How to Be a Better Human - How to find food in your own backyard (w/ Alexis Nikole Nelson)

Episode Date: April 15, 2024

It’s easy to forget that the packaged lettuce you bought from the store originally grew out of the ground – but it did! What if you could cut out your trips to the store – and get more food right from your own backyard? Foraging is a fantastic way to reconnect to your natural environment and Alexis Nikole Nelson is an outdoor educator, food writer, and expert forager. This week, she’ll help ignite your curiosity about the green spaces around you, even if you live in the concrete jungle. For the full text transcript, visit go.ted.com/BHTranscripts Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Apple Watch Series X is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X.

Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required. Charge time and actual results will vary. You're listening to How to Be a Better Human. I'm your host, Chris Duffy. Growing up in a big city, I did not have much of a connection to the idea of cultivating or finding your own food. Every once in a while, we would buy a potted basil plant from the supermarket,

and then I would watch it slowly wither and die because it could not get enough sunlight on our windowsill. And now, now I live in Southern California where there are just citrus trees growing on the sidewalk. It is wild. trees growing on the sidewalk. It is wild. People are out here picking and eating lemons and oranges and pomegranates and all sorts of other fruit on their commute to work. And while I love that, I have to admit it still feels a little unnatural to me. I have only ever viewed city sidewalks as being fertile places for bacteria and disease to grow, not for fruit and food. And yet, food growing outdoors, free, that's actually the most natural thing that could exist. It is literally nature. So if you're like me and you feel pretty

disconnected from the idea about where food comes from, today's guest is exactly the person to help open our eyes. And if you are already into foraging and gardening and growing food, well, get ready to nerd out with someone who shares your passions. Alexis Nicole Nelson is a forager, a cook, and a passionate environmental scientist. She has been thinking about food since she was very, very young. Here's a clip from her TED Talk. At the age of five, upon realizing that the cows in the field and the cows on my dad's grill were the same cows. I asked my parents if I could go vegetarian, to which they said, sure, but let's wait until you're done growing first.

So sure that I would change my mind over the next five to nine years. Well, shortly after my 12th birthday, I took the plunge and I gave up meat completely. It took another 12 years for me to give up eggs and dairy. And now between the veganism and the foraging, I have one of the more eclectic pantries. I have one of the more eclectic pantries. In just a moment, we're going to hear all about what Alexis stocks in her pantry and how she finds it out in nature, even when she is living in the middle of a big city. Don't go anywhere. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever.

It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series 10. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary.

Today, we're talking about foraging, food, and nature with Alexis Nicole Nelson. Hey, hello. I'm Alexis Nicole, and I eat wild plants for a living. I feel really lucky because the first time that I ever went to TED was also the time when you gave your talk. So I actually have gotten to eat food that you foraged and put out before, which is a really cool thing to be able to say. But let's first start with, for people who are not familiar with this at all, how do you define foraging? Like, what is foraging? So I would define foraging as part science, part art form of being able to go out in the world and use your science brain to recognize these wild plants so you don't die.

We hate dying. None of that. We hate dying. None of that. But then also using your creative brain to turn these wild foods into really fun, innovative, or just easy dishes. So it's a whole lot of fun. I feel like it satisfies both halves of my brain in a way that not a lot of other things do.

Foraging is kind of new for me. But if I was to make a list of my favorite things in the world, like high on the list would be eating things that are delicious. And then also very high would be things that are free. And I love that this combines both of those things. Right. It's fantastic. It's like, oh, you get to go on a free little scavenger hunt and then you get a treat at the end. So I kind of always associated foraging with like you live in the beautiful hillsides of like a forest and you go out and you find these pristine mushrooms or like leeks or something like that. And what's really cool is that you can actually forage in almost any environment that you live in. No matter where you live, there can be something that you can forage and eat. Literally everywhere.

No matter where you live, there can be something that you can forage and eat. Literally everywhere. That, I think, is always the takeaway I want people to get from my content or any of my writing or my TED Talk, is that wherever you are, if you exist there, you can forage there. I live right smack down in the middle of downtown Columbus, and I forage in my neighborhood all the time. When I was at TED in Vancouver, I walked out of the convention center and immediately was like, oh, magnolia blossoms. Don't mind if I do. All you have to do is be there and be willing to, put your feet to the pavement for however long you want to. you know, put your feet to the pavement for however long you want to.

