'Cause the reason why, here's why. 'Cause people are like, "Native plants, what, who cares?" All plants are poisonous to something. Okay? 'Cause if you're stuck in the ground and you can't get away from something that has a bunch of teeth-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … you know, what are you gonna do?

Scott Hammond: Get poisonous.

Griff Griffith: You better get poisonous. Better get some thorns. You know what I'm saying?

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: So almost all plants are poisonous. So our insects… And insects are also specialists. So 95% of our insects are specializing on a certain family of plants because they've evolved or were created, however you wanna think about it, to be able to eat this plant. Okay? So think monarch and milkweed. If you want monarchs, you have to plant milkweed, a poisonous plant.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Okay? Because it's not poisonous to the monarch because they evolved or were created to deal with this poison.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: That is not a exceptional story. That's, like, the rule. Most plants have things that specialize on them, host plants. And when people think about pollinator gardens, like, "I wanna attract beautiful little bees and butterflies to my yard," and they plant a bunch of flowers, that's like building a town and, like, just the only things you build are fast food restaurants.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Like, you gotta have houses, you know?

Scott Hammond: Schools.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And that's your host plants. That's the, that's the milkweeds.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: That's the oak trees. Oak trees are the best h- host plant.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: Um, so you need those plant… And that's what attracts the insects to lay their eggs, and then they make caterpillars. Now, people are like, "I want birds. I want a bird feeder." A lot, most birds don't want to do bird feeders, and hardly any birds feed seeds to their babies. I mean, imagine your little baby and your mom's throwing up, like, crushed up seeds in your mouth. That's not cool.

Scott Hammond: No.

Griff Griffith: Unless you're a pigeon or a dove. But, um, most of them want to feed their babies insects,

Griff Griffith: but not just any insects, 'cause you don't want to keep giving your baby spiny, stingy-

Scott Hammond: Sure

Griff Griffith: … roaches or something.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: So you wanna give them caterpillars. And so butterflies and moths lay their caterpillars on their host plants. So if you plant the host plant, you are planting your bird feeder. That's episode two in Jumpstart Nature, is planting your bird feeder.

Scott Hammond: So native plants.

Griff Griffith: Native plants by far are the number one-

Scott Hammond: Oh

Griff Griffith: … best thing that everybody can do. And, you know, all you need is a balcony or a porch. You can, you can plant them at your church, your workplace, wherever. You can plant native plants and make a huge difference for migratory species, you know, 'cause our native plants bury at the right time. So that's what you wanna do. You wanna plant native plants.

Scott Hammond: Number one.

Griff Griffith: Yes.

Scott Hammond: So I can go to Miller Farms. I can go to Pearson's, get some native plants.

Griff Griffith: You can go to CMPS, the California Native Plant Society.

Scott Hammond: Oh, where's that?

Griff Griffith: Um, it's, um, Freshwater.

Scott Hammond: Yes.

Griff Griffith: So right up there, they have their nursery, and then you can go to Lost Foods

Griff Griffith: on the, um, fairgrounds, and they sell native plants, too.

Scott Hammond: Oh, really?

Griff Griffith: It's called Li- Lost Foods Nursery.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Griff Griffith: And if you wanna know exactly, you can go to calscape.org and you can put in your ZIP code. And if you do, if you live outside of California, you can go to National Wildlife Federation. Just put in native plant finder.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Put in your ZIP code. It will tell you… And you can pick the butterflies you want. So if you are, like, just one of those people and you're feeling dandy and you just wanna have, like, beautiful butterflies in your backyard, you can look up the butterfly and it will tell you the native plants to plant-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … to attract that butterfly. So that's the number one thing you could do.

Scott Hammond: I like to feel dandy.

Griff Griffith: Every once in a while, yeah. I just-

Scott Hammond: Every once in a while

Griff Griffith: … I've been reading Brett Harte. And Brett Harte was a, is, was a dandy.

Scott Hammond: He was a dandy.

Griff Griffith: So I've been saying dandy. Yeah, I've been saying dandy a lot.

Scott Hammond: He got in fights and stuff down in Old Town.

