90 Miles from Needles: the Desert Protection Podcast

For this episode on the weekend of Dia De Los Muertos, host Chris Clarke celebrates the life and work of five departed desert defenders: Judith Ackerman of El Paso; Tomás Rojo Valencia of Sonora's Yaqui communities; Donna Charpied of Desert Center, CA; David Gaine of Lee Vining, CA, and Ken Sleight of Green River, Utah. In these all-too-brief descriptions, Chris gives us a glimpse into each activist's work and life. Some of the five died tragically and far too soon, others lived out longer lives. All are missed. Bonus: If you stay to the end, Chris lists and commemorates 60 other departed desert defenders. Their work made our work possible.

Chris also observes the passing of labor icon Dolores Huerta, and in a mid-stream PSA, he urges listeners to donate to groups aiding survivors of the serious flooding in the Four Corners area. Check out the Bluff Community Foundation, Hopi Relief, the Navajo Relief Fund, and/or Samaritan's Purseto help out.

Chris is eagerly anticipating his attendance at the CHihuahuan Desert Conference in El Paso on 11/4-6, and hopes to see some of you there.

Resources:

Judy Ackerman — Texas House Resolution 63 (2023). Official memorial covering her military career, Castner Range work, Rio Bosque protest, and civic organizing. https://capitol.texas.gov/tlodocs/88R/billtext/html/HR00063I.htm

Tomás Rojo Valencia — Human Rights Defenders Memorial. Profile and links to additional reporting on his killing and subsequent prosecutions. https://hrdmemorial.org/hrdrecord/tomas-rojo-valencia/

CEMDA — Independencia Aqueduct and Yaqui consultation rights (2015, Spanish). Legal and organizing background from an organization involved in environmental-rights advocacy. https://cemda.org.mx/a-dos-anos-del-fallo-de-la-suprema-corte-continua-operando-de-forma-irregular-el-acueducto-independencia/

La Jornada — Arrest in Rojo’s murder (July 6, 2021, Spanish). Contemporary reporting that attributes the toll-revenue motive to prosecutors. https://www.jornada.com.mx/2021/07/06/estados/024n1est

Donna Charpied — First-person interview, parts I and II (2008). Her farming background, the landfill campaign, and her vision for Eagle Mountain. https://edgeofthemirage.blogspot.com/2008/02/interview-with-donna-charpied-part-i.html and https://edgeofthemirage.blogspot.com/2008/03/interview-with-donna-charpied-part-ii.html

Chris Clarke — Court Order Final Blow to Landfill Near Joshua Tree National Park. https://www.pbssocal.org/redefine/court-order-final-blow-to-landfill-near-joshua-tree-national-park

Donna Charpied — Family obituary notice (2017). Includes remembrances. https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/venturacountystar/name/donna-charpied-obituary?id=10096010

John Hart — Storm over Mono (University of California Press, 1996). Free full text of the book recommended in the episode. https://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/public/book/storm-over-mono-the-mono-lake-battle-and-the-california-water-future.html

California State Water Board — Mono Lake Basin. Official entry point to the 1983 court ruling, Decision 1631, and restoration requirements. https://www.waterboards.ca.gov/waterrights/water_issues/programs/mono_lake/

John Wesley Powell River History Museum — Ken Sleight. River-guide biography and Hall of Fame profile. https://johnwesleypowell.com/ken-sleight-2012-hall-of-fame-inductee/

Richard Markosian — The Last Man To Know Glen Canyon Before Lake Powell (Utah Stories, May 29, 2014). Source of the interview and compromise quotation used in the episode. https://utahstories.com/2014/05/glen-canyon-before-lake-powell/

Ken Sleight — The Death of Glen Canyon. His own account, republished by the Canyon Country Zephyr. https://www.canyoncountryzephyr.com/2020/11/30/from-the-archives-ken-sleight-remembers-the-death-of-glen-canyon/

Dolores Huerta Foundation — In Memory of Dolores Huerta. Official memorial and family statement. https://doloreshuerta.org/in-memory-of-dolores-huerta/

Places and assistance links

Glen Canyon Dam facts and history — Bureau of Reclamation. Construction, power generation, and reservoir filling. https://www.usbr.gov/uc/rm/crsp/gc/index.html

Lake Powell operations — Bureau of Reclamation. Date-sensitive reservoir conditions and operational forecasts. https://www.usbr.gov/uc/water/crsp/cs/gcd.html

Hopi Relief. Assistance to Hopi communities. https://hopirelief.org/

Navajo Relief Fund. Partnership With Native Americans program supporting food, water, and emergency assistance. https://nativepartnership.org/nrf/

Copper Mountain College. Episode sponsor. https://www.cmccd.edu/

Support 90 Miles from Needles. https://90milesfromneedles.com/donate

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Blackbrush, Coleogyne ramosissima, is easy to overlook. It’s tiny, dark leaves and gray stems can make a stretch of landscape look at best boring, at worst funereal. But this rose family plant’s low, dense canopy helps shape desert plant communities, and gives desert animals an important food source. Nurse plants shelter vulnerable seedlings from heat, drying winds, and hungry animals. Blackbrush may well be the most important nurse plant for Joshua trees.

Long-lived adults, episodic seed production, rodent seed caches, and suppressed young plants help blackbrush stands persist. But blackbrush isn’t well adapted to what North America’s hot deserts have become. Research in the Panamint Mountains shows why rebuilding a mature desert shrub community can take far longer than replacing its individual plants.

Protecting existing blackbrush matters as warming and disturbance make natural recovery harder.

Also, you still have a few days left to apply for our Fellowship for Desert Reporting, viewable at https://thedamn.org/fellowship.