So just like taking where you are right now in Columbus, what's the most recent thing that you foraged? Oh man, what is the most recent thing that I foraged? Earlier this week, I was foraging American persimmons in our neighborhood. One of the neighborhood mini parks has a giant persimmon tree that is just raining fruit down upon empty grass right now. If I don't eat it, the possums and the groundhogs get to have their fill. They still get to have their fill. It's more persimmons than a person could ever need. But thankfully, my neighborhood is just very community agriculture focused. So we also have berry brambles planted everywhere. A lot of people have trees that produce fruit at some point during

the season or nuts or acorns. So here in my neck of the woods, even though I can like see skyscrapers from the edge of our block, there's a whole lot of wild food to be found most times of the year. It's great. I think that I've heard you say in other interviews that you got started foraging because your parents also were interested in this. Yeah. I like to say that between my mom's love of plants and my dad's love of cooking, Between my mom's love of plants and my dad's love of cooking, I kind of didn't have a say in the matter in becoming like this. Every time when I was growing up and they'd be like, oh, you're bringing home weird stuff to eat again. I'd be like, listen, you made me this way. I don't want to hear it.

Okay, so for someone like me where I'm really into this, but I didn't grow up doing it, and my family doesn't necessarily have knowledge to pass along, I worry when I'm picking things, is this actually what I think it is, or is this something that's going to kill me if I eat it? Oh, yeah, that is everyone's biggest fear going into this, and honestly, that makes me happy. I'm glad that's everyone's biggest fear fear because it's a real fear to have. And what I always advise people, especially if they are new foragers, is don't be afraid to start small. You know, no one who you see out here writing the foraging books or making all the cool outdoorsy foraging content learned everything that they know overnight. All of us started with one plant or one mushroom, got to know that one really well, and then just built on top of that.

I do think sometimes people get too wrapped up a bit in the danger of it all. I'm always like, if you don't know what it is, just don't eat it. Yeah. That's a good rule. If you're not a hundred percent sure, simply do not put it into your mouth hole. Problem solved. Okay. That actually feels really, especially to me, that feels really like good life advice. And also like something that I can, I can master a few things because there are a few plants that I, and this is what I've done is like, I've learned a few plants and I'm like, okay, I know for sure that that is, for example, where I live in Los Angeles.

I'm like, that is a fig. I know for sure that that's a fig. So I'll taste it. And sometimes they're really bad and sometimes they're amazing, but like, I'm not worried that I'm going to die when I see a fig tree because it's so distinctive to me. Exactly. Whereas if you took someone out of the Midwest and put them into Los Angeles, then they would be like, oh, I'm actually not 100% sure if that is a fig.

So I'm going to bypass that one and instead go for something that I feel really comfy IDing, like an acorn or a prickly pear, which we weirdly do also have in the Midwest. Really? Prickly pear cactus? Oh, I wouldn't have thought of that. Yep. We have a native species, the eastern prickly pear cactus. I have some growing in my front yard.

They accidentally get me frequently. For me, when I walk into a new environment and I see a tree or a plant that I recognize, it's so fun to be like, yep, I've seen you before. I know you. And each time you get another one, you grow your understanding of the environment around you. Exactly. Whenever I'm in Los Angeles and I see like a sycamore tree as a tree planting, I'm like, oh, hey, buddy. Hey, cousin. It's been a minute.

What are you doing out here? It's wonderful. It just, it gives you a new way to feel connected to the world around you. And I think in these days, especially with how isolated so many people feel, that is so important. I'm not going to ask you what your favorite plant is because I imagine that's an impossible one to ask. But what about, what's a plant that when you see it, you get really excited? Oh, my gosh. Whenever I see any of the plants in the Passiflora genus, so that's all the passion flowers. I love them.