Griff Griffith: Brett Harte was… I, I, uh, I've been hanging out with Steve Lazar lately. Do you know who he is?

Scott Hammond: I know his name.

Griff Griffith: He's a Humboldt County commissioner. He's on the, on the board and stuff, and active with, um, Humboldt Historical Society.

Scott Hammond: Lazar.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. And he's like, he's as nerdy as I am.

Scott Hammond: Uh-huh.

Griff Griffith: But he's a history nerd, where I'm more ecological nerd.

Scott Hammond: He's told you some Brett Harte stories?

Griff Griffith: And gave me this book with a Brett Harte story, which is about Roaring, I think Roaring Camp or something like that. It's fascinating. But Brett Harte was-

Scott Hammond: He got in a big fight at Oberon.

Griff Griffith: Did he?

Scott Hammond: He got his ass… He kicked some ass, and I think he got in the hospital for a couple days, too.

Griff Griffith: Oh, oh.

Scott Hammond: And then, uh, the old, uh, Brucci, which is now the, uh, basement, uh, in Jacoby Storehouse in Arcata-

Griff Griffith: Hmm

Scott Hammond: … was called Brett Harte's.

Griff Griffith: Oh, dang.

Scott Hammond: Having to do with Brett Harte.

Griff Griffith: I'm gonna take a deep dive on Brett Harte here in the next year or so.

Scott Hammond: He's a famous writer, right? Came up here and spent some time.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. And became friends with Mark Twain and-

Scott Hammond: And Jack London was down somewhere.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: I think he was at Sonoma, Glen Ellen.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. There were some cool writers.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Some k- some real interesting cats came through.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm. Yeah, so I'm, I'm studying-

Scott Hammond: Jed Smith.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: My great-great-great-grandfather, Jedediah Hammond, Hammond

Scott Hammond: Lumber.

Griff Griffith: Oh, whoa.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. You're buying that?

Griff Griffith: So you got… Well, sure. Why not?

Scott Hammond: Just saying it. Might be true.

Griff Griffith: No, I'm gonna believe everything right now 'cause you're on camera, so I figure.

Scott Hammond: The Hammond Ta- Hammond Trail named after us. If Joni was here, she'd just be giving you, like-

Griff Griffith: She'd be like, "This dude"

Scott Hammond: … that stink eye.

Griff Griffith: He's from San Diego. He doesn't know.

Scott Hammond: He's, you know, he's from Iowa.

Griff Griffith: He doesn't know.

Scott Hammond: Those Iowa guys, they try to get away with stuff.

Griff Griffith: They got a cornfield named after them.

Griff Griffith: That's, uh-

Scott Hammond: That's-

Scott Hammond: … the Corn Palace out in Iowa. It's a fam- It's a thing, actually.

Griff Griffith: Is it?

Scott Hammond: The Corn Palace is, like, a whole, like Trees of Mystery.

Griff Griffith: Oh, whoa.

Scott Hammond: It's the Corn of Mystery.

Griff Griffith: Now I'm kinda scared to go there already.

Scott Hammond: You should be. Uh, I've never… I don't think I'd go. So, uh, tell me more about, um, um, Jumpstart Nature. Is it… Well, actually, you're on number two, so we're gonna plant native plants. What's number two?

Griff Griffith: Well, the last episode of Jumpstart Nature was about cats.

Scott Hammond: Oh, the cat thing.

Griff Griffith: And I'm a cat lover.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: But cats kill billions of songbirds a year. They're like… People don't realize how destructive cats are.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: And I love cats. Cats are, like, my best friend is a cat. Like, I love cats.

Scott Hammond: What if you didn't like cats and you were still telling the truth about, which I believe you are? It, it, I, I don't really care for our cat, so-

Griff Griffith: Your own cat?

Scott Hammond: I don't really want Ricky inside either.

Griff Griffith: I hope your wife likes it.

Scott Hammond: So I'm kind of in a dilemma here.

Griff Griffith: Does your wife like the cat?

Scott Hammond: Loves the cat.

Griff Griffith: Oh.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: We better watch it.

