"Timestamp Speaker Transcript" "00:15.75 Jacques Hello You are listening to Delta Dispatches we're discussing Louisiana's Coast its people wildlife and jobs and why restoring it matters I'm Jacques Avert with environmental defense fund." "00:26.00 Simone Maloz And I'm Simone Maloz with restore the Mississippi River Delta." "00:32.20 Jacques Simone you know we're about a week away I need to go and get my turkey I need to plan out my thanksgiving menu I just I cannot believe we're already there. Ah" ah. "00:37.50 Simone Maloz Um" shock shock I'm going with the ice cream Turkey I have to I have to. "00:45.74 Jacques Okay" so you have to explain this because this conversation happened outside of the episode but it is groundbreaking yes. "00:48.98 Simone Maloz It needs some context. Um" so um I I have been sucked into the Instagram vortex I have bought several things lately and this targeted me because it knew I was um vulnerable and baskin robbins. Sells an ice cream cake that looks like a roasted turkey. The legs are sugar cones and you can pick what icing you put in it. It's it's just unbelievable shac I just hope it's not a joke. It doesn't look like a joke because I went to order it on the website didn't didn't hit. Um. You know follow through all the way. But um I'm fascinated by this. It. It involved a family text message that was like how are you going to get it to the police where we have thanksgiving police escorts dry ice. What do we need to do to make this happen. "01:40.35 Jacques I was going to say dry ice but that is incredible and just to be clear. It's not turkey flavored you get to pick whatever plate ice cream flavor you want? Yeah um." "01:44.76 Simone Maloz No oh no" no yeah yes yes yes it's probably a little off putting it first. But um our family actually doesn't really eat turkey. Um and so I thought that's 1 of the reasons why I thought my kids would love it. "01:57.93 Jacques There you go and I have to say I absolutely love baskin robin's ice cream cakes I can't remember the last time I had 1 but as a child it was like the best thing ever that yeah" exactly that and the cookie cake from lakeside mall were like my favorite. "02:01.80 Simone Maloz Um" probably 6 years old oh girl I mean we had that we had that. Um. Six days ago. Ah Miss p's birthday I had to had to go cookie cake had to. "02:17.00 Jacques Who it was so such a hard decision between the 2 But anyway as I said in our offline conversation. Ah" you will be mom of the year if you get the ice cream ah turkey you know cake. "02:25.13 Simone Maloz Um." "02:32.19 Simone Maloz Or my kids will think it tastes like turkey and refuse to eat it either 1 or the other but I'm just I'm just fixated on it. It's a yes yes" yes. "02:35.41 Jacques So no" why just request that you document this through photo photo and video so I can live vicariously through you because we'll probably have just a boring like pumpkin pie or something at our house for Thanksgiving Even though I'm a. "02:53.14 Simone Maloz Um" let me know if you need me to send you some pecans. "02:53.80 Jacques And more pecan pie like I love pecan pie. So who yeah I will definitely do that. Um" the story about the thirty dollars pecan pie that I bought when I was in California is for another episode but I did realize that pecans are a lot more. "03:07.33 Simone Maloz Ah" well now we know Molly's fun question today. Ah. "03:12.16 Jacques Except facans are a lot more expensive outside of louisiana and and pies also so anyway" well let's get to the subject at hand we had such a great episode last week focusing on the latest science of louisiana's coast with. Liz chamberlain and we wanted to keep the ball rolling but simone I heard that you had some great fan feedback about last week's episode. "03:35.30 Simone Maloz I did it did but did you see I think we were liz's first tweet. Um" maybe ever she that she's like I'm um on Twitter is gonna be my first tweet so it was about the show last week um but um yes yes um avid fan Dr. Joe ogeron. "03:39.48 Jacques Ah." "03:55.30 Simone Maloz Um I had a chance to see him on Friday and we chatted about the show he had just listened. It was hot off the presses and I joked with him that I think this is your way of making me take like non-credit science classes. So a notice that you've done back to back shows. On science and so um" message received shock message received. "04:16.72 Jacques Ah" well I just say you know we are science based in our work and it's always great to get down to the substance of what's happening on the coast and how science is guiding that. So. "04:20.82 Simone Maloz Um" we are We are. "04:30.20 Jacques Wonderful having liz chamberlain on last week glad we were able to compel her to join twitter as a result and and excited to see her thought leadership and engagement. Um" go forward on Twitter but we're having another scientist on the show molly keo um who is postdoctoral. "04:33.99 Simone Maloz Um." "04:48.70 Jacques Scholar at the university of Oregon department of earth