Sources cited, plus extras:

• Webb, R. H., Steiger, J. W., & Turner, R. M. (1987). Dynamics of Mojave Desert Shrub Assemblages in the Panamint Mountains, California. Ecology, 68(3), 478–490. The exceptionally slow recovery of blackbrush communities after disturbance, including the climatic and geomorphic stability quotation. Free PDF. pubs.usgs.gov
• Hunter, K. L., & McAuliffe, J. R. (1994). Elevational Shifts of Coleogyne ramossissima in the Mojave Desert during the Little Ice Age. Quaternary Research, 42(2), 216–221. Packrat midden evidence for blackbrush expansion at the southern Nevada study site during the Little Ice Age. The extra “s” in ramossissima appears in the published title. Cambridge Core
• Meyer, S. E. (2023). Factors Regulating Population Stand Structure in Blackbrush (Coleogyne ramosissima: Rosaceae), a Masting North American Desert Shrub. Diversity, 15(5), 619. Stand structure, episodic seed crops, rodent dispersal, and banks of suppressed young plants within adult crowns.mdpi.com
• Pendleton, B. K., & Meyer, S. E. (2004). Habitat-correlated variation in blackbrush (Coleogyne ramosissima: Rosaceae) seed germination response. Journal of Arid Environments, 59(2), 229–243. Differences among populations in seed chilling requirements and germination responses. . ScienceDirect
• Jones, L. C., Schwinning, S., & Esque, T. C. (2014). Seedling ecology and restoration of blackbrush (Coleogyne ramosissima) in the Mojave Desert, United States. Restoration Ecology, 22(5), 692–700. Seedling establishment, herbivory, and how nurse-plant effects change with elevation and environmental stress.

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• we realized that our continent's easternmost desert, the Chihuahuan Desert, is not as well known in many ways as its sister deserts like the Mojave and Sonoran. And we had to do what we can to rectify that! So in this episode, Chris chats with Dr. Kevin Floyd, botanical curator of the Chihuahuan Desert Gardens at the University of Texas at El Paso, about what life is like in the Chihuahuan Desert. Kevin discusses:
• Elevation, winter freezes, and summer monsoon rains.
• Why no one really agrees on the precise boundaries of the Chihuahuan Desert
• The small cacti, agaves, yuccas, that thrive in the desert’s grassland landscapes
• Native bees, birds, bats, and the connections between plant diversity and animal life.
• Bighorn sheep in the Franklin Mountains, road mortality, and the case for wildlife crossings.
• How native landscaping and reduced pesticide use help support local food webs.

Our first taste of a new batch of Fred Bell’s nature recordings features coyotes around Furnace Creek Campground in Death Valley National Park. And Chris reflects on storm damage, past and future. Check on your neighbors!

Also! We've extended two deadlines. Our Fellowship for Desert Reporting is still accepting applications until October 31, and you can still be the first to submit an answer to our bird ID quiz from last week! Listen to the Fred Bell recording in S5E33; the first three emails received at chris@90milesfromneedles.com that correctly identify the birds in the audio by October 22 win a 90 Miles from Needles T-shirt.

Links and Resources:

Desert Diaries Podcast: https://www.ktep.org/podcast/desert-diaries

Chihuahuan Desert Gardens at UTEP: https://www.utep.edu/centennial-museum/chihuahuan-desert-gardens/

Kevin Floyd and Daniel Carey-Whalen staff profiles: https://www.utep.edu/centennial-museum/about/people.html

Fellowship for Desert Reporting: https://thedamn.org/fellowship

Support 90 Miles from Needles: https://www.90milesfromneedles.com/donate

Become a desert defender!: https://90milesfromneedles.com/donate

See https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Listeners in Joshua Tree and Moab may think their homes are overrun with jackasses, but this episode's guest has got them beat. We talk with Dr. Jennifer Anderson, whose diverse career has brought her to stewarding 300 acres of Sonoran Desert landscape in Mohave County, Arizona. But restoring her former 19th Century mine site has not proved as straightforward as Anderson had imagined. Western Arizona landscapes — and others throughout the deserts — are contending with a huge increase in the numbers of feral burros, introduced centuries ago but newly prospering at the expense of the desert. Anderson details the impact her unwanted guests have caused to her part of the desert, and the cascade of unpleasant effects that stem from the donkeys' presence as well as the inability of land management agencies to contend with the issue.

Plus! Our first ever listener contest: correctly identify all the birds in Fred Bell's nature audio and message Chris, and you may win a 90 Miles from Needles T-shirt. The first three listeners who email Chris with a correct ID, a t-shirt size, and a mailing address will get some mail from us.

Citation links and further reading

• AZGFD study — Associations between a feral equid and the Sonoran Desert ecosystem — Esther S. Rubin, Dave Conrad, Larisa E. Harding, and Brianna M. Russo; Wildlife Monographs 215, e1083, published June 26, 2024. Fieldwork in 2017–2019 compared areas with and without established burro herds near Lake Havasu and Lake Pleasant.
• Environmental Assessment — Big Sandy Alamo and Lake Havasu Wild Burro Gather and Population Control Plan — BLM Kingman Field Office, DOI-BLM-AZ-C010-2023-0025-EA. Official document index for the final revised EA, Finding of No Significant Impact, and Decision Record. Decision issued September 13, 2024. Expand Final Documents to access the assessment.
• BLM 2025 Three Rivers Complex gather and daily reports — Official record of the bait and water trapping operation and fertility control work.
• Alamo Herd Management Area — BLM geographic profile and appropriate management level.
• Big Sandy Herd Management Area — BLM geographic profile and appropriate management level.
• Havasu Herd Management Area — BLM geographic profile and appropriate management level.
• AZGFD explanation of the burro study — Accessible agency summary of the ecological concerns.
• National Academies review of equid fertility management — Methods and Effects of Fertility Management, in Using Science to Improve the BLM Wild Horse and Burro Program A Way Forward (2013).
• Mountain lion predation study — Lundgren and colleagues (2022), A novel trophic cascade between cougars and feral donkeys shapes desert wetlands. Background relevant to the predator discussion.
• NPS saguaro biology and nurse trees — Background on young saguaros, nurse trees, growth, and roots.
• Federal wild horse and burro law — Official U.S. Code PDF covering private-land removal and criminal provisions, including 16 USC 1334 and 1338.