Scott Hammond: All right, Joni, you heard it here first.

Griff Griffith: I have to look, 'cause one of you might end up outside.

Scott Hammond: Going after songbirds.

Griff Griffith: At 50/50. No, my-

Scott Hammond: What's Scott doing? He's after the songbirds again

Griff Griffith: … I love cats. Dogs are too busy for me. They want too much attention. I have, like, commitment issues. But, um, cats, you gotta really work. I like that hard to get thing cats have.

Scott Hammond: You gotta work for their love.

Griff Griffith: You gotta work for their love, yeah.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: My cats are like, "Whatever," until it's like, until they're hungry.

Scott Hammond: So keep kitty inside 'cause he or she's gonna be out there killing stuff.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, and a lot, and a lot of people are like, "But that's natural. Survival of the fittest." No, it's not natural, and it's not survival of the fittest. It's not. I know that's easy to say.

Scott Hammond: How about gophers, and moles, and voles? Is that what you think there, there's a role there? 'Cause they seem to be out of control in McKinleyville.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, well, when you remove all the predators and you provide perfect habitat for rats and mice, you know, and, like, food and trash, and all that kind of stuff, you're gonna get those things. There's other ways to manage.

Scott Hammond: I mean, I mean gophers digging up the yard.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. Um, do cats help with that a lot?

Scott Hammond: Some.

Griff Griffith: Hmm.

Scott Hammond: Not enough.

Griff Griffith: My mom's got weasels at her house to handle the gophers.

Scott Hammond: Wow, weasels.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, she lives right next to Widow White Creek, so they come in there. And she has foxes too that take care of the gophers.

Scott Hammond: A lot of fox in McKinleyville.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Um, yeah, there's other ways to handle gophers, but I… But the cats are gonna kill 10 birds for every gopher.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: And usually when they're migrating through. And also, when your cat kills a bird, and it was a mama bird-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … there's three babies that are slowly starving on the da- you know? "Oh, look it. She brought me a gift." And then there's three babies that are, like, up in the bushes, you know, starving to death because Mom's dead.

Griff Griffith: Um, so I have a catio. And I understand a lot of people already have outdoor cats, and it's too late.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And so what I'd say to them is just make a pledge that your next cat will be

Griff Griffith: indoors.

Scott Hammond: That's good.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. If you can't keep-

Scott Hammond: Fair

Griff Griffith: … this cat… Yeah, 'cause then, like, it's hard to take a outdoor cat-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … and put it in. I understand. I had outdoor cats before.

Griff Griffith: Um, so I get it. Just make a pledge that your next cat is gonna be indoors.

Scott Hammond: Gonna be an indoor cat.

Griff Griffith: So episode 10 is about cats, and everybody on our team is a cat lover. Like, we all have cats. We all are pro-cat. Cats are from Northern Africa. They're desert animals that had big territories.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Okay? And we take, took them, and we put them in a city block. So you have, like, you know, you could have 10 to 100 cats per city block.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Griff Griffith: There's not that many terrestrial predators per that space anywhere that's natural. That's why when people say, "It's natural," no it's not. And also, they're subsidized with food. So they're super healthy.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: They can just keep killing, and killing, and killing. There's nothing natural about it.

Scott Hammond: They're killing for fun.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, there's nothing natural about it. It's not natural.

Scott Hammond: Natural born killers.

Griff Griffith: And it's not survival of the fittest either.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Survival of the fittest is an evolutionary concept that takes hundreds if not thousands of years to be realized.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Griff Griffith: It's a slow… When you take an, a species and you put it on a plane, and you fly it 3,000 miles, that's not survival, and then let it out, and it doesn't have any predators and competitors.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Okay? It doesn't have… And you didn't bring any of its natural diseases. You didn't bring any of its natural-

Scott Hammond: It ain't survival.

Griff Griffith: It ain't survival of the fittest. This is invasive species. This is an invasion.

Scott Hammond: Sure.

Griff Griffith: This is unnatural, human-induced… This is anthropocentric invasion. It's not survival of the fittest. And cats from, they're a desert animal that we brought over here, and we have them in such huge… Like, where are predators that… Where can you find that many predators per, you know,

Griff Griffith: block?

