masa is taking their practices back to the age before industrial farming, when saving a harvest’s seeds, sharing, and trading them in the community was normal. but as populations grew and farms scaled up, the industry transitioned to genetically modified seeds, bio-engineered to withstand blights, resist toxic pesticides that otherwise would kill the plant, and maximize the yield and nutritional value. as the industry focused on crops designed for mass production, nearly 90% of crop varieties in agriculture were lost according to the food and agriculture organization of the united nations.

genetically modified seeds are often not adapted to specific climates, but they are many farmers’ most reliable source for production. this precipitous drop in crop diversity has created an uncertain and fragile future for agriculture, one that masa is hoping to provide an answer to.

“in 1929, 1930, before the first hybrid, everyone would be doing exactly what we do. we’d be like, ‘oh yeah, we save a part of the crop for seeds’,” said laura allard, the seed house and operations manager at masa. before production agriculture was the norm, farmers would trade and share seeds from that year’s successful crops, fortifying a network of seeds adapted to grow in their local environment. 

the seed exchange

today, farmers can simply log into an online store and with a few clicks, add seed varieties from all over the world to their virtual shopping cart. for a commercial grower who’s focused on one crop, like corn or soybeans, these genetically engineered seeds help strengthen the chances of a fruitful harvest. but many of these seeds are patented by companies like bayer and syngenta, making it illegal for farmers to save the seeds to plant next season and forcing farmers to repurchase new seeds at the start of every season.

this leads to a dangerous homogeneity among available seeds that fails to take advantage of the resiliency inherent to a diverse population. seeds are like little nuggets filled with data, and by selecting for certain traits farmers can help a crop adapt to their environment overtime. “whatever that season was like, whether it’s maritime or dry, windy, whatever happens, those seeds have the knowledge of that in the face of inevitable extreme weather or climate changes,” allard said.

masa’s founder rich pecoraro has been breeding and adapting seeds for over 40 years. when he founded the non-profit in 2019, he donated his entire collection, which now holds more than 1,000 different crop varieties. these seeds’ genetics hold decades of knowledge, and are slowly adapting to colorado’s unique growing conditions.

sprouting a vision

during springtime on masa’s 24 acres of land, greenhouses are beginning to overflow with the seedlings of hundreds of different plant varieties. leafy stems of ‘billy buttons’ craspedia wait patiently to sprout yellow globelike flowers, and soon the squat stalks of ‘green zebra’ tomato plants will blossom and don yellow and green striped fruits like ornaments. 

each plant sprouts from a seed, and nearly each seed has been touched by one of masa’s farmhands. the work is meticulous and time consuming, from harvesting seeds the size of pencil tips to the hours spent misting carpets of green seedlings that cover greenhouse benches end to end. 

for masa, these seeds are sprouting more than just stems, they’re contributing to a  sustainable vision. “we never pictured just being on this project, six or seven of us, working as hard as we can to get the next crop of seeds,” allard said. while research and breeding are central to masa’s mission to build a bio regionally adapted seed bank, the ultimate goal is to educate. 

if they don’t teach the importance of seed preservation, then this knowledge will only exist within the confines of the farm, allard explained. one of masa’s next big steps is to launch their thousand petaled seed cooperative. masa would share seeds with community members, from novices to commercial farmers, for them to grow, adapt, and learn about seed preservation. 

“we have to free ourselves to be able to find time or bandwidth — capacity is our word — to launch a mini ag campus for people to learn how to grow seeds, to be inspired to do it,” allard said. 

seed farming at scale

masa is a piece of a global movement to return to seed farming and build a more climate resilient agricultural system. university of colorado boulder professor nolan kane points out that masa is unique in its scale. “it’s not a huge place,” kane said, but in terms of the number of varieties they’re growing successfully, it’s special. “it’s not just cultivating something familiar. it’s doing that but also trying to generate something new.”

while industrial agriculture places constraints on seed sharing and negatively impacts biodiversity, there is still a place for it, according to kane. “it certainly has provided very stable, high nutrition food for a huge population reliably,” he said. at the same time, there’s value in agriculture that focuses less on monoculture, and more on a genetically diverse community of plants. 

