What This Season Taught Me: The Lessons That Rose to the Top with the Emerging Wildlife Conservation Leaders with Crystal DiMiceli, Ep. 108

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This season of Forces for Nature featured alumni from the Emerging Wildlife Conservation Leaders community. Across very different ecosystems and roles, the same patterns kept showing up. I pull those threads together into a handful of practical lessons you can apply whether you work in conservation professionally or you just care deeply and want to be useful in whatever you’re passionate about.

Highlights

• Lesson 1: Listen first. Trust is needed before solutions.
• Lesson 2: Durability comes from local ownership.
• Lesson 3: Small wins are not small.
• Lesson 4: Storytelling is not fluff. 
• Lesson 5: Coexistence is engineered in the details.
• Lesson 6: The “unsexy” stuff matters.
• Lesson 7: Civic participation is also a conservation tool.
  
  

What YOU Can Do

• Listen: Have one conversation with someone who is directly affected by a local issue — and do not lead with your solution.
• Join something local. A watershed group, park friends group, community garden, citizen science effort—show up once.
• Support: Give money to the backbone — operations, salaries, field costs — or volunteer a concrete skill you actually have.
• Share a story: Share one episode and add one sentence about what action it made feel possible.
• Show up civically: Bentley reminded us that public comments, specific asks, and local relationships matter. Choose one thing and do the small step.

Resources

• Emerging Wildlife Conservation Leaders  
• Ep. 97 with Hugo Pereira 
• Ep. 98 with Kaitlyn Bock 
• Ep. 99 with David Tucker 
• Ep. 100 with Gaby Ochoa 
• Ep. 101 with Kate Gersh  
• Ep. 102 with Alex Goetz & Justin Grubb 
• Ep. 103 with Bentley Johnson 
• Ep. 104 with Ali Abdullahi 
• Ep. 105 with Shivani Bhalla 
• Ep. 106 with Jamal Galves 
• Ep. 107 with Rhett Ayers Butler 

If you'd like to sponsor next season (or even just an episode) reach out to me and let's chat! My email is crystal@forcesfornature.com.

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