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Like piranha in the Amazon maybe.

Scott Hammond: And who's killing the cats? Nobody.

Griff Griffith: No, except for cars.

Scott Hammond: Occasional, occasional car or dog.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: I saw a big mountain lion at Beau Pre Golf Course years ago.

Griff Griffith: Maybe they had some cats for dinner.

Scott Hammond: That was a big cat. Probably ate cats.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, they usually do.

Scott Hammond: God, that was a big dude, man. He was big. So, uh, talk to me more about other pro-… So number three, and then I, I'm gonna wrap it up by talking to you about just the rest of the projects and what you're up to coming, coming up down the road.

Griff Griffith: Okay.

Scott Hammond: So real- re- so no cats indoors. Native s- species plants.

Griff Griffith: Support wildlife crossings.

Scott Hammond: What's that?

Griff Griffith: So they're like overpasses or underpasses that w- the animals can cross our

Griff Griffith: roads.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And so, um, another thing that I hear a lot is like, "Well, survival of the fittest. They're so stupid, they can't cross the road."

Griff Griffith: Ah. So nothing evolved for hollow rocks speeding across the ground at 65 miles per hour here. Nothing evolved for that, okay? And the way that a lot of species defend themselves against predators is not by running away.

Griff Griffith: Porcupines, have you ever caught a porcupine before?

Scott Hammond: Mm-mm.

Griff Griffith: I used to do it all the time. You could, I could chase them down and put them in a, in a trash can, look at them, let them go. I used to do that. Don't do that, folks.

Griff Griffith: Um, but they have quills. They're not trying to run.

Griff Griffith: Skunk doesn't run. It lifts its tail and spray.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Griff Griffith: So when a car comes, they try to spray the car. That's what they know how to do. So these animals didn't evolve to getting quickly out of something's way.

Scott Hammond: They get hit a lot. Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Yeah. That's not their trip.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: And the reason why you're seeing skunks right now all over the road is because in February, the males are all looking for females.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: And they have a Pepé Le Pew type

Griff Griffith: motivation. Um, Pepé Le Pew's not allowed to be shown on TV anymore. Did you know that?

Scott Hammond: I did not know that.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, because he was a sexual harasser.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Is that true?

Griff Griffith: Yeah. And that's also, and that's how skunks really are too. They're not great fathers. They just, like, find. They're, they're like, "Brroom, brroom, brroom."

Scott Hammond: Pepé Le Pew.

Griff Griffith: Like Pepé Le Pew was. And then they impregnate a female, and they don't

Griff Griffith: help at all.

Scott Hammond: And they're gone.

Griff Griffith: No. Nothing, like the worst baby daddy you've ever heard.

Scott Hammond: Aren't elk like that? Do elk hang out?

Griff Griffith: Yeah. Yeah. Uh, yeah, they hang out a little bit longer. I think they hang… Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Huh.

Griff Griffith: Not really, though. No. No, never mind. I take that back. Elk don't really hang out. They don't care either.

Scott Hammond: Almost forgot a key part of the show here.

Griff Griffith: Men, men animals are just awful.

Scott Hammond: Before we go any further, here's the quiz, the quiz show.

Scott Hammond: Ready?

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: This is for all the bucks. Thanks, Dutch Brothers, for coffee. And you too could win a coffee coupon if you answer correctly.

Griff Griffith: Oh, no.

Scott Hammond: Question number one.

Griff Griffith: Oh, I'm the player. Okay.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Yeah, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're the contestant.

Griff Griffith: I'm player one. Okay. Okay.

Scott Hammond: I'll be the game show host.

Griff Griffith: All right.

Scott Hammond: All right. Question number one. You get to hike any trail. You got all day. We pay you money to do it. We got food. You got a companion. Where, what trail, where do you go in

Scott Hammond: Humboldt?

Griff Griffith: Oh, God. That was the hardest question you could have possibly have asked me.

Scott Hammond: Really?

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: That's good. I, I feel good about my question.