sciences. Although she has a lot of experience and expertise in and louisiana's coast. So we're going to talk about that. She was also featured in 1 of my favorite documentaries about Louisiana's coast last call for the bayou. So. A lot to get to but first and foremost welcome molly how are you doing today." "05:06.45 Molly Keogh Hi jacque hi Simone I'm well great to be here." "05:10.81 Simone Maloz I Molly or you on oh I was going to ask Molly if she was on Twitter. Oh yeah I love it? yes yes" yes yes okay jac um on 1 with the real show. Yeah. "05:10.98 Jacques So tell us a little. Okay." "05:15.20 Molly Keogh Oh I'm not yet so who knows maybe it could be my first tweet also but I won't promise anything." "05:20.86 Jacques Um I own. no no I'll get it all starts with Delta dispatches and if we can inspire you to to tweet that is that is great. But so tell us a little bit about yourself. Molly I mean you're currently at the university of Oregon in the Pacific northwest" "05:29.70 Molly Keogh So." "05:39.21 Jacques Hope you're staying dry through all this rain but but recently you were um at tulane where you got a Ph D So give us a little bit about your background and how you got to where you are." "05:47.46 Molly Keogh Yeah" so as you said um I'm currently a postdoc at the university of Oregon um and in 2019 I finished my ph d at tulane university working with alex colker and Torch hornquist. Um yeah so I'm a coastal geologist. I Study wetlands and how they respond to sea level rise and other both human and natural caused pressures of change. Um yeah so I really like getting out and getting muddy in the wetlands. "06:15.85 Simone Maloz And so Molly they probably happy you brought some new orleans reign to where you are right? Um" but it's the right amount where you are right. "06:21.57 Molly Keogh Um" yes it's good to get some rain and we have had some good atmospheric rivers lately. "06:29.37 Simone Maloz Nice" nice. So tell us um you're here today to talk about a specific new study that you've worked on and and how you still are relating back to louisiana's coast so tell us more about um I think it's titled. Organic matter accretion Shallow subsidence and river delta sustainability tell us about that. "06:48.49 Molly Keogh Yeah" so this is um part of the work that I did as ah as a graduate student and it's out this week in the journal geophysical research or surface. So um yeah this paper focuses on um wetland sediments and how they compact through time. In particular when they get loaded by additional sediment on top. Um so we were interested in this because um many modern river deltas are sediment starved. They don't get as much sediment as they used to because of things like Dams upstream in the watershed and downstream. Things like levees that prevent flooding and prevent that sediment that is in the river from getting out into the wetlands. So that means that without this regular sediment input. Um the the wetlands are really dependent on organic material to. Keep up with sea level rise and and that organic material is produced locally. So. It's the you know the plants growing and dying in place and accumulating organic matter. So there's been this long debate. Um about. The importance of organic matter in wellands and and how much that matters for keeping up with sea level rise so to kind of get at this question. What what we wanted to know was um how quickly organic matter compacts and and how much so so we are looking at once that organic matter is there. How does it keep its thickness or or how much does it compact? Um so we have kind of 2 parts to the study and the first 1 is is using sediment cores and and direct observations to look at how much compaction has already occurred and then in the second part we wanted to know. How much more compaction is possible in the future if these wetlands continue to be loaded with additional sediment on top with new weight. Um so we we are looking at both compaction that's happened so far and projecting that into the future. "08:57.65 Jacques Somali What were some of the main findings of the research." "09:00.79 Molly Keogh Yeah" so well we see that in a lot of coastal wet and wetlands. Um the sediments are substantially compacted and that's particularly true in areas with a lot of peat. Um a lot of organic material in them. So. In in some areas of the Mississippi delta where there is ah um extensive peat Beds. We see that we see compaction up to about fifty percent of the thickness. Um and it's pretty widespread. So and and we we find that that happens pretty quickly. It doesn't take a long time. And a lot of loading so it doesn't take a lot of weight on top to make this compaction happen. It's mostly happening within the top 1 to 3 meters of the sediment um and within the first 1 hundred to 500 years after the sediment is deposited and then compaction will continue after that. But. But the bulk of it has already happened at that point. Um yeah. "09:57.99 Simone Maloz So so Molly I was as actually going to jump