They are so wild looking. They literally look like an alien landed on Earth. It really pushes the barrier on what you think a flower can look like. They're so cool. And that's another one that always surprises people that we have a passion flower out here, too. We call them May Pops, but the flowers look just as wild. And I just I love them. So every time I'm traveling around and I see any of the members because they all kind of have those telltale, beautiful, crazy flowers. It just gives me the warm fuzzies. Something that I really love about you and the way

that you engage with the world is, you know, you have this like scientific accuracy, but you also have a really great sense of humor. And then you're also, I think, able to think about these things in a bigger philosophical way. So I am curious to get your take on, and this is a big question, but like why you think we are often so disconnected from nature and from the idea of like understanding at the most basic level, the plants that are around us. Honestly, if we're going to take it way, way back. The disconnection kind of started with the advent of the agricultural revolution. And that makes perfect sense. Nature is hard to predict. It's hard to rely on when it's your only source of like taking care of yourself, your family,

your community. So the first step of disconnection definitely came from us being like, okay, all of these different groups around the world decided these are the plants we're going to focus in on because these are the most productive. These are the animals we're going to focus in on because they were easier to domesticate. And that immediately others all of the other plants and animals and rele relegates them, for some people, to something that they decide is less important to them, affects them less on a regular basis. And then we kicked it kind of at that point of mild disconnection. Like, people would still know the plants and stuff in their area, but also would be much more focused on crops and having a job on the family farm. Then you have the Industrial Revolution, which then had people flocking to cities. You know, all of these places with bricks and with concrete, with a lot fewer plants and animals

than people would have been seeing if they were out living on the farm. And now, suddenly, you're not having a lot of these kind of, I like to think of them as little mini seasonal holidays that you would recognize while you're out in the country. If you're out in the country, you know, every year the walnuts fall at around the same time and every year the spring beauties bloom at around the same time and you see it because you're out there every day. Whereas if you're in the city, unless you're taking the time to get out of the city, that's not something that you're interacting with. You're not seeing all of these little machinations and the day-to-day changes in nature anymore. So I think that was another point of disconnection. And now we're also really

disconnected from our food. And food was kind of one of the last ways that we were staying connected to a lot of different plant species, because we were having to eat seasonally, because before things like refrigerated trucks and all of these really high-tech like hoop houses and warmed spaces for growing plants outside of their season, you would only have tomatoes during tomato season. You'd only have apples during apple season. And in a way, that was keeping people tethered to some of the rhythms of nature. But now, you can have a Granny Smith apple in February, regardless of where here in North America you live. You can have raspberries any time of the year outside of the like two weeks, really, the year outside of the like two weeks really that they're in season every summer and so this little bit that we were still holding on to with having to know how nature was moving through its

yearly cycles gone and we we're not the ones growing the food so we're not even we're not even in the greenhouses the hoop houses anything. Even getting to see that aspect of the way that plants grow. People like don't know what plants grow on trees versus shrubs versus vines because they don't have to. It makes me think like foraging is on the one hand, you know, a way to get food and to have a brain that was programmed to like eat berries in a cave around a fire with the same 30 people you've known your entire life. Yep. And this is a way to get back to that a little bit. Just a little bit.

Except you don't have to move into the cave. You get to still keep your stuff. You still get to keep your AC, your heat, your refrigerator, no caves, and all of the buggies that come with living in caves. But it definitely feels like when you are out foraging, you are tapping into something very normal, very natural, at least for me. I don't know. There might be some not outdoorsy people who are like, I don't know.

This is not a soothing experience for me. Do don't know. There might be some not outdoorsy people who are like, I don't know. This is not a soothing experience for me. Do you find it to be soothing? Do you find that to be like a part of taking care of your health, not just physically, but also mentally? Oh, absolutely. It's a really meditative practice for me. I realize when I go out into the woods, especially if I've been glued to my phone for the hours leading up to it,

you go through a bit of an adjustment period to where at first you feel really overstimulated and you're like, oh, too many trees, too many plants, too many fungi. And then you start, your breathing starts slowing down. You start hitting a groove with your pace while you're hiking. And your brain starts kind of being able to like tune into all of these things, you go into a bit of a soft focus. And for me, I find that incredibly meditative. It really helps me bring down the general anxiety caused by just, you know, existing as a connected person in this world we have built. We're going to take a quick ad break, so slow your breathing, get your mind into a meditative

state, and we will be right back. Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series 10, available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary. And we are back. So Alexis, one thing I wanted to talk to you about is how being out in nature and identifying plants, especially in a city or a more urban environment, it also is a way of understanding history and our past. One thing that I've seen is like the more that I learn about the plants in the cities that I've lived in, the more that it is also a history of migration and immigration, right? Oh, absolutely. There's bitter melon here. And that's because someone brought that because it was an important ingredient that they couldn't find in the grocery store. So they started growing it. Oh,