biodiversity in farming can lead to a more robust ecosystem. if one crop variety is affected by blight, or can’t successfully adapt to a changing climate, it’s failure won’t decimate an entire food system. applying ideologies from masa and other seed sharing organizations can create a new approach to large scale farming, kane said. 

for kane, it comes down to “thinking about how to improve agriculture by both adding in alternatives in different ways to predominant agriculture, but also, how can we improve the way that we do large scale agriculture? those are both things that i think you can learn a lot from here by just seeing how they do things.”

the students, who are interns in the lafayette youth corps (lyc) internship program, each grab a hammer and a metal probe before walking down to the creek. they hammer the probes into the river bank, making a hole that’s just big enough to plant a willow branch. a few hours later, willow branches are poking out of the ground every foot or so along this entire section of coal creek. 

“we really value just making sure that all of our youth in our community are being engaged in meaningful projects,” said lexie sierra-martinez, the interim open space superintendent for the city of lafayette. a big part of land stewardship projects like the internship program is providing a pathway for kids to develop valuable skills and knowledge. “learning about the ecosystem, learning about history and learning about ways to better the land, those are all really helpful tools that they can take directly into next steps,” she said. 

on dec. 2, 2023, the interns were accompanied by kalei gopar, a student mentor from the university of colorado boulder who has been working with wildland restoration volunteers (wrv) since she was in high school. today, she’s hoping to provide the interns the same opportunities that opened the door to a career in the outdoors for her. 

“i always imagined i’d like to work in the outdoors but i never saw how it would be reachable until i started working here,” gopar said. she got her start with thorne nature kids, an environmental education and outdoor recreation program designed to serve underrepresented youth in the lafayette area. 

through this program she discovered wrv and took every opportunity she could, from participating in youth leadership meetings to assisting with grant writing. “it felt like i was climbing the ladder, in a sense, which was really nice,” she said. 

without the funding for these programs, vaulting the barriers to nature access and environmental careers can seem impossible for underrepresented youth. essential outdoor gear, like winter jackets, boots, and gloves are costly for low income families. with help from the city, every intern receives this gear that lets them get their hands dirty. 

throughout the school year, the interns learn about ecology and environmental stewardship. this lays the groundwork for the interns to lead a community-wide restoration project of their own at the end of the school year. “i let them have complete ownership, as much as they want to take on,” said the program’s administrator anna degolier.

just like gopar, several of the students see this as an opportunity to start a career in the field. 

“it’s a great impression for resumes for various kinds of jobs,” said third-year intern anthony reyes, who wants to study how astronauts can grow food in space or on other planets.  

the internship program also provides valuable experience for students like cedar moriarty, a current high school senior who hopes to study environmental science at the university of washington next year. 

hailey rasmussen, who helped lead the intern’s restoration project last spring, hopes to spread what they’ve learned throughout the community. “it might spark inspiration… they see how it affects them and also everyone else in the community,” they said. 

according to shanna edberg, director of conservation programs for the hispanic access foundation, there’s a large constituency of minority groups who care about the planet, but by leaving these groups out it’s difficult to have a strong conservation movement. “when we let other communities have a voice, when we let that diversity in, the outcomes (for conservation) are better,” edberg said. 

community involvement in restoration projects like these could be essential to environmental preservation in cities like lafayette. in 2013, a 100-year-flood (a flood with only 1% probability of occurrence in a given year) ravaged coal creek and threatened hundreds of nearby homes. a recent study from the national oceanic and atmospheric administration (noaa) predicts that, due to climate change, 100-year-floods could occur once every 20 years in this region. the interns have been working tirelessly to plant willows along the banks of the creek to help control the erosion from more frequent flooding.

wrv and thorne nature are focused on bringing these voices to the table in lafayette and across colorado. the lafayette youth corps internship program was born out of community feedback on access to nature education programs. “people really wanted more opportunities for high school aged youth where they will get paid, where they can get free winter gear, and have free lunches,” degolier said. 

community involvement is key to helping wrv identify gaps in access and meet families where they are at. thorne meets monthly with the promotores – a group of community liaisons who help communicate the needs of lafayette’s hispanic and latinx families – to better understand barriers to access and outdoor education for these families. these meetings helped create opportunities for gopar and other former participants to pursue careers and build a stronger community. “i’m just so passionate about this because it helped me find my path in life, but i figure by working here, i can help someone else do that too,” she said. 