ahead is I'm always interested in and how y'all do this work and how you conduct the research. So can you describe for our listeners a little bit more about the process." "10:05.99 Molly Keogh Um" yeah. "10:11.45 Molly Keogh Yeah" great question. Um coastal louisiana has a wealth of data. It's 1 of the reasons. It's wonderful to work there. It's such a well-studied delta and as much as I love fieldwork and collecting my own sediment cores. Um it's really great to be able to tap into this resource of existing data more than I could do in in 1 graduate ah degree or or a lifetime. Um so we looked at more than 3 hundred sediment cores that had already been collected across the coast and many of those are part of the. Coastwide reference monitoring that system crims. So that's a great resource and so a lot of these sediment cores or they all have um subsams within them right? So we have 3 hundred sediment cores. But in total we had more than 3000. "10:49.16 Simone Maloz I mean." "11:06.83 Molly Keogh Sampling intervals. Um" so with this resource we we divided all of these samples into 2 groups and 1 was ah a kind of a reference group of samples that were at the surface of the wetland when they were collected and we. We assumed that these were uncompacted. They hadn't been loaded by any additional sediment. They're in the top four centimeters of the wetland. So. That's what uncompacted sediments look like and then everything else below four centimeters. We we determined was compacted to some degree. So with these 2 groups. We were able to look at these compacted samples which are buried at some depth and compare them to surface samples that look similar in terms of organic content and density that kind of thing or or organic content and um. And then look at how the density had changed so we were able to use these this reference set of uncompacted surface samples to get an idea of what had changed with the the samples at Depth. So basically we were going back in time and uncompacting. These whole sequences of sediments. "12:20.35 Simone Maloz That is so it's first of all" it's so neat that you were able to use crims right? I think that's um 1 of the things that we could brag about more frankly right is this really robust monitoring system. We have coastwide and where the stations are and the data that collects. Really cool system we have in place and I think it's so interesting that you're building on top of that you know you used work that was already you know ah data that was already collected and and reanalyzed that I'm assuming because crimson is coastwide. You see changes from from plate 1 place to the other right I mean. 1 area is more impacted versus the other those kinds of things anything that stands out as an observation or as part of this work about particular regions. "13:06.85 Molly Keogh Yeah" for sure. Um right The delta is not 1 single thing. It's very diverse across the coast and and that is really special about the the crims network is that um it encompasses all of that variability. So yeah what we see is. Is in areas where there's a lot more peat or a lot more organic material. So These are a lot of basins that are more sheltered from from active deposition. Not a lot of new sediment getting in there. Um they are really um compaction prone So a lot more compassionate happening there. And areas where there have been um so closer to the mouth of the River or or active deposition where there's a lot more sand and silt built up these don't compact quite as much because that's um sturdier substrate it. It does not. It's it doesn't have as much poor space. It doesn't have as much ability to compact. "14:11.74 Jacques So so molly I want to dig in a little bit and do a bit of a science 1 oh 1 for the lay peopleople out there like simone and myself. Um" there are a lot of terms that are thrown around and I did you know review your paper and you know it is fascinating but I think it's also. You know whenever we're talking about science an opportunity to kind of break down some of the terms that we use to kind of help people understand so in Louisiana we talk about subsidence and then we talk about relative sea level rise. So can you help us understand what relative sea level rise is as it relates. To the Mississippi river delta. "14:48.19 Molly Keogh Yeah" yeah that's a great question. So the sea level rise part of relative sea level rise is of course the water level going up and so that's as a result of things like glaciers melting and and other processes that make the water level go up. At the same time. The land level can change also and in the Mississippi delta. The land level is going down so you combine that the the water level going up the land level going down and that is relative sea level rise. So yeah it's kind of a double whammy. On our coast with with the water going up and the land going down. Um but yes that that combination is the relative sea level rise. "15:32.75 Jacques Yeah" a very clear explanation and also a reminder of why we need to do