Guest and episode links

• Sonoran Desert Sanctuary
• Anderson-Arroyo Foundation
• Fellowship for Desert Reporting
• Support 90 Miles from Needles
• This episode's sponsor Copper Mountain College
• Contact Chris

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As promised a few episodes back, Chris explores a sneaky trick developers sometimes try to use to evade legally required environmental analysis of their projects. Segmentation, the term of art for dividing a large project into smaller pieces to obscure the environmental impacts of the whole project, is likely to become more frequent as the Trump administration keeps hacking away at environmental protection laws.

Chris provides a handful of illuminating examples:

• Cadiz gets the Interior Department to assess the company’s Northern Pipeline separately from the pumping it would enable, prompting new desert protection lawsuits.
• A non-desert example: 14 years ago, frontline community groups successfully challenged an upgrading of Chevron Oil’s refinery on Richmond, California. Though their allegations of segmentation (called “piecemealing” in California state law) didn’t sway a judge, the case illustrates how reasonable people can disagree on what constitutes segmentation.
• As the Federal approach to NEPA changes, Chris briefly examines what the erosion of CEQ regulations means for protecting the public and the environment from improperly segmented project proposals.
• An Imperial County victory: the court overturned a data center’s lot merger approval and required environmental review of the entire development.
• Fred Bell shares the dawn chorus from Sabino Canyon in Tucson.
• Apply for DAMN’s Fellowship for Desert Reporting, and support independent desert journalism through a donation to 90 Miles from Needles.

Cadiz lawsuit by Tribal Nations, NALC and NPCA, July 28, 2026: identifies plaintiffs and explains their objections to separate pipeline review.

Cadiz lawsuit by the Center for Biological Diversity and Sierra Club, July 28, 2026: Earthjustice’s account of the parallel challenge.

NPCA and NALC’s 2021 Northern Pipeline lawsuit: background on the earlier approval and litigation.

Communities for a Better Environment v. City of Richmond, 2010 appellate opinion: the decision distinguishes the successful project-description and greenhouse-gas claims from the rejected piecemealing claim.

Earthjustice on the Richmond refinery appeal: the community groups’ account of the outcome.

City of Imperial data center information and court documents: includes the September 9, 2026 decision, tentative decision, petitions and project documents.

KPBS coverage of the September 9 data center ruling: accessible explanation of the ruling.

Department of Energy history of CEQ regulations: official timeline and links to the rescission rules.

January 8, 2026 CEQ final rule: official Federal Register publication.

Podcast and support links

S5E1: Standing Up to Tech Giants: Desert Locals vs. California’s Largest Data Center

Fellowship for Desert Reporting

Support 90 Miles from Needles

Copper Mountain College

Become a desert defender!: https://90milesfromneedles.com/donate

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Desert Dispatch Media is bringing together artists and communities to document how the AI buildout is affecting desert lands and the people who live there. Chris talks with organizer Melinda Matson Spina, filmmaker Jodi Darby, and musician Sage Bond about their planned community-led documentary, a short film for public assemblies, and the stories they hope to gather across the Southwest.

Sage describes composing with sounds and materials from the land, while Jodi explains how footage contributed by community members can shape the larger film. Chris also surveys actions communities and tribal governments are taking in response to proposed data centers.

Links and further reading

•

Desert Dispatch Media

•

Listen to Sage Bond on YouTube

•

The Border Chronicle and its fifth-anniversary celebration

•

Virginia’s Data Center Accountability Framework

• Gallup: Americans Oppose AI Data Centers in Their Area — In a March 2026 national survey, 71% of U.S. adults opposed construction of an AI data center in their local area.
•

Support 90 Miles from Needles

• Episode image is from a satirical website dated 2013

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For our 150th episode, we return to a foundational question: why does the desert need people speaking up for it?

Chris offers four answers. Deserts are widely misunderstood as empty or expendable. They remain surprisingly understudied, even when familiar species such as Joshua trees are concerned. Desert protection cannot be separated from Indigenous sovereignty, migration, heat inequality, contaminated water, and the lives of working people. And beneath the science, policy, and activism lies a simpler reason: we love these places.

Listeners Kimberly, Nancy, and Diane share their own reasons for caring about deserts. Fred Bell supplies the nighttime voices of Woodhouse’s and Amargosa toads at Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge.

After the closing credits, Chris looks back at the geographical and topical reach of the podcast’s first 150 episodes—and identifies some of the places still missing from the archive.

In this episode:

• Why calling deserts “empty” makes them easier to sacrifice
• Creosote rings, desert fire and ecological time
• How invasive grasses have transformed wildfire in the Mojave
• Why conspicuous desert species can remain surprisingly understudied
• Environmental justice, border communities and urban heat
• What love contributes to conservation
• Where 150 episodes have taken us—and where the podcast needs to go next

Resources and related listening:

• The National Park Service explains how invasive plants can create a cycle of increasingly frequent and extensive Mojave fires: Fire in the Mojave Desert.
• NPS reports that the 2020 Dome Fire burned 43,273 acres, killed as many as 1.3 million Joshua trees and exposed the forest to a potential invasive-grass fire cycle: Dome Fire.
• Related episode: S4E31: Five Years On—Cima Dome After the Flames.
• Related episode: Joshua Trees and Family Trees.
• The Joshua Tree Genome Project and affiliated researchers are using mapping, crowdsourced observations and machine learning to study Joshua tree populations: The Yoder Lab at CSU Northridge.
• NOAA’s current assessment of the strengthening 2026–27 El Niño: ENSO Diagnostic Discussion.
• Related episode: S5E28: Four Things You Need to Know About Desert Flooding.
• Support the podcast at https://www.90milesfromneedles.com/donate.
• Learn about the Fellowship for Desert Reporting at https://thedamn.org/fellowship.
•

Not sure where to start with 150 episodes? Visit our Start Here page for a selection of episodes that offer a good introduction to 90 Miles from Needles.

Become a desert defender!: https://90milesfromneedles.com/donate

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Journalist Joe Dana of 12 News in Phoenix joins Chris Clarke to discuss questions raised by the August 29 flash flood in Grand Canyon National Park—and what happened inside the National Park Service before the disaster.

After the 2025 Dragon Bravo Fire, Grand Canyon Trails Supervisor Adam Gibson warned publicly that the upper North Kaibab Trail had become a substantially more hazardous environment. In a March appearance on The Grand Canyon Hiker Dude Show, Gibson described debris flows, hydrophobic soils and risks likely to persist for years.