as the willows along coal creek take root, so does the interns’ passion for conservation. whether that grows into a career in environmental science, or simply fosters an awareness for the environment in whatever the students pursue, wrv feels it is making a difference. “it’s like this whole program is planting a seed for later, and [for] some of them, it might sprout now,” gopar said.

as the family stared up the steep, dry canyon walls, arens’ 7-year-old daughter pointed at a little cottonwood tree poking up from the desert ground. “​​at that moment, this light went off in my head,” arens said. “i was looking at that landscape through a lens of scarcity, of how much this landscape had been devastated. and i switched, and started looking at this landscape through a lens of the possibility of renewal.”

water levels in lake powell first began to drop in the year 2000. this trend has continued almost uninterrupted since then, and the reservoir is currently only one-third full. the land is drying up as questions on how to deliver water to millions of people across the region remain unanswered. 

but with every foot the lake drops, the potential for a new beginning gets stronger. native habitats are returning to the colorado river’s tributary canyons, and the resurgence of these riparian ecosystems could impact the coming decisions that will change how the river is managed. 

the regrowth of glen canyon

when the u.s. bureau of reclamation completed construction of glen canyon dam in 1966, glen canyon became a giant bathtub as the colorado river slowly flooded hundreds of thousands of acres to form lake powell. it also drowned the desert oases that made their homes along this massive river system. this riparian ecosystem is now returning as the megadrought in the southwest has made it impossible to keep lake powell full. 

arens has spent the last two years observing, cataloging, and analyzing this rebirth, conducting what he calls “usable science.” the idea is that his research will help government agencies in making land and water management decisions for the colorado river basin. 

these changes are happening without direct human interference, in a process that ecologists call ecological succession. essentially, this means the development of an ecosystem over time, where the growth of a few colonizing species slowly gives way for new species to “succeed” the initial species, eventually creating biodiversity. 

in the case of glen canyon, arens observes a change at varying elevations, which indicate how long the land has been out of the water: the higher the elevation, the more robust and diverse ecosystems he sees. “it’s like walking back in successional time,” arens said. “as i’m walking upstream in the tributary canyon, i’m getting to older and older landscapes, and landscapes that have been exposed to natural, spontaneous ecological succession for longer and longer periods of time.”

one of the key observations so far is the fast resurgence of cottonwood trees, a keystone species in glen canyon. “cottonwood groves in the desert are, just from a human standpoint, lovely environments to be in. they’re these little oases of shade, and diversity, for that matter,” arens said.

the presence of cottonwoods is early evidence that the system is moving towards a “climax community” of peak biodiversity. as such, cottonwood canopies provide essential habitats for nesting birds, cast havens of shade for desert creatures, and their roots and fallen branches create secure habitats for native fish. 

typically, arens observes cottonwoods first in areas that have been out of the water for 3-5 years. as he walks towards higher elevations, where the land first emerged from the lake a decade ago, the trees are taller and thicker. 

right now, the bureau sees invasive species, like tamarisk and russian thistle, as the dominant vegetation in glen canyon. arens’ research is proving this assumption wrong. so far, he’s found that native species are slowly replacing the invasives as the ecosystem recovers. “they’re out competing tamarisk at almost every level,” arens said.

a closer look at cottonwoods

in a lab in fort collins, co, peter brown, a dendrochronologist for rocky mountain tree ring research, has been working closely with arens. by looking at the tree rings present in cottonwood samples that arens has collected, brown can determine the age of each tree. 

inside a tree trunk, concentric rings show the growth of a tree year to year.  each ring also contains climate data dating back hundreds of years before humans began keeping records.

using tree ring data from the colorado river basin, scientists like brown are able to reconstruct periods of drought and high stream flow over the last millennium. this data tells us the southwest is currently the driest it has been in over 1,200 years. it also exposes a critical error in the logic behind glen canyon dam’s construction.  

