The Daily - August 10, 2021 - 26

Ideas
B I G A C T I O N
The film Drop follows
the voyage
of water from the
top of the Continental
Divide to
the Pacific Ocean.
research ecologist and director
of the USGS Climate Change in
Mountain Ecosystems Project.
He was one of the inspirations
for this film (way back in your
college days when you interviewed
him). Can you speak to
some of the climate predictions
he shared years ago and what
you observe now?
Dr. Fagre used scientific studies
from over the 30 years before [our
interview] that led to his hypothesis
that we would see a lot of big
changes. Everything from an earlier
and more dramatic runoff that
ends sooner-and we run out of
water in the Flathead sooner; two
catastrophic wildfires that burned
hotter and longer, to the west side
of [Glacier National Park] having
more moisture, the east side having
different drawing periods; threats
to certain 'canary in the coal mine'
wildlife, like the pica; what might
happen to mountain goats if the
snow line changes and that grizzly
bears can get up higher...
Different things that he was
saying that over the next 25 years
through my life, I just started like
mentally checking off...[and] it's
weird right now. We can have these
mega spikes and our runoffs are
just bananas in terms of predictability.
It's like the Katy Perry
song, it's hot and it's cold...it's all
over the place.
After releasing this film, do you
have any major highlights or
memorable moments?
I think I'm most proud of witnessing
what some of the people did
26
WE'RE CHOOSING THE VENDORS WHO ARE
PAYING ATTENTION TO THEIR SUPPLY CHAIN,
TO THEIR PACKAGING, TO THE MATERIALS...
AND PUTTING PRESSURE ON THEM.
within this film is being able to see
fly shops go carbon neutral - and
zero waste was huge. That wasn't
something that I saw before we
started to make this film. This film
didn't have anything to do with
it. Hopefully it will in the future
because we talked about it. But
during the process of making the
film, one of the things that I saw
was that they influenced each other
as fly shop owners and managers
and guides and Outfitters. Dave
McCoy, who hosted our Q and A
[after the film's release on Earth
Day], is the first fly shop to go
carbon neutral in the country. He
set this great example of not only
that it was something important
to do, but how to do it. So my fly
shop - Larry's fly, which is short
for Hillary - is going through that
process and it has helped me look
at my business in a whole new way.
/ OUTDOOR RETAILER SUMMER 2021
You start to see your actual impact,
your actual footprint and then start
to realize, yeah, there's definitely
things that you can do to lessen
that and cause positive change that
can scale up.
Speaking of " scaling up, " what
does that mean for climate
change and this effort of so
many to go carbon neutral?
So you've got these fly shops that
are going carbon neutral now all
across the country and guides and
outfitters who are committing to
go carbon neutral and the scale
up part is that now we're putting
pressure on our vendors. We're
choosing the vendors who are
paying attention to their supply
chain, to their packaging, to the
materials...and putting pressure
on them. Then they are putting
pressure on their associations, on
their factories. And that's a scale up
type of deal. We all know we have
an impact, but now, it's being able
to be one of the little guys and you
work your way up to showing the
bigger system of commerce that this
matters and that we actually are out
here buying, but it's not going to be
the wrong way.
After this experience and what
you continue to see in your daily
life, what gives you hope that
maybe, just maybe, we can turn
things around or at least make
them better than they would be
if we did nothing in the face of
climate change?
In watching this film as a viewer, I
had this new renewed hope. It gave
me hope that these little things that
we're doing. We shouldn't be left
with this overwhelming feeling of
'not doing enough,' end up being
something that can be incorporated
into your life that creates a bigger
impact. All those little things add up
to a change in our own livelihoods.
And, and that might be uncomfortable
at first, but then that scales
up into something that can create
systemic change at a high level.
COURTESY DROP
The Daily - August 10, 2021

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