there's a loquat tree. Someone brought that because it mattered to them. There's all of the history of plants and food that are tied up in it. I have goosebumps right now, which you cannot confirm or deny, listener. But I'm telling you that it's true. When I read about why so many of these non-native plants have ended up where they are, you know, Chris, you're out in Los Angeles, black mustard covers the hillsides in those beautiful but invasive yellow blooms every spring. And that is still a remnant of Spanish missions moving up the coast in California, bringing those mustard seeds over from Spain and spreading those wherever they were going. Like a lot of, there are so many stories of people moving from place to place told in the form of plants. Sometimes they are invasive plants. Over

here, our kind of counterpart to black mustard is garlic mustard, which was brought over here because European immigrants were eating it and they knew it wasn't going to be here when they got here, so they brought it. Even things that are so quintessentially American, like corn brought up from southern Mexico, Central America. not be the apples that we know today if we weren't also bringing in like Asian and European varieties to mix with our native crab apples. Like we just wouldn't have the apple pies that we Americans know and love so much in this day and age. And it's so cool to see, especially in places like Los Angeles, where yes, so many immigrant families will bring entire fruit trees because they know that they will thrive in Los Angeles, as opposed to here, where when in a lot of communities where folks from around the Mediterranean have emigrated, they have to bury their fig trees so they survive the winter. They survived the winter up here.

I grew up in New York. And one of the things that I remember is like going to Astoria, Queens and seeing someone like wrapping a fig tree in a blanket, like literally like a warming blanket for the winter. And I was like, oh, wow, they're tucking in the tree. That's so beautiful. The things that we do for what we love. It's true. I'm curious. for what we love. It's true. I'm curious, you know, there's this idea of native and invasive and that there's kind of like a hard line between those two. And I wonder what you think about that, because I've heard other people say sometimes that they think that maybe that is not necessarily

accurate, that like the idea of like there's some good native plants and there's some bad invasive plants is actually it's much less of a binary than sometimes it sounds like. Oh, well, like with everything in life, people love putting everything into black and white boxes, despite the fact that we all exist in a realm of gray colored nuance. think it is really harmful to mark every single plant that is non-native as harmful in some way, as invasive. Usually within the realm of forestry and environmental science, invasive is specifically reserved for non-native species that are aggressive to the point of out-competing other plants around them. Things like black mustard, I would consider invasive. Things like garlic mustard, I would consider invasive.

Japanese knotweed and giant knotweed, I would consider those invasive because they do, they're so good at their job, and their job is just wanting their progeny to survive which is like a nice little reminder when people are getting so mad at them they're just doing what evolution encouraged them to do with no malice no ill intention just trying their best but we also have a lot of, I wish people would use the word naturalized a lot more with things like dandelions. Even though there is now some conflicting evidence on whether or not some dandelions were native here in the first place. But dandelions, I feel like people love throwing around the word invasive. But that little guy is not displacing anybody. In fact, they're actually really helpful for reclaiming spaces where humans have maybe come in and gotten rid of a lot of the vegetation.

Those tap roots re-aerate the soil, help things break apart a little, break down a little. They're a really great species to have introduced to a space that in a few years you want to be able to put native plants into. I think just like people have spread all over the world, plants have now also spread all over the world for better or for worse. And being really mad about every instance of that is one, super exhausting. And two, that anger rarely yields anything. You know, it's I don't want to push a metaphor too far, but it really does feel like that distinction that you just drew between non-native and invasive is actually a really applicable one for thinking about being a human in a space, right? It's like, if you are not a native indigenous person to the land that you live on, how can

you be non-invasive, right? Like not pushing people out and erasing them, but instead just being from somewhere else. There is a big, important difference between those two things. Yes. And there is a big important difference between those two things. Yes. And there is a way to do that. There can be a recognition of what was already here. And there can be an uplifting of what was already here while you are still going about your day-to-day life. And I do think plants like the dandelion or like common mallow are a really sweet metaphor. Of course,