Dana's reporting goes further. Sources told him that Gibson had recommended keeping the North Kaibab Trail closed for the 2026 season, and that park leadership initially appeared receptive to that recommendation before the entire trail reopened May 15. NPS had previously described its reopening strategy as adaptive, promising to “open what we can, where we can, when we can,” while balancing visitor safety, resource protection and operational readiness.

Chris and Joe talk about the pressures on park managers to restore public access, the risks faced by trail crews and visitors in a recently burned landscape, and the larger question built into National Park Service management: how do you provide public enjoyment of extraordinary places while ensuring that those places remain unimpaired for future generations? NPS policy says conservation ultimately takes precedence when those purposes genuinely conflict.

The August 29 flood killed two hikers, left a third missing, prompted roughly 80 rescues, and devastated infrastructure along Bright Angel Creek. As of September 8, the North Kaibab Trail, Phantom Ranch, Bright Angel Campground and several other inner-canyon areas remain closed, with no estimated reopening date.

Links and background

Joe Dana and 12 News

Grand Canyon Hiker Dude: Adam Gibson's March 4 interview

NPS: North Rim reopening announcement, March 25

NPS: Current North Rim and North Kaibab Trail status

National Park Service Management Policies: conservation and public enjoyment

Chris will also be taking 90 Miles from Needles to El Paso for the Fourth Chihuahuan Desert Conference, November 4–6, 2026, at the El Paso Zoo and Botanical Gardens.

Chihuahuan Desert Conference information

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Episode thumbnail photo by Bo Insogna.

The deadly August 29 flood in Grand Canyon National Park received national attention, but it was not an isolated event. Flooding struck communities, parks and backcountry destinations across Utah, Arizona and New Mexico throughout the summer.

Chris Clarke presents four things we should understand about desert flash floods: they are regional rather than isolated disasters; they are fundamental forces that build desert landscapes; blaming victims can undermine safety; and better preparation, warnings, closures and land-use decisions can reduce the danger. The episode also explains why violent monsoon floods do little to relieve the Colorado River drought.

Key takeaways

• The Grand Canyon flood was part of a much wider period of destructive Southwest monsoon flooding.
• Flash floods are not aberrations in deserts. They carve canyons, move boulders, reroute washes and build alluvial fans.
• Experience and preparation reduce risk, but they cannot eliminate it.
• Blaming victims encourages people to treat safety warnings as advice intended for someone less competent.
• Closures, permits, upstream monitoring, better flood maps and responsible land-use decisions can save lives.
• Intense local flooding does not necessarily produce enough water to replenish major reservoirs or end a regional drought.

Notable quote
“The sustained river incision and the geological uplift are the canvas. The flash floods are the brushstrokes.”

• Griffiths, Peter G., Robert H. Webb, and Theodore S. Melis. 2004. “Frequency and Initiation of Debris Flows in Grand Canyon, Arizona.” Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface 109(F4).
DOI: 10.1029/2003JF000077
• Melis, Theodore S., Robert H. Webb, Peter G. Griffiths, and T.J. Wise. 1994. Magnitude and Frequency Data for Historic Debris Flows in Grand Canyon National Park and Vicinity, Arizona. USGS Water-Resources Investigations Report 94-4214.
DOI: 10.3133/wri944214
• Cannon, Susan H., et al. 2008. “Storm Rainfall Conditions for Floods and Debris Flows from Recently Burned Areas in Southwestern Colorado and Southern California.” Geomorphology 96(3–4): 250–269.
DOI: 10.1016/j.geomorph.2007.03.019
• Goodrich, David C., et al. 2018. “Southwestern Intermittent and Ephemeral Stream Connectivity.” Journal of the American Water Resources Association 54(2): 400–422.
DOI: 10.1111/1752-1688.12636
• Swain, Daniel L., et al. 2020. “Increased Flood Exposure Due to Climate Change and Population Growth in the United States.” Earth’s Future 8.
DOI: 10.1029/2020EF001778

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Journalist Kimon de Greef joins Chris Clarke to discuss his new book, The Ego Trip: Psychedelic Toads, a Trail of Deaths, and the Guru Who Peddled Transcendence.

The Sonoran Desert toad (Incilius alvarius) spends most of the year underground, emerging to breed during summer rainstorms. It is also the only animal known to produce 5-MeO-DMT, an extraordinarily powerful psychedelic compound, in its defensive secretions.

That biological curiosity has made the toad the center of a global psychedelic industry.

Chris and Kimon discuss how Sonoran toad secretions changed from a little-known psychedelic tool into an international spiritual commodity; how outsiders profit from romanticized ideas about Indigenous tradition; and what the resulting trade means for the toads, the people hired to collect them, and communities living amid poverty and cartel violence.

They also examine parallels with the commercial appropriation and poaching of white sage, and consider an uncomfortable contradiction: people seeking healing, transcendence and communion with nature may be supporting a supply chain built on wildlife exploitation, misinformation and harm.

Content Note

This episode contains discussion of drug use, addiction, death, animal mistreatment and abusive psychedelic practices. It is not intended as medical advice or encouragement to use 5-MeO-DMT or any other controlled substance.

About Kimon de Greef

Kimon de Greef is a South African journalist whose work has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Guardian, National Geographic, Guernica and other publications. He has a master’s degree in conservation biology from the University of Cape Town and a master’s degree in journalism from New York University. Much of his reporting concerns wildlife trafficking, illicit economies and the complicated relationships between human desire and the natural world.