informed by 22 years of human recorded stream flow data, states in the colorado river basin drew up the colorado river compact in 1922, which paved the way for the construction of the dam. it also turns out this period was the wettest 20 year period in measurable history, “just by pure coincidence,” brown said.

today, data from the resurging cottonwoods is evident of a rapidly recovering ecosystem. while arens’ and brown’s research is still in progress, they’ve found that cottonwoods and other native trees popped up almost immediately after lake powell’s water levels started dropping two decades ago.

where the lake once painted the landscape blue, patches of green now dot the desert canvas. but these brush strokes aren’t science, and arens’ research provides evidence that goes beyond the anecdotes of recovery. “lake powell is no longer a slick rock container for water,” arens said. “there is a cost to refilling that, now (that) there will be a loss of ecological resources.”

who gives a dam?

the u.s. bureau of reclamation is in process of drafting its supplemental environmental impact statement (seis), which will update the current guidelines for managing the colorado river. the seis provides an interim solution, while the bureau begins the process of determining the post-2026 operations for the colorado river.

the process involves years of planning for a drier future brought on by human caused climate change. mainly, it will make changes to the operations of lake powell, and its sister reservoir lake mead, that sits further down river. 

from the ecological resurgence of the area’s riparian habitats, to tribal water rights, impacts on agriculture, and the massive recreational economy generated by visitors to the lake; the post-2026 plan will create a tidal wave of impacts on the stakeholders in the basin.   

right now, water storage is shared between lake powell and lake mead. powell provides water to a few thousand people in nearby page, ut and the lechee chapter of the navajo nation, and largely acts as a way to capture surplus water and later release it downstream to mead. nearly 25 million people rely on water from this reservoir. as water levels in both reservoirs continue to decline, a movement to store all of the water in lake mead is gaining steam.

“you can’t fill (lake powell) back up,” said eric balken, executive director of the glen canyon institute (gci), a non-profit with a mission to restore glen canyon. in 2009, gci released their fill mead first proposal, an approach that would consolidate all the reservoirs’ water into mead. this would involve reengineering glen canyon dam, an approach that balken said is getting support from farmers and water authorities in the basin. it would also help avoid the worst case scenario: deadpool. if water levels in lake powell drop low enough, glen canyon dam will no longer be able to send water downstream at a sustainable rate. “it turns from an asset into a liability,” balken said.

this could be a good thing

what’s happening in glen canyon is unique. it’s not just cottonwoods returning, it’s the revival of an entirely new ecosystem. at lake powell’s lowest level in april 2023, over 100,000 acres of land, from tributary canyons to the shores of the colorado river, were no longer under water. “it’s not just drought, not just climate change, not just water use, it’s all three of those things acting in concert together,” that have caused water levels to plummet, arens said. 

usually, this spells doom, but it could be a chance for a new start in glen canyon. glen canyon dam changed the landscape indefinitely, but the unintended consequences of native ecosystems returning to this iconic canyon could spur a change in perspective. “we want people to realize the potential for glen canyon and show the world that what’s happening there is a good thing,” balken said.

there is no simple solution to managing the future of the colorado river. arens just hopes that this resurgence will be a factor. “it is one of dozens, hundreds of management issues in the colorado river basin that… should be considered in that process.”

fishing is evolving in iceland, and the country continues to learn from and adapt to the looming threat of climate change and overfishing. i witnessed a condensed timeline of this shift, from visiting a century-old abandoned fish factory, to the forefront of industry innovation in the nation’s capital. this story is a portrait of iceland’s adaptability, and commitment to preserving not just an industry but a piece of their cultural identity.

click on the presentation below to see the full story.

editor’s note: lindblad expeditions, our planet forward storyfest competition partner, made this series possible by providing winners with an experiential learning opportunity aboard one of their ships. all editorial content is created independently. we thank lindblad expeditions for their continued support of our project.

in this video, storyfest winner tyler hickman reflects on the history of the fishing industry in iceland and what modern-day fishers can learn from the past.

a special thank you to lindblad expeditions for their continued partnership with planet forward and for sponsoring our storyfest winners as they traveled across the rocky coastline of iceland, interviewing experts, and creating their upcoming stories. an additional ‘thank you’ goes to icelandair for supporting the students’ air travel.