things are much more complicated than a single non-native plant coming up in a person's lawn. What would you say is a good first step for someone who wants to get started in foraging? What should they do first to get into it? As much as I'm always playfully yelling at my friends and family to get off of social media, joining a local foraging Facebook group is such a great way to not only meet other people who are already doing the activity and can give you some of the knowledge they already have from foraging in your area, you can just watch what people are posting and get a feel for what's in season in your area. And I would say the more specific location-wise of a group you can find, the better. You know, I am in a Columbus-specific

foraging group. I'm in a Central Ohio-specific, Ohio-specific, Midwest-specific. It's such a great way to start getting a feel for the way that things come in and out of season and a great way to know what you could feasibly be going out and looking for. Nothing's more heartbreaking than reading a book or a post by someone written halfway across the world and then doing a little Google search-a-rooney and seeing that that plant or fungi exists nowhere in your vicinity. I get that frequently. That's how I feel living in Ohio when one of my favorite hyperfixations is seaweed. That's how I feel living in Ohio when one of my favorite hyperfixations is seaweed.

Oh, yeah, that's that is tough. Ohio does not have a lot of access to seaweed. We do not. We do not. Thinking about that, that awkwardness that sometimes people feel like they are not of the group or don't look the way that a forager is supposed to look. What would you say to people who are feeling like that? The outdoors belong to everybody. Everybody has ancestors who foraged. Literally all of us exist because someone at some point in time in our long lineage of human history was out there knowing what plants and mushrooms they could and couldn't eat without dying.

And because of that, I feel like it's truly a hobby that all of us are entitled to reclaiming should we want to. It is hard sometimes, especially if you're joining a group and you're feeling like one of the first people who is not middle-aged and white. I have been that person in the groups. And especially when I started making content, it took a lot of time for some of the older folks in these Facebook groups to even warm up to someone like showing excitement in their videos instead of very calmly droning on six feet away from the camera at all times. Yeah. But I think that that adjustment is necessary and it's good for everybody. Yeah. But I do think division always makes things worse. People just ending up in echo chambers where their maybe limited worldview is just bouncing

around between other people who share that limited worldview is just bouncing around between other people who share that limited worldview is dangerous. And that's why diversifying, especially a lot of these outdoor spaces, is so important. You know, I can't wait until, I mean, I won't be around for it, 100, 200 years from now, when people will be able to read things about American nature through the perspective of so many different eyes, white men included, everybody from everyone's perspective. Yeah, it seems like this is one of the reasons why it I imagine is important to you that you use the handle Black Forager. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. When I was starting to

make foraging content five, six years ago, the thing that I kept bringing up to another one of my friends who is in the foraging community was, wowee, I don't see anybody in this space, at least anyone who was regularly like churning out content who looked like me. And so when I wasn't making videos at first, when it was just photography and recipes and essays, I wanted people to know regardless of whether they could see my hands in a shot or see my face, I wanted them to know that it was coming from a Black woman, from a person of color, just as a gentle reminder that we are in these spaces too. And I think that's really important. But I also am curious about the times when people are surprised to see you doing what you're doing or foraging because they just don't understand what foraging is. Like, have you ever had someone spot you foraging and have a

really strange or interesting reaction to that? Absolutely. My first year making TikToks, I was gathering some mugwort around this time of year and two women who were just power walking together stopped in their tracks and were just like, what are you doing? And I was like, oh, you know, just gathering some aromatic herbs. I wanted to roast some potatoes tonight and I needed some mugwort and here it is.

Honestly, it was a great interaction. They had so many questions. And for them, it just wasn't, it was just not something they ever expected to see anybody doing. I think my identity maybe made it more surprising, but even if it was someone their own age, I think they would have been really surprised. And those are always really delightful moments when people approach it with just like a childlike curiosity. I love those times. There are definitely other times when people approach it from a point of apprehension, being like, oh my God, I don't know what that six foot tall, very loud, gregariously dressed black woman is doing, so I'm going to go ask her about it. But I like to think that usually I end up changing that apprehension to delight almost every time. It definitely hasn't worked every single time.

I used to teach at an elementary school. I taught fifth grade. And I remember so clearly that one day we were reading a book. It wasn't even a science lesson or something. It was just a book where it kind of came up incidentally. And it said like, and they picked the lettuce out of the ground. And the kids were like, lettuce comes from the dirt. Oh, that's the most disgusting thing I've ever heard. It grows out of dirt, which is like hilarious. Of course, like you have to learn that at some point. But but the other thing is and I feel like this is maybe I wonder if this is the thing that must not be said in foraging circles. But I'm like, they also have kind of a point.