as much as possible to put that sediment and kind of material out to kind of sustain against both factors. Um next next term terminology organic versus inorganic matter. You kind of explain this a little bit but can you like. Help us understand what that with those when you talk about organic soils versus inorganic soils like what do? What do those mean. "15:56.92 Molly Keogh Yeah" another great question so organic material is the the remains of plants so anything that you know was was a plant in the wetland and it decayed and and um. You know stuck around on the Mars surface and eventually it gets buried by more plant material or more sediment that comes in on a river flood. Um then is incorporated into the soil. So that's the organic material plant-based inorganic material. Also sometimes called mineral or plastic material. "16:30.38 Jacques Are." "16:33.10 Molly Keogh All kinds of names. Um" that's all stuff like sand and silt so this is Rock. That's broken down into little pieces and usually it comes from Upstream comes from the River rather than there's no source in place in a wetland. It's it's deposited from things like. Floods when the River overflows its banks and and is able to deliver that it's usually denser heavier than organic plant-based material and then it's deposited into the wetland and wetlands are almost always made up of both. Types of sediment a combination of this this mineral sediment inorganic and then the organic component. "17:13.61 Jacques So when we talk about sediment diversions in in terms of what's likely going to be deposited in the wetlands. That's more of the inorganic matter correct." "17:21.68 Molly Keogh Yes" so again it would probably be a combination of both especially because in a diversion you will have in a diversion receiving basin. You'll have plants and those plants will be growing and dying and decaying so it'll be mixing with with the sediment. That's the or. Inorganic sediment that is delivered through the diversion itself. But yeah the sediments the sediments deposited sorry the sediments deposited from the diversion um are likely to be more inorganic. "17:44.80 Jacques Okay I got it and then oh go ahead." "17:55.62 Jacques Okay god this is great science 1 on 1 So this next term is 1 that we throw around a lot in Louisiana I don't know if it's actually a science term or more of a traditional ecological knowledge term that's used part of the culture but it certainly was you know top of mind after ida and that is flow taunt." "18:14.28 Molly Keogh Oh yeah." "18:15.60 Jacques Marsh So or do you have any experience or thoughts on Flotente marsh and is that like an actual scientific term or how do you define that." "18:22.63 Molly Keogh Yeah" so that is a type of Marsh. Um and it's ah it's a really interesting type. Um because it float on it. Floats. So this is when when the water level rises the marsh and the plants and the root mass. Actually disconnect from the bottom of the you know whatever water body the bayou it disconnects and floats and these plants are adapted to this kind of um ecology and and living this way and they're able to um. Go up and down with the water level and if the water level drops. Maybe that floating marsh hits the bottom again and isn't floating for a while. Um but but yeah it's ah it's a pretty unique type of wetland. "19:14.20 Jacques Yeah that's a helpful explainer because certainly and you may have seen this but in the aftermath of ida there was a lot of loss of flotent marsh or at least dislo dislocation right? displacement of that marsh and in different areas and so you know we were. Wondering with like ah Dr. Lisia renfro and others. You know" trying to understand like well why is that and how does that compare to other areas and you know actually going out to some areas on the east bank of plaqueman's parish where there there has been regular input of sediments and kind of fresh water. Some of the health. The marshes there were. A little bit healthier and kind of withstood the storm surge better and and 1 of the things that kind of clicked for me that Dr. Renfro explained was a lot of times when you think about flotent marsh and and loss of wetlands during storms. It's not so much. Always an issue of Salinity. You know freshwater versus Salt water. But. Sediment input like which marshes have regular sediment input versus those that don't and may have weaker roots. So anyway thank you for that I wanted to get your explanation and I like doing a little science 1 to 1 on these episodes so we should work that into future episodes. But sibone I'll hand it over to you. "20:21.95 Simone Maloz Jock I I hear you I hear you I I know I have to be better about it. Um I will say something I think that alicia would say I don't know if she wants me to tell everybody this but she's like it's floating because there's no sediment to attach itself to um. So I I do appreciate all the explanations of um" all the science 1 oh 1 that you're trying to push on me trust me I get you? um Jacque but Molly