Ep. 40 Nut Trees and Connection with Elspeth Hay

Feeding humanity doesn’t need to come at the Earth’s expense. Elspeth Hay is here to talk nut trees, ecosystems, and humans as keystone species.

In 2019, Elspeth was a local food writer who felt despondent about humans’ need to tear up nature in order to feed ourselves. When she discovered that acorns are edible—that they had, in fact, once been a central pillar of an abundant North American food system—she was electrified. This week she joins Erin to talk about the book that resulted from her all-consuming research into that subject, Feed Us with Trees: Nut Trees and the Future of Food.

If you have ever felt like human beings are rootless and adrift without our own habitat or wild food that can sustain us, this conversation will open your eyes and seize your heart. Erin and Elspeth discuss the oak savannas and chestnut trees that, managed by Indigenous peoples’ understanding of succession ecology, once fed the human and more-than-human life of a continent. They look at the still-living food culture of chestnuts in Switzerland, grieve over the politics that deliberately erased abundance at home, and embrace hope at the re-emergence of traditional land management practices in agroforestry and restoration agriculture.

Join us in re-discovering our habitat and home. Who knows—maybe acorns will change your life, too.

Find Elspeth Hay Online

Website: https://elspethhay.com/

Instagram: @elspethhay

The Local Food Report: https://www.capeandislands.org/podcast/the-local-food-report

Feed Us with Trees: https://newsociety.com/book/feed-us-with-trees/?aff=65

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