Meet the Pack: Spring 2024 Contributors
Get to know some of the talented contributors behind the Spring 2024 issue of National Wildlife magazine
- By Laura Tangley and Jennifer Wehunt
- NWF News
- Mar 28, 2024
Clockwise from top left: Randy Edwards