I want to switch gears just a little bit and want to talk about you being a star. Um so you were featured in the incredible films last call for the buy you. "20:50.50 Molly Keogh Seven." "20:57.28 Simone Maloz About your scientific research along with Dr Alex Koker So what was that like tell us about that." "21:01.91 Molly Keogh Yeah" boy Encompass Films did such a beautiful job with that film and bringing those stories to life I mean I learned a ton watching the other stories and seeing those diverse perspectives about the bayou and it was really wonderful and. I'm honored that they wanted to tell our story and thankfully they made us sound really composed because it's terrifying to be on camera put on spot and on camera. "21:30.62 Simone Maloz Yeah" it's something else to have them all in your face and ok and sound intelligent and all these things that you normally would be without something um in your face. But um the filmmakers followed you and Alex around as you monitor Davis Pon a place that we've talked about on the show and I've been to so so many times. So. Tell us about your work and your research out at Davis pond. "21:52.25 Molly Keogh Yeah" um davis pon is a neat place to work. Um and it was wonderful that the filmmakers came with us and really got to know the area and really got to know the ins and outs and and what we were working on so that was that was really special. Um but davis. Pond is this neat system because it's it's really constrained right? It has this 1 inflow channel and it has maybe 8 distinct outflow channels and these guide levees on either side. So. It's this really bounded system really controlled in terms of the edges but then on the. Aside the interior wetland is a left alone to do its thing to to evolve. However it wants to so it makes this this really great living laboratory and just you know over the course of a few years while I was working there really regularly. You just see such rapid change um with the sediment accretion and willows growing. You know gangbusters. Um so that was wonderful just to be there. But in terms of our research. Um we wanted to know. So the the flow of davis pond. The water flow is regulated of course and we wanted to know how the amount of water that that goes through davis pond. Um how that impacts the amount of sediment that is retained within the ponding area. So of course davis pond was designed as a freshwater diversion. To regulate salinity in the basin rather than a sediment diversion which maybe would be intended to ah build land as as the primary purpose. Um but still davis pond is building land. Ah so so and in terms of in terms of land building. We. We think that you know to retain the most sediment in the basin. That's what gets you the most land building and that's what some of these diversions mid-berat teria and others that will be the the main focus of those diversions that'll be coming online in the next several years. Um. "23:57.62 Jacques Yeah" that was going to be my follow up question molly which is how does research like the work you and alex and so many other scientists do at places like davis pond carnarvan wax lake delta I went out to qubit's gap with alex which is 1 of my favorite trips ever. "24:01.55 Molly Keogh Yes." "24:16.51 Jacques Um" how does that research inform the projects planned as part of the coastal master plan like the sediment diversions. "24:21.13 Molly Keogh Yeah" So there's really no substitute for seeing these processes in action and you know the the new diversions will be different. They're in different locations. There'll be a different size different engineering. Um but but you know Davis pon and Connarvin. These are these are great examples of of what we can expect and what we can learn from you know what? what will we change? What's working What's maybe not working as well as we wanted. Um yeah and so 1 of the takeaways from our work in Davis pond was um I think there's often a conversation. When we're talking about restoration and and diversions and sediment land building. There's often a ah thought that more water is better the more water we can divert the more sediment will get out there the better that is for land building and what we found is that actually more is not always better. Up to a point. Um we we found that a moderate amount of water Discharge is best because you get a lot of sediment delivered to the receiving basin. But then you don't want to wash that don't want to have so much water coming in that you just blow all that sediment right Through. You know and out to the Gulf so actually kind of reing that in and and diverting a moderate amount of water retains the most sediment in the system and that is um would be optimal for landbuding So Hopefully we can apply those kind of. Um ideas to these future diversions as we are you know planning them to be the most effective at building land. "26:03.53 Simone Maloz So molly I know you saw this? Um" you know we we go out there so much there were times when we would go out with cp