Alternative Medicine: Herbal Healing

Today's Local Dirt features two herbalists in the Davis and Sonoma areas.

For the first half of the show we speak with Leslie Gardener, the garden director at the California School of Herbal Studies and author of "Life in the Medicine".
Leslie is also the director of the Sonoma County Herb Exchange and can be reached at herbexch@sonic.net

Then we speak with Kami McBride, of the Living Awareness Institute and author of "The Herbal Kitchen".

The show featured a conversation about the significance of herbal medicine today, as an alternative to pharmaceutical options.

Davis Bicycles!, Red Bike and Green and bike/transportation safety

Leo Rainer came to the studio and talked about the work that Davis Bicycles! does in Davis to advocate for better transportation policies. Davis Bicycles! is a citizen advocacy group that is made up of volunteers who strive to promote biking by working with the local government. They also put on events throughout the year, like a film festival and a bike loopalooza, to celebrate bike riding. To find out more or to get involved go to their website: www.davisbicycles.org


Russell Neches also came by the studio to talk with us about bike safety and his personal passion for improving safety in our community. He created a crash map to document the occurrence and details of bike accidents in Davis to see how things could be improved. He is currently a graduate student and serves on the Davis Safety and Parking Advisory Commission.





Our third guest on the show was Jenna Burton, the founder of Red Bike and Green. Taken from their website: Red, Bike and Green is a community-building collective of Black urban cyclists seeking to improve the physical and mental health, economy and local environment of African Americans by creating a relevant and sustainable Black bike culture.  Jenna shared with us how RBG started with just a few friends and now has chapters opening in Chicago and Atlanta. Check out their website for more info: www.redbikeandgreen.com 

You can listen to the show by clicking here, or right-click to download it to your computer. 

Sociolgy and Entomology: An In-Studio Cross Pollination Session

Today we speak with Katharine Ullman from the Entomology department about her work with honeybees and pollinators in Yolo COunty. We then speak with Bruce Haynes from the Sociology department. Prof Haynes is a specialist in race and ethnicity, whose most recent work is called "The Ghetto: Contemporary Global Issues and Controversies"


Info on honey bee swarms: http://beebiology.ucdavis.edu/HONEYBEES/swarms.html
    Info on collective decision making in honey bees: http://ucanr.org/blogs/blogcore/postdetail.cfm?postnum=6634
    Info on how honey bees and humans are similar: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v443/n7114/pdf/443893a.pdf
    you can also look at research conducted by Brian Johnson (UC Davis    Entomology) who studies honey bee behavior and evolution http://johnsonlabucdavis.wordpress.com/    and the work of Gene Robinson (U. Illinois) http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/feature/from-society-to-genes-with-the-honey-bee/1
    Info on native bees can be found at http://www.xerces.org    or look at the Williams Lab website here: http://polleneaters.wordpress.com/   


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