• Kimon de Greef’s website
• Kimon on Instagram
• Buy The Ego Trip through Bookshop.org
• Publisher’s page for The Ego Trip

In this episode

• The remarkable monsoon-dependent life of the Sonoran Desert toad
• What 5-MeO-DMT is, and why “toad licking” is both inaccurate and dangerous
• How Octavio Rettig helped popularize toad-derived 5-MeO-DMT
• Claims that toad smoking is an ancient Comcáac/Seri tradition
• Psychedelic tourism, cultural appropriation and spiritual marketing
• The economic realities behind supposedly “responsibly sourced” toad secretions
• Toad collection, repeated “milking,” displacement and disease transmission
• Why synthetic 5-MeO-DMT removes the need to exploit wild toads
• Parallels between the toad trade and the international market for poached white sage
• What scientists know and don't know about the toad’s population status
• The difficulty of conducting conservation research in cartel-controlled areas
• Why a potentially profound experience can still leave a trail of real-world harm

Selected timestamps

• 00:02:07 — How Kimon found the story
• 00:03:52 — Sonoran Desert toad natural history
• 00:06:20 — 5-MeO-DMT and the toad’s defensive secretions
• 00:08:47 — Octavio Rettig and the rise of “toad medicine”
• 00:11:34 — The Comcáac community and claims of recovered tradition
• 00:14:50 — Is there evidence of ancestral toad use?
• 00:20:15 — Psychedelic tourism and its consequences
• 00:22:30 — Seri ironwood carving and the creation of “tradition”
• 00:30:10 — The parallel with white sage
• 00:34:59 — Toad-derived versus synthetic 5-MeO-DMT
• 00:38:44 — Inside the toad-secretion supply chain
• 00:44:35 — What is happening to wild toad populations?
• 00:50:27 — Psychedelic experience, reporting and ethical distance

Further reading and resources

• Kimon de Greef’s original New Yorker investigation, “The Pied Piper of Psychedelic Toads”
• De Greef on the collection trade, “The Psychedelic Toad Milkers”
• High Country News, “A Hallucinogenic Toad in Peril”
• Sonoran Desert Toad Fund, supporting research and conservation throughout the species’ range
• Tucson Herpetological Society, whose president Robert Villa has worked extensively on the toad’s conservation
• Sonoran Desert toad species account from AmphibiaWeb
• U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Sonoran Desert toad species profile
• PLOS One, “Diet and Chemical Defenses of the Sonoran Desert Toad”
• California Native Plant Society, White Sage Protection

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We think of range maps as static representations of where plants and animals belong. It doesn't often occur to us that maps are just snapshots of a constantly changing world. In the Mojave Desert, two sister species of desert ground squirrel coexist nearly side by side. A field guide's range maps will tell you where those species live right now. But those maps also convey hints out of Deep Time, and those hints can explain not only why the squirrels live where they do, but also how the two species evolved in their own directions.

Host Chris Clarke shares the story of those sister species: the Mohave and Round-tailed ground squirrels. One is doing well and is abundant. The other has been designated as a threatened species. Each of them is a library of history... if we know how to read them.

Chris also announces the launch of our Fellowship for Desert Reporting: prospective Fellows can start by filling out the application form at https://thedamn.org/fellowship-application.

Resources

Mohave ground squirrels

• California Department of Fish and Wildlife: Mohave Ground Squirrel
Species overview, conservation status, recordings and access to the state conservation strategy.
CDFW Mohave Ground Squirrel
• Philip Leitner, “Current Status of the Mohave Ground Squirrel: An Update Covering the Period 2013–2020”
Reviews the animal’s current distribution, apparent losses from portions of its historical range and continuing conservation concerns.
Status update PDF
• Mohave Ground Squirrel Technical Advisory Group
CDFW’s archive of technical documents and meeting materials from researchers, agencies and other specialists.
Technical Advisory Group
• Mohave Ground Squirrel Conservation Council: Publications
A bibliography covering the species’ taxonomy, ecology, genetics, distribution and conservation.
Publications list

Separation, contact and hybridization

• Kayce C. Bell and Marjorie D. Matocq, “Regional Genetic Subdivision in the Mohave Ground Squirrel: Evidence of Historic Isolation and Ongoing Connectivity in a Mojave Desert Endemic”
Animal Conservation 14 (2011): 371–381. Examines genetic structure and historical isolation within Mohave ground squirrel populations.
Article and abstract
• Philip Leitner, Jennifer S. Rippert and Marjorie D. Matocq, “Genetic Structure Across a Contact Zone Between Xerospermophilus Ground Squirrels in Southern California”
Western North American Naturalist 77 (2017): 152–161. Documents both species and genetically admixed animals near Hinkley. It also reports expansion across the former barrier of no more than approximately 30 kilometers—an average of no more than five meters per year.
Full article
• “Distribution and Genetic Status of Xerospermophilus Ground Squirrels in the Barstow Region”
Includes useful maps of trapping records and genetically identified Mohave, round-tailed and hybrid or backcrossed animals around Barstow and Hinkley.
CDFW-hosted report

Mojave River and vanished lakes

• Marith C. Reheis et al., “Geomorphic History of Lake Manix, Mojave Desert, California: Evolution of a Complex Terminal Lake Basin”
Geomorphology 392 (2021). A detailed modern synthesis of the lake basin’s development, changing river routes, tectonics and climate history.
USGS publication page
• USGS: Surficial Geology and Stratigraphy of Pleistocene Lake Manix
Detailed geologic mapping of Lake Manix, its component basins and the deposits exposed by the Mojave River and Afton Canyon.
USGS Lake Manix map and report
• Marith Reheis and Joanna Redwine, “Lake Manix Shorelines and Afton Canyon Terraces: Implications for Incision of Afton Canyon”
Discusses the overflow of Lake Manix and relatively rapid initial incision of Afton Canyon at approximately 25,000 calibrated years ago.
USGS publication record
• USGS: Mojave River and Associated Lakes
An accessible introduction to the Mojave River, Lake Manix, Lake Mojave and the modern Soda and Silver Lake playas.
Mojave River and Associated Lakes

Range maps and Joshua trees

• USGS: High-resolution distribution maps for western and eastern Joshua trees
Describes empirical and modeled range maps for Yucca brevifolia and Yucca jaegeriana across four states.
USGS Joshua tree distribution study
• Smith et al., “Genome-Scale Data Resolves the Timing of Divergence in Joshua Trees”
American Journal of Botany 108 (2021). Estimates that the two Joshua tree species diverged approximately 100,000–200,000 years ago.
Journal article

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The vaquita is the world’s smallest and most endangered cetacean, but the handful still living in Mexico’s Upper Gulf of California may be more resilient than recent headlines suggest.