we'd go out with Aaron or thearron that's funny I never thought about how that rhymes but Aaron or theron and um they would have to take the boat out just to see. If the path had changed that we could take the boat and. "26:25.38 Molly Keogh Yeah" it changes so rapidly and that you know things are filling in things are changing. Um it's hopeful I think you know if we're thinking about Land building Davis pond and some of these other little diversions are are little green spots on that. That Red Map and I think we can really learn from that and and grow those green spots across the map. "26:49.33 Simone Maloz And yeah" we we always had to tell the story that um you know how much it changed from year to year. Sometimes you know within a whole season. Um but but that's not even what this structure was intended to do and so. As we meet folks at the physical structure itself. We tell them the differences we explain to them. Okay this pulls from the top we want to pull from the bottom. So um davis pondus will always have a special place in my heart. Ah in terms of um helping me better understand. Um. Possibilities and opportunities of what we could do and so it's interesting to hear it from your science perspective as well. So what are you studying now? What are you? What are you focused on from a research standpoint. "27:33.97 Molly Keogh Yeah" so um now I'm you know as you said in the Pacific northwest and um I'm taking the kinds of things that I learned in the Mississippi delta and applying them to estuaries on the pacific coast so these are really different systems in terms of scale in terms of. Um geology you know setting on the coast. But there's a lot of key similarities and you know both of these areas the Mississippi delta and these pacific coast estuaries are really economically important culturally important ecologically ecologically important. To the to the local area and Beyond. So we're I'm looking at a lot of similar questions here in the pacific northwest things like sea level rise and land use change and how that affects these wetlands and how sustainable these wetlands are going to be moving forward. "28:31.33 Simone Maloz So this is 1 of my favorite questions to ask Molly um" when you were little molly did you always want to be in Earth scientists tell us about your path um to your career profession. "28:44.50 Molly Keogh Yeah" um as a kid as a little kid I loved collecting rocks I was always collecting rocks until my pockets overflowed until I would want somebody else to carry my rocks for me because I had too many and I didn't want to put any down they were all precious. "28:57.43 Simone Maloz Um." "29:03.72 Molly Keogh Um I remember as a little kid I had my in the summers I had a friend and and we would run a rock store except that we didn't sell any rocks because we wouldn't have wanted to part with any of them. They were all too special. Um" so. "29:14.87 Simone Maloz Um" so a rock um store where nothing's for sale and so museum. Ah okay. "29:22.22 Molly Keogh Yes" absolutely not? yeah um I didn't know that I wanted to be a geologist but I think nobody else was surprised around me when that's the path that I took. "29:30.42 Simone Maloz Um" so you obviously went undergrad and you felt like this kind of specialty. You know you have to go further. "29:42.27 Molly Keogh Ah" as a geologist have to go further. "29:44.64 Simone Maloz Yeah" yeah like to get you know graduate school all those kinds of things. "29:50.32 Molly Keogh Um" yes and no I wanted to go farther I've I've always liked school but there's a lot of options in terms of career paths with geology and Earth science and um no I think you don't have to go further. Um I think there's a lot of options. There's a lot of great options in terms Of. Um environmental consulting and industry and and those kind of jobs that um don't necessarily require years and years of graduate school. Um but if you do like graduate school.. There's also a lot of jobs with academia and agencies and um. "30:10.46 Jacques Oh." "30:12.84 deltadispatches Yeah" Molly we we can't hear you see if we can do this chat. "30:24.57 deltadispatches Paul Are you there." "30:28.17 Simone Maloz If we give oh she just dropped. Um" let's end this and maybe we could just then like start again and finish out with her. "30:28.31 Molly Keogh Yeah" just so many options with with geology and earth sciences. "30:31.34 deltadispatches Here. Let's go ahead and release. Yeah I think so." "30:41.82 Molly Keogh I think I lost you did I lose you." "30:49.38 Molly Keogh I Don't know." "31:33.15 Molly Keogh Oh hello shoot I don't know what happened weird. Um." "32:01.54 Molly Keogh Sure Yeah" that's fine. "32:11.29 Molly Keogh Um" chip. Okay great. "32:26.40 Molly Keogh I Don't see anything I don't see anything it has changed except that it's not recording." "33:22.10 Molly Keogh Okay." "00:00.00 Simone Maloz So molly what advice would you give to students looking to pursue a career in Earth sciences." "00:06.95 Molly Keogh I Think that it's