This is how Botanically Speaking began in my head: as a Podcast. And now it finally exists

It has taken me a long time to get this out into the world. There are a couple of reasons for that, the main ones being fear and “the perfect being the enemy of the good.” As I write this, I have 3 episodes out and published, and 7 conversations in raw form to be published one at a time on a fortnightly schedule henceforth. All of these conversations are precious to me, and I’m excited and nervous to share them.

A little preview of my creation: the basic format of the show is a conversation between myself and someone. The conversation has something to do with plants but not necessarily “botany” in the strict sense of academic jargony nerd talk (some of the episodes are closer to this). We talk about food, and sustainability and gardening and the joy of growing plants. The episodes aren’t just rambling rants, though; I made a conscious effort to include games, activities and more structured question/answer sections to give episodes a feeling of “progression”. Also, each episode includes a bit of monologue from me at the beginning and the end, which is my attempts to knit a narrative together while also trying to be a bit personal, vulnerable and to share my feelings or a story from my life.

Just to keep you excited about upcoming Botanically Speaking episodes, here is a list of my guests and draft one of the episode titles:

• Colin Chapman - An Even Nerdier Botanist: Herbaria, Paw Paws and a Mysterious Geophyte (published!)

• Connor Fitzpatrick - Doctor Dirt: Sunflowers, Evolutionary Ecology and the Future of Agriculture (published!)

• Kate Hudson - Kate Hudson - Wine Wizard: Stories of Flavour, Aroma and Spiciness (published!)

• James Santangelo - Clover Hunter Extraordinaire

• Nash Turley - Punk, Pacifist, Pollinator: Changing the World and Citizen Science

• Molly Herrington Rauth - Plant Evolution and Tree of Life

• Corey Burt - Wild Foraging and Building Miniature Worlds

• Alan Kligman - From One Seed to an Indoor Citrus Grove

• Jennifer Gordon - Urban Forest Engineer

• Jenn McPhee - Protector of Rare Flora: Environment Law Enforcement 101

Between full episodes, there is a good chance I will also release mini-episodes: basically little audio diaries on some topic the tickles my fancy. I have one about Coffea arabica that I’m excited about. Another about Kombucha. Another about Aquascaping. They’re fun, and I’ll throw them in for a bit of added flavour.

If there is interest, I can also include “bonus material.” For each conversation I recorded 2+ hours of audio, and most of that had to be cut to reveal the story underneath. But some of those cutting are really good! So if you want more stuff, let me know.