In 2025, researchers concluded that there was a 67 percent probability that seven to ten distinct vaquitas had been observed in the study area. That was a count of animals seen, not an estimate of the species’ total remaining population. Researchers also found evidence that vaquitas are continuing to reproduce.

Dr. Lorenzo Rojas-Bracho, one of the world’s leading vaquita experts and chair of the International Committee for the Recovery of the Vaquita, joins Chris Clarke to explain why the species is not necessarily doomed by its small population. Surviving vaquitas appear healthy, continue to produce calves, and retain the genetic capacity to recover—if people stop killing them in gillnets.

The vaquita is also a desert porpoise. Its only habitat lies in a marine ecosystem made exceptionally productive by its desert setting. Evaporation, concentrated saltwater, tides, wind, and upwelling continually move nutrients through the Upper Gulf. Although the loss of Colorado River flow has profoundly changed the delta and harmed some species, Rojas-Bracho says there is no evidence that food scarcity or habitat degradation is driving the vaquita’s decline.

The principal threat is bycatch in gillnets used for shrimp, fish, sharks, and especially totoaba. Totoaba swim bladders command extraordinary prices in an illegal international market, bringing organized crime into a conservation problem already complicated by government resistance and the legitimate needs of fishing communities.

Saving the vaquita requires eliminating gillnet deaths while developing fishing gear and markets that allow Upper Gulf communities to make a living without driving another species to extinction.

About the Guest

Dr. Lorenzo Rojas-Bracho has studied the vaquita for decades and helped establish the International Committee for the Recovery of the Vaquita, known as CIRVA, which he has chaired since its creation. His research has addressed vaquita abundance, bycatch, genetics, habitat, fisheries policy, and the species’ prospects for recovery. He is affiliated with the National Marine Mammal Foundation and has worked extensively with Mexican and international scientists, conservation organizations, fishing communities, and government agencies.

Quotable Moments

“Vaquitas are strong animals. If you stop killing them, they will recover. It’s amazing how resilient they are.”

“I would be satisfied if I see the population trend being positive, or at least not declining. I can die peacefully if I see that.”

“We cannot be stupidly optimistic, but we are optimistic because the data shows that we can be optimistic.”

“I don’t want Mexico to be the country that loses the vaquita.”

“Don’t give up. That’s the worst thing.”

In This Episode

• Why seven to ten vaquitas observed does not mean only seven to ten exist
• How the vaquita became adapted to natural rarity
• Why genetic evidence shows that inbreeding does not necessarily doom the species
• How a desert evaporation basin creates an exceptionally productive marine ecosystem
• What ending Colorado River flow has—and has not—done to vaquita habitat
• How fisheries authorities used habitat degradation to deflect attention from bycatch
• Why totoaba gillnets are particularly deadly
• How the illegal swim-bladder trade brought organized crime into the Upper Gulf
• Why protecting vaquitas cannot mean abandoning fishing communities
• The need for effective vaquita-safe fishing gear and better markets for safely caught seafood
• What listeners can do to help

Resources

• Viva Vaquita — Background on the species, its habitat, the totoaba trade, conservation work, and current developments.
• Act Now for the Vaquita — Suggested actions include writing Mexican officials, supporting conservation work, making sustainable seafood choices, and avoiding shrimp and fish caught with gillnets.
• 2025 Vaquita Research Campaign report — The complete acoustic and visual survey report, including the seven-to-ten observation range, its statistical limitations, and evidence of continued reproduction.
• IUCN Cetacean Specialist Group: Vaquita — Scientific background, distribution, conservation status, and updates from cetacean specialists.
• CIRVA reports and archive — Reports from the International Committee for the Recovery of the Vaquita, including recommendations on eliminating gillnet mortality and developing viable fishing alternatives.
• The critically endangered vaquita is not doomed to extinction by inbreeding depression — The 2022 genomic study discussed in the episode. Researchers concluded that the vaquita’s longstanding natural rarity has reduced its burden of damaging genetic variation and that recovery remains possible if bycatch stops.
• Mexico must save the vaquita from gill nets — A 2024 Science commentary coauthored by Rojas-Bracho and other vaquita researchers.
• Bycatch in gillnet fisheries threatens Critically Endangered small cetaceans and other aquatic megafauna — A study coauthored by Rojas-Bracho placing the vaquita crisis within the worldwide threat that gillnets pose to small cetaceans and other marine animals.

Take Action

Visit Viva Vaquita’s action page for sample letters to Mexican officials and other ways to help. Seafood buyers can also ask where shrimp and fish were caught and whether gillnets were used. Public attention matters: it gives officials who want to protect the vaquita political support to act and makes continued inaction harder to ignore.

The vaquita’s situation is desperate, but extinction is not yet inevitable. The animals are still feeding, reproducing, and surviving. The remaining question is whether people will give them the opportunity to recover.

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Border-wall contractors have destroyed three ancient Fremont cottonwoods in Lochiel, Arizona. Estimated to have been 200 to 250 years old, the trees stood in the path of two proposed 30-foot walls through the San Rafael Valley.

One landmark cottonwood remains. Activists have occupied it in what may be the first tree sit organized against border-wall construction.

Kate Scott joins Chris Clarke from the Casita de la Esperanza, the activists’ base at the former Lochiel port of entry. She describes the loss of the cottonwoods, the wildlife that depended upon them, and the apparent absence of meaningful environmental monitoring as the trees came down. She also explains why organizers are demanding protection for the surviving tree and an end to plans for a secondary wall through the community.

The fight is about more than one cottonwood. The tree represents the ecological richness, cultural history and cross-border relationships threatened by wall construction throughout the Arizona–Sonora borderlands.

Key Takeaways

• Contractors destroyed three of Lochiel’s four landmark cottonwoods to make way for border-wall construction.
• Activists are maintaining a tree sit in the remaining cottonwood and demanding that it be spared.
• Organizers also want the proposed secondary wall through Lochiel abandoned.
• The cottonwoods provided habitat for barn owls, flickers, kingbirds, insects and other wildlife. Scott also reports hearing a threatened yellow-billed cuckoo.
• Scott says Customs and Border Protection had promised protections for active bird nests, but activists saw no meaningful environmental monitoring during the tree removal.
• Organizers are combining direct action with art, music, ceremony and public gatherings.
• Wall construction threatens wildlife movement, a historic border community, neighboring ranchland in Sonora and potentially significant archaeological resources.