Griff Griffith: I built trails here. I was on the state park trail crew. That's one of the seasonal jobs I forgot to tell you.

Griff Griffith: Um,

Griff Griffith: in 1997.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: James Irvine or Bull Creek Trail.

Scott Hammond: Bull Creek. Hmm.

Griff Griffith: Um, my favorite grove is the Mahan Plaque Grove, but mostly because Laura Mahan is my number one conservation hero.

Scott Hammond: Where's that?

Griff Griffith: Uh, Humboldt Redwoods State Park.

Scott Hammond: Is it off the-

Griff Griffith: It's right by Founders Grove. So if you go to Founders Grove-

Scott Hammond: Okay

Griff Griffith: … you can walk to the pla- plaque grove.

Scott Hammond: Oh, it's right there. Okay.

Griff Griffith: Ma- Mahan Plaque Grove, yeah. Where Laura Mahan, like, stopped the logging so that, 'cause the Women's Federation was buying that grove.

Scott Hammond: Oh, right, right, right. Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, Laura's awesome.

Scott Hammond: Been there. And then Bull Creek has its own trail system.

Griff Griffith: Yep.

Scott Hammond: So to go to Grasshopper, that's the other way.

Griff Griffith: Uh, Grasshopper, you could, you could hike up to Grasshopper.

Scott Hammond: From there, right?

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: It kinda connects.

Griff Griffith: I was, I was on a spike. I was camping out at the top of Gra- Grasshopper doing, uh, meadow restoration, which means cutting down Douglas fir trees when I found out my grandmother had a stroke and was gonna die, and I was, like, 40 years old, and I cried all the way down the trail. It was, like, one of the few times I've cried in my life.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: I just had to share that with everybody for some reason.

Scott Hammond: Thanks.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: It's okay to cry.

Griff Griffith: Yeah, I'm not going to.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: In case you're waiting for that.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Can you cry for us?

Scott Hammond: So funny how crying is, is joyful and sad. You can have the, the, the combo.

Griff Griffith: I know. But does that mean that I get a free coffee?

Scott Hammond: We'll see. See how much you cry.

Griff Griffith: Oh, God.

Scott Hammond: So-

Griff Griffith: My coffee that bad?

Scott Hammond: Question number two.

Griff Griffith: Okay.

Scott Hammond: Where do you go for coffee? You're a coffee dude.

Scott Hammond: You, I mean-

Griff Griffith: I'm a major coffee dude. Songbird Coffee.

Scott Hammond: Oh, yes.

Griff Griffith: Smithsonian label. Songbird Coffee. They have it in Eureka Natural Foods. That's the coffee I drink. That's the coffee you should drink because-

Scott Hammond: Wow

Griff Griffith: … coffee, like, it cracks me up 'cause, like… All right, let me, let me start over. I don't wanna sound like an elitist. I almost, I almost sounded-

Scott Hammond: You almost went there

Griff Griffith: … caught myself.

Scott Hammond: Yeah.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Thanks.

Griff Griffith: Um,

Griff Griffith: so everybody loves coffee, and, and, and a lot of people who love coffee also love the

Griff Griffith: environment.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Coffee's one of the worst things you can drink for the environment.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Griff Griffith: And when they say shade grown, that doesn't mean anything.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: So when you go to all, like, the little fancy hippie stores, and they're like, "We got shade grown coffee"-

Scott Hammond: Means nothing

Griff Griffith: … doesn't mean anything.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: You could plant eucalyptus between those rows. You can plant palm oil, and that's what they usually plant-

Scott Hammond: Huh

Griff Griffith: … is palm oil trees. So it's just, like, a doubling plantation. There's nothing for birds there.

Scott Hammond: Right.

Griff Griffith: Songbird Coffee has the Smithsonian Bird Safe label on it. It's the only coffee that I'm aware of at this time. If one of your listeners know of another coffee, I'd be happy to hear about it.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: But it's the only one that I've been able to find.

Scott Hammond: Songbird.

Griff Griffith: Songbird Coffee-

Scott Hammond: Is it good?

Griff Griffith: … with the Smithsonian label. It's excellent.