It's wonderful for anyone learning at any stage to get out in the field and see things with your own eyes or the lab get into the lab. Either way" get your hands into what you're working on and. I Always learn so much more whenever I'm working on a new project when I when I get out and see the field site for myself or or see the samples and and work with them myself. Um and also finding somebody who is a mentor who is passionate about what they do. Excitement is always infectious and it's always great to work with somebody who loves what they do. "00:46.86 Simone Maloz Yeah" great advice. Thank you. "00:48.76 Jacques Yeah" get your hands dirty and and I know simone and I like to get out and get in the field. So who knows maybe we'll have a late blossoming career in science simone. Maybe there's hope for us. We can apply to the same grad program or something keep dreaming. "01:03.59 Simone Maloz Yes" yeah sure there there are people like Molly you are so much better at it. Why would I mess with that and. "01:08.35 Jacques All right? Well yeah" exactly we just we just like to help elevate the work that the scientists do and I think that's a good place to be because you all are brilliant and Louisiana is very lucky to have such dedicated people um working on its coast. "01:18.14 Simone Maloz Yes" yep Totally agree. "01:27.30 Jacques And kind of advancing the science and knowledge on its coast. So thank you Molly and to all your colleagues for that." "01:27.71 Simone Maloz And and full credit to Molly and to people like Liz and and the folks that we've had on the show that have to communicate the Science. It's it's 1 thing to do it. But it's also. Um" something else to translate it to to folks so they understand how your work impacts our everyday lives and so um that's really important in kudos to all the scientists that I know are working extra hard on that science communication piece as well. "01:56.71 Molly Keogh Well thank you to you all in in your good questions and helping us do that." "01:56.86 Jacques Absolutely. Great. Well molly if you've listened to delta dispatches in the past and we've alluded to it earlier so you probably know we're going to ask but it is time for the fun question and as the day of gratitude is nearly upon us I can't think of a better fun question then. What is your favorite thanksgiving dessert." "02:23.81 Molly Keogh Oo ooh what a important question Blueberry pie. Absolutely." "02:26.51 Jacques Ah" well I know someone who can hook you up with some blueberries so you've come to the right place. "02:26.60 Simone Maloz Ah" could call. Um yes Molly yes my mom and dad have a blueberry bog orchard I don't know something that's kind of out of control and so yeah. "02:31.96 Molly Keogh Oh well. Fantastic." "02:43.18 Molly Keogh Oh fantastic" Well good to know. "02:43.81 Simone Maloz I got you on the blueberries for sure. Yes" yes um Jacques I saw an um ah lots of advertisements for little debbie christmas trees. So I'm assuming they don't have a um thanksgiving or a thankful dessert have to. "02:58.20 Jacques I feel like they have to have little turkeys or something but maybe yeah is that your favorite thanksgiving dessert Simone little divy." "03:02.13 Simone Maloz Yeah" like a little fall autumn something. No no yeah um no my mom um my mom makes really great prawlines and fudge. But she really only does it a couple times of year and um thanksgiving is the kickoff to that season and so. "03:13.26 Jacques Oh." "03:22.16 Simone Maloz It's it's like girl scout cookies and kingincake right? like you can only have at certain times of of the year or otherwise you'd be like obese and things like that. But so so thanksgiving is the kick off to that and so it's so funny because um" we we will hide prawlline. "03:28.59 Jacques Oh yeah." "03:39.46 Simone Maloz Before Thanksgiving lunch even starts like we go into the um container and people start squirreling I'm away so it's really kind of bad. Um" and so that's probably the dessert I'm most excited for um how about you thirty dollars pie. What's up. "03:50.65 Jacques Um I will not thirty dollars pies but I love pecan pies you know" bourbon pecan pie chocolate pacan pies with a little scoop of vanilla ice cream I think that is the perfect way to end a thanksgiving meal but I will say. "04:00.21 Simone Maloz And then f." "04:10.19 Jacques My grandmother made the best fudge in the world and I agree with you. It was around this time of year and going into Christmas that it would kick off and and you'd know like when she was stirring kind of that sugar. Whatever you know liquid for the fudge or when she was making the root. It's like do not go near her. You know if there's like." "04:19.24 Simone Maloz A." "04:25.36 Simone Maloz Yeah" yeah don't bother her right right? yeah. "04:28.13 Jacques So really hot liquids going on there and she's she's very focused. So I also yeah I would say my grandmother's fudge is a close" maybe not close second. Maybe it's number 1 but it's just a special 1 So um well it was