Notable Quotes

“We do not want a double wall through this historic community.”

“Each one is unique—a universe in and of itself.”

“This is not a crossing point. This is a wildlife migratory corridor.”

“We’re not taking this anymore. We’re making our stand here.”

“Don’t obey in advance.”

About Kate Scott

Kate Scott is a southern Arizona organizer and a co-founder of the Madrean Archipelago Wildlife Center. Her work includes community organizing and direct action to protect the San Rafael Valley and the wildlife, cultural resources and cross-border relationships threatened by border-wall construction.

Resources

• Rally for the Valley on Instagram
• Support the Lochiel tree sit and campaign
• The Guardian: Protesters occupy a 200-year-old border cottonwood

Episode image modified from a photograph by the Center for Biological Diversity.

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Federal environmental laws matter. They have prevented destructive projects, protected wildlife and cultural sites, and given communities a way to challenge powerful interests. But laws are only as durable as the political support behind them.

As the Trump administration weakens environmental and cultural protections, Chris Clarke asks what happens when desert advocates rely too heavily on Washington. If federal law is the only defense a landscape has, one election or court decision can leave that landscape exposed.

The alternative is not abandoning federal protection. It is building additional layers beneath it: local ordinances, community relationships, persuasive stories, political constituencies and a shared understanding of what people stand to lose. Protecting the desert requires more than winning a legal argument. It requires enough organized public support to make destruction politically difficult.

Key Takeaways

• Federal environmental laws remain essential, but laws alone cannot provide permanent protection.
• Political administrations can weaken regulations, reduce enforcement and reinterpret longstanding statutes.
• Environmental harm commonly produces concentrated private profits while distributing costs across the public.
• Local ordinances and policies can add protection when federal safeguards fail.
• Desert advocates need durable relationships with residents, workers, businesses, Tribal communities and local institutions.
• Successful movements give people reasons to defend a place before a destructive proposal appears.
• Building political power requires narratives rooted in community needs as well as ecological facts.

Notable Quotes

“The public loses more than money. We lose wildlife habitat, we lose groundwater, we lose archaeological and cultural sites, we lose wilderness.”

“Profits become concentrated by one party, and the costs are borne by the public.”

“Those of us who love a place shouldn’t just rely on Washington to defend it.”

“A president can weaken federal laws. And if federal laws are the only layer of protection that we have for places that we love, then we find ourselves in the position that we’re in right now.”

Join the Conversation

What has helped people protect a place in your community? Which local campaigns have built lasting support across political or cultural lines? Chris would especially like to hear about community and independent radio programs covering desert issues.

Email: chris@90milesfromneedles.com

• 90 Miles from Needles

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On July 13, 2026, President Trump announced new reductions of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments, removing protections from nearly three million acres. The action again places Tribal cultural landscapes, wildlife habitat, watersheds and public lands at risk from mining, drilling and other development.

Writer Morgan Sjogren joins Chris Clarke from southern Utah. Sjogren has traveled these landscapes extensively and written about Glen Canyon, uranium mining and the conflicting legacies carried by public lands. She describes the disorienting contrast between an enormous political assault and the apparent quiet of the country itself.

The conversation also considers what landscape-scale knowledge provides: an understanding that rivers, mesas, wildlife, plant communities, rural towns and Indigenous homelands cannot be separated by conveniently redrawn lines on a government map.

Key Takeaways

• The July 2026 actions removed national-monument protections from most of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante.
• Bears Ears is an Indigenous cultural landscape whose protection was developed through years of Tribal leadership and advocacy.
• Reduced protections could expose lands to uranium and coal mining, drilling and other extractive uses.
• National-monument protection also safeguards rivers, watersheds, wildlife habitat, archaeological sites and public access.
• Sjogren argues that traveling through these places at landscape scale reveals connections that political boundaries conceal.
• Supporting organizations based in and near the monuments remains an important way to respond.

Notable Quotes

“The air is filled with tension, and the noise is mostly online, but outside it’s eerily quiet.”

“Monuments are one of the most robust protections we have for rivers in this country.”

“I’ve been getting to know my riverside neighbors: both the human and more-than-human, plant communities, wildlife, Tribes, rural Americans, urbanites, farmers.”

“Vote like this landscape and our lives depend upon it.”

About Morgan Sjogren

Morgan Sjogren is a writer, adventurer and longtime traveler through the landscapes of the Colorado Plateau. Her books include Path of Light: A Walk Through Colliding Legacies of Glen Canyon, Outlandish: Fuel Your Epic, and The Best Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument Hikes.

Resources

• Morgan Sjogren’s Glen Canyon Backcountry Club
• Grand Staircase Escalante Partners
• Bears Ears Partnership
• Conservation Lands Foundation: Defend Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante

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•

An Australian company has amassed mining claims across roughly 20,000 acres near Twentynine Palms and Joshua Tree National Park. Dateline Resources says its Music Valley project could produce heavy rare-earth elements. Residents and conservationists see the possibility of an enormous industrial operation beside homes, wilderness, desert tortoise habitat, and one of the country’s best-known national parks.

Chance Wilcox of the National Parks Conservation Association joins Chris Clarke to explain what has been proposed, how the Mining Law of 1872 gives mining interests unusual power over public land, and why Music Valley threatens more than scenery. Dust, noise, water use, traffic, habitat loss and diminished views could affect the landscape as well as the tourism economy supporting Twentynine Palms and the surrounding Morongo Basin.

The project has also prompted a growing local response. Residents, small-business owners and conservation groups are finding common ground in a simple message: Twentynine Palms is a national-park gateway community, not a mining district.