It's a little gross that things come out of the dirt and that they're fed by poop and like rotting things. I'm like, you know what? It is gross and it's delicious. And that's just how things work. And that's life, baby. It is delightful and it is often icky. And there are usually bugs. That's life.

That's a great phrase for life. I put that on a t-shirt. I'll buy that t-shirt. You know, your work is about having us reconnect with the natural world, having us value these things which we take for granted or are invisible. And I think that this the broader questions of how do we use technology like generative AI, I think they go to the heart of that as well. Right. Like how much do we care about something just being like new and shiny and how much do we want to actually re-appreciate the traditional and more natural forms of knowledge, which sometimes get ignored, even to the place where it can be really dangerous.

Exactly. Like, you know, I always hear a lot of fear-mongering about mushrooms, and I'm just like, listen, outside of a few extraordinarily deadly mushrooms, you're going to have a bad tummy ache. You're going to have the poops. But plants honestly are the ones that will get you if you are not careful. Some of the most poisonous plants in the world are here in North America when it comes to things like water hemlock. So to hear that people are out here just kind of typing into a generative AI, give me a North American foraging book as a person who can't go and double check that work. That's, that's terrifying. And that could have life altering or life ending consequences.

And I think, and this would open up a whole other can of worms, but going into foraging either through wanting to disseminate foraging information or even through selling the things that you are foraging with the sole intention of profit, in my opinion, is really dangerous. If it's not coming from a place of love, if it's not coming from a place of reverence for the spaces around you and from a space of just loving what you're finding so much that you want to be able to share it with other people, that's how you end up with folks in West Virginia harvesting trash bags full of ramps and just completely devastating centuries-old patches of plants that grow really slowly, a fancy restaurant serving fancy people can

serve them these ramps and not give them any story behind them, not give them any way to actually connect to it. They just get to feel like they won a medal for eating the cool, weird thing that Martha Stewart wrote about. Since we've talked about some of the ways that it can be dangerous to use not trusted sources, what are some trusted sources that you'd recommend that people seek out?

My favorite wild food writers, people who just have a really deep love for wild plants. Sam Thayer, Ellen Zocos, John Callis, Alan Burgo. If you're looking for online content, maybe you're more of a visual learner than a learner through words. Linda Black Elk is an excellent resource. I believe she goes by at Chubby Forager on TikTok, which in retrospect, I was like, oh, that's real good handle. I wish I had that handle instead of my TikTok just being my name like a fool. is an excellent resource and also has done a lot of work with preserving a lot of indigenous food ways and indigenous plant knowledge as well. They are all an excellent jumping off point. And the great thing is, since a lot of us all know each other, in reading their works, you will find names of other people who you can reference as well. reading their works, you will find names of other people who you can reference as well.

Oh, I feel like for the West Coast, I got to give you someone. Pascal Boudar, who lives around the Los Angeles area and teaches there frequently, is a great West Coast person for everyone along the Pacific. Well, Alexis, it's been such a pleasure talking to you. Thank you so much for making the time to be on the show. Thank you so much for having me, Chris. This was truly a joy. I feel like my day has peaked now. Oh, absolutely. Same. It's all downhill from here. Exactly. That is it for today's episode of How to Be a Better Human. Thank you so much to today's guest, Alexis Nicole Nelson. You can find her on social media at Black Forager on Instagram or at Alexis Nicole on TikTok. I am your host, Chris Duffy, and you can find more from me, including my weekly newsletter and other projects, at chrisduffycomedy.com. How to Be a Better Human is brought to you on the TED side by Edible Mushrooms, Daniella Balarezzo, Ban Ban Cheng, Chloe Shasha Brooks, and Joseph DeBrine.

This episode was fact-checked by Julia Dickerson, Mateus Salas, and the many microbiological communities that make up their bodies. On the PRX side, our show is put together by a team that picks and plucks the ripest, freshest audio morsels for you to consume. Morgan Flannery, Nora Gill, Patrick Grant, and Jocelyn Gonzalez. And of course, thanks to you for listening to our show

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with even more How to Be a Better Human. In the meantime, eat something delicious. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes.

The Apple Watch Series X, available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone Xs are later required. Charge time and actual results will vary.