always really hot. But I feel. "04:35.12 Simone Maloz Did you get to? um" did you get to lick the spoon or the pot. Well I meant you know what I mean. "04:46.83 Jacques I'd say yeah" generally like when they would make cakes and stuff I would get to lick obviously like the pot and spoon and and all that stuff. So yeah oh yeah that's special. Well well thank you again. Molly for being on. It's so great to speak with you and and happy to have you on as your research advances and if you have new. "04:49.52 Simone Maloz Yeah" that's that was my mom's thing right? like who got the spoon and who got the pot. So yes. "05:06.28 Jacques Studies or papers that you'd like to share with our listeners. So thanks again and best of luck to you in the Pacific Northwest as you pursue your your next phase of your studies." "05:15.16 Molly Keogh Yeah" well thank you both so much I really enjoyed it. "05:17.69 Simone Maloz Thank you molly sha I'm going to hit up the coastal stat of the week and I'll let you go with the coastal voice from a ah friend and colleague. How's that down so from Molly's paper she says to test our hypothesis." "05:27.57 Jacques Sounds good." "05:35.30 Simone Maloz We synthesized data from 5 sources consisting of 3 hundred and 30 sediment cores previously collected in coastal louisiana um" as molly mentioned those came from the coastwide reference monitoring system which was designed to monitor the effectiveness of restoration actions. At different scales from individual individual projects along the entire coastal landscape. So the design of that system includes a suite of sites that range that encompasses a range of ecological conditions in Swamp. Ah Habitats fresh intermediate brackish salt marshes. There's over 3 hundred and ninety sites that are monitored using standardized data collection techniques and fixed sampling schedules. They're located within or outside of quippa restoration projects and the reference. Network approach allows for comparisons to changing conditions within and outside the restoration and protection project. So a wonderful resource that louisiana has invested in that folks like Molly and and others are building their work off of. "06:40.39 Jacques Yeah" so glad that you highlighted crims. It is 1 of the I think um most extensive coastal monitoring systems in the world as I've heard described and so just so important to have access to that data and monitoring. As projects are built and and as molly mentioned louisiana is a great place to do research and science. So um a lot of a lot of resources available to do that so I will jump in with the coastal voice of the week um folks may have seen but. Congress passed and yesterday president biden signed the infrastructure bill and our coalition restore the Mississippi ver delta put out a statement highlighting the amount of investments that are coming to louisiana for coastal restoration community resilience and other priorities to help. Protect communities from future storms and sea level rise and really help get a lot of the projects that we advocate for implemented. So this quote is from Kathleen berthalot. My colleague who's a senior policy manager on a climate resilient coasts and watersheds and environmental defense fund and kathleen says that coastal restoration. And other forms of natural infrastructure are some of the best solutions available to push back against more severe storms and sea levels or sea level rise at a time when louisiana is dealing with more fema disaster declarations than anywhere in the country. This infrastructure bill will bring sorely needed investments to better protect communities across our state from and. Increasingas climate impacts now congress must work to also pass the buildback better act to provide even more vital investments to louisiana's coasts and the communities that support so we'll certainly be tracking that and. Um hopefully we're providing updates on the investments that are coming in louisiana and to louisiana's coast as a result of the infrastructure bill. "08:19.98 Simone Maloz Good good voice of the week so just a reminder you can add your coastal voice at mississippiriver delta dot org dash restore dash out slash sorry that was confusing mississippi river dot org slash restore dash the dash coast." "08:22.33 Jacques E just." "08:36.67 Jacques All right? Well" another great episode. Thank you to molly and we'll be coming to you soon? um with some more good content. We've got great episodes and great guests lined up for the rest of the year so stay tuned. Always you can go online rate subscribe like us share us with your friends. We appreciate our listeners and our guests. "08:54.36 Simone Maloz Oh maybe a milestone coming up too. Jockey bear." "08:56.40 Jacques So much you know don't want to tease too much. But yes" we were about to hit a major milestone on Delta dispatches so more to come on that and really as it's celebration of our guests and our listeners for getting us there. But until then we will see all later alligators.