Key Takeaways

• Dateline Resources has acquired or staked claims across approximately 20,000 acres near Joshua Tree National Park and Twentynine Palms.
• Mining claims are not the same as an approved mine, but they establish the company’s interest in developing the area.
• Potential effects include habitat destruction, dust, noise, water demand, industrial traffic and damage to views from Joshua Tree National Park.
• Threatened Mojave desert tortoises and other desert wildlife occur within the affected landscape.
• The community’s tourism economy and residents’ quality of life are inseparable from the surrounding desert.
• The Mining Law of 1872 continues to give mining companies extraordinary access to minerals beneath public land.

Notable Quotes

“This is going to be about 20,000 acres of strip mine next to residential neighborhoods and Twentynine Palms.”

“People live here to really be part of this landscape. And people live here for a reason.”

“Twentynine Palms is not a mining town. It’s a gateway community to Joshua Tree.”

“There’s so much more at stake. It’s about the interconnection of all of that to every small business in Twentynine Palms.”

Resources

• National Parks Conservation Association: Five national parks threatened by mining exploration
• Los Angeles Times: Mining claims next to Joshua Tree National Park
• Recap of the Stop Music Valley Mine community meeting
• NPCA campaign concerning Dateline Resources’ activity at the Colosseum Mine

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Fireworks are an American tradition—and a predictable source of wildland fires. Every year, July Fourth produces a sharp national increase in firework-related ignitions, with many occurring in the western United States.

In desert landscapes, the danger is growing. Invasive annual grasses now carry flames through habitats where large, frequent fires were once uncommon. A single ignition can kill slow-growing native plants, destroy wildlife habitat, and begin a cycle in which fire encourages still more invasive grass.

Chris Clarke examines the research on holiday fire ignitions, the fires that never become famous, and the growing strain on federal firefighting capacity. He also considers an obvious question: can we celebrate without setting the landscape on fire?

Key Takeaways

• Fireworks cause a predictable surge in wildland-fire ignitions around July Fourth.
• A 2023 study found that firework-related ignitions are concentrated in the West and north-central United States, with a particularly large share recorded on Tribal lands.
• Invasive grasses have made many desert landscapes more vulnerable to fast-moving and repeated fires.
• Small ignitions matter even when they do not become spectacular disasters.
• Drone shows and other alternatives can provide communal celebration without the same fire risk.

Notable Quotes

“We remember the spectacular fires. We forget the thousands of ignitions that didn’t become disasters.”

“The desert has already given us an incredible fireworks show: thunderstorms over distant mountains, meteor showers, the Milky Way visible in the background of silhouetted Joshua trees.”

Resources

• The timing of fireworks-caused wildfire ignitions during the Fourth of July holiday season — Richard S. Vachula, Jake R. Nelson and Anthony G. Hall, PLOS ONE, 2023
• Watch Duty wildfire map and alerts
• 90 Miles from Needles

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We visit the Amargosa watershed to discuss Greenlink West, a transmission project now under construction that will ship energy from Vegas-area solar facilities to data centers near Reno. This project not only threatens to enable an explosion of data centers in Northern Nevada, but also incentivizes solar developers to concentrate development in largely untouched desert in the Mojave and Great Basin.

Key Takeaways:

•

The Greenlink West transmission line is purportedly for energy distribution but appears to primarily serve data centers.

•

NV Energy's developments misalign with publicized renewable energy goals, potentially increasing the burden on natural gas resources.

•

The substation built in the Amargosa Valley indicates the impending rise of massive solar projects, with minimal benefits to local communities.

•

Sallying efforts such as the strengthening of water rights control and military navigation illustrate the complex web of interests surrounding the project.

•

The discourse reflects on broader energy infrastructure expansions, potentially at the expense of Nevada's untouched desert landscape.

Notable Quotes:

•

"It used to be the Greenlink was to fight carbon emissions and climate change. But the goal has been becoming more obvious over the years that no, it's just for hyperscale data centers that are going to suck up all of our energy and water." - Laura Cunningham

•

"What if I told you, though, that there was a pretty good chance that data centers are going to seriously damage hundreds of square miles of the wild Mojave and Great Basin deserts in the state of Nevada?" - Chris Clarke

•

"This public land needs to be put to use and it's not for people." - Laura Cunningham

•

"The primary reason that so much solar was associated with Greenlink is because it was supposed to replace fossil fuel plants... they're gonna just go with the flow with whatever market is available." - Kevin Emmerich

•

"To me, this is such an interesting area because 30 air miles that way is Area 51." - Laura Cunningham

Resources:

•

Basin and Range Watch

•

Western Watersheds Project

•

Taxonomic revision of the tarantula genus Aphonopelma within the United States

•

Google Maps: Tahoe Reno Industrial Center, NV

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In this timely episode, Chris discusses the best ways to avoid becoming a statistic while hiking during desert heat waves. He also points out that the vast majority of people suffering injury and death from extreme heat have little other choice. Migrants, the incarcerated, and outdoor labor all face serious threats from hot weather, with little recourse to protect themselves. That's why state and federal protections for workers and the incarcerated are so crucial.

Notable Quotes:

•

"Heat turns minor mistakes into fatal mistakes."

•

"Testosterone is not an electrolyte replacement."

•

Incarcerated people dying from heat injury is a frequent and growing problem that is not tracked in any methodical way."

•

"Hug your dogs."

Resources:

•

Podcast Website: 90 Miles from Needles

•

PO Box for Donations and Support: P.O. Box 127, 29 Palms, CA 92277

•

https://www.theinvadingsea.com/2025/12/13/heat-protections-outdoor-workers-osha-deaths-illnesses-index-farm-california-federal-standard/New analysis provides more evidence that heat standards save lives

• Leading Healthcare and Public Health Organizations Call for Federal Government to Fast-Track Rules to Protect Workers from Worsening Extreme Heat
• American Hiking Society's Hot Weather Hiking Guide

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In the wake of a personal loss and a several-week hiatus, our host Chris wonders about the future of the podcast and whether it's doing what we need it to do to get to the people who need to hear it. Listeners are encouraged to take a few easy and free (or cheap) steps to help spread the word of 90 Miles from Needles, including posting reviews on Apple, Spotify, or our website; boosting us on social media, and so many other possible ways to help.

A full episode will come your way on 6/19!

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