Scott Hammond: Really?

Griff Griffith: And, um, it's the only one that's monitored, and they have to plant a certain amount of native plants.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Griff Griffith: I think it's, like, 25%.

Scott Hammond: Oh.

Griff Griffith: Um, it might be 15, 15, 25%. So they, so there has to be habitat for birds, and that's where our birds go. So our birds are in the redwoods, like the Wilson's Warbler, which is a beautiful yellow bird with this black cap. They fly down California through San Francisco, through your yard, and you don't have any native plants. They can't eat there.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: Um, they have to go to your friend's house, who has the native plants. They can eat there. And then they fly through LA. Again, they're looking for the people who planted native plants. They're eating there. Flying at night, landing during the day, eating. And then they end up in coffee plantations.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: If there's nothing to eat there, our birds aren't coming back.

Scott Hammond: Hmm.

Griff Griffith: So if you love birds, you have to do the whole migration, 'cause a lot of our birds are m- like, most of our birds are migratory.

Scott Hammond: Songbird.

Griff Griffith: So, um, Songbird Coffee, for sale at Eureka Natural Foods.

Scott Hammond: Located in Eureka and McKinleyville.

Griff Griffith: Yep.

Scott Hammond: Open today.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: From 8:00 to s- 9:00. 8:00, 8:00 to 8:00 tomorrow.

Griff Griffith: And it is expensive.

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm.

Griff Griffith: You know? So it's like, you know, if I was broke most of my whole entire life-

Scott Hammond: Mm-hmm

Griff Griffith: … and so I wouldn't, you know, be hard for me to drink something like that. So if you know somebody who's broke and loves the environment, buy, that's your gift for them is you buy them Songbird Coffee, and you stoke them with that.

Scott Hammond: That's cool.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: Okay. Love it. Uh, parting shots. So how do we get ahold of you if we wanna say hi, support your, your

Scott Hammond: causes?

Griff Griffith: Um, my personal… I have two Facebook pages that are both Griff Griffith, but if you go to @GriffWild, that's my Facebook page, where I'm usually the most

Griff Griffith: personal at.

Scott Hammond: Okay.

Griff Griffith: Um, and then if you put in Redwoods Rising, you can find me on all the platforms talking about this amazing project. And you can go to redwoodsrising.org. Um, it's a solutionary project. It's something that people are gonna copy, um, all over the planet, hopefully.

Scott Hammond: Wow.

Griff Griffith: Because we're fixing our forest, and we're bringing our fish back.

Scott Hammond: So the model is here.

Griff Griffith: Oh, yeah. Of course.

Scott Hammond: Cool.

Griff Griffith: You know how we are here.

Scott Hammond: It's how Hum- it's how we roll in Humboldt.

Griff Griffith: It's how we roll. We innovate, and so it's-

Scott Hammond: This is the guy, Brett McFarland. That's how, that's how we do it in Humboldt.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: He's, you know-

Griff Griffith: Is that who it is?

Scott Hammond: Hey, Brett. We should have you on the show. Have you interviewed Brett yet? He's pretty cool. Well, I'm gonna, I'm gonna bring it to a close and thank you and present your prize here in a minute.

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm.

Scott Hammond: Uh, hey, thanks for listening. Look for us on, uh, Facebook, on, uh,

Scott Hammond: YouTube-

Griff Griffith: Mm-hmm

Scott Hammond: … on TikTok. I'm, uh, we're on a lot on YouTube. We're on, uh, Access Humboldt and all the podcast platforms, and

Scott Hammond: like us, um, and enter to win a, uh, Dutch Brothers card with a positive review. I'm gonna do a drawing once a, once a month.

Griff Griffith: And when you're there, ask them if they carry Songbird Coffee.

Scott Hammond: And when you're there, don't forget. Oh, good one. And we'll be back next week. Griff, thanks for coming, man.

Griff Griffith: Yeah.

Scott Hammond: Appreciate you.

Griff Griffith: Thanks for having me.

Scott Hammond: Yeah. Take care.

Griff Griffith: Cool.

Scott Hammond: Thanks.