Environmental Health News Editor Peter Dykstra fills in Host Bobby Bascomb about a study indicating the continuing prevalence of lead, a neurotoxin, in the blood of young children, though levels are lower than in years past. Also, some commercial baby foods can contain lead and other heavy metals like cadmium, mercury, and arsenic, though the FDA has yet to set standards. In the history calendar, the classic novel by Herman Melville Moby-Dick turns 170.

The Arctic is warming and changing fast, from vanishing sea ice and shifting habitats to what’s on the menu for the region’s top predator. BirdNote®’s Michael Stein reports.

For Indigenous People’s Day we take a look at the “Land Back” movement that seeks to return land to its original inhabitants in North America or at least restore meaningful connections to those lands. To start, some Native Americans are campaigning for the return of the sacred lands of the Black Hills or “Hesapa” in South Dakota, which include Mount Rushmore. Krystal Two Bulls, Director of the Land Back Campaign at NDN Collective, speaks with Host Bobby Bascomb about the significance of the area and why “Land Back” aims to benefit all peoples.

President Biden has restored the Northeast Canyons and Sea Mounts, Grand Staircase-Escalante, and Bears Ears National Monuments, reversing orders of former President Trump. The lapse in protection for the Bears Ears area had especially led to an increase in vandalism and looting. Executive Director of the Bears Ears Inter-Tribal Coalition Patrick Gonzales-Rogers explains to Host Bobby Bascomb how lands are more than just historical sites for native peoples, and how they are key to their cultures, their spirituality, and their being.

Landfills in America were often sited in coastal wetlands before their value as wildlife habitat and buffers from coastal storms was better known. Now rising seas are threatening to unleash the trash, toxics, and even nuclear waste these landfills contain. Journalist Dave Lindorff joins Host Bobby Bascomb to discuss the risks.

With the changing climate, polar bears are moving south in search of food, and grizzly bears are moving north in search of cooler climes. In some cases, the two have mated and created a hybrid animal known as a "pizzly" bear. Paleontologist Larisa DeSantis joins Host Bobby Bascomb to explain more about these hybrid creatures.

In the 1950s and ‘60s landfills were often sited in wetlands, land too soggy for farming or houses. That use would be illegal in the US today and many have been shut down. But the Massachusetts Department of Environmental protection still gave the green light to uncap part of a waste incinerator landfill in an estuary north of Boston and add half a million more tons of toxic ash. Host Bobby Bascomb reprises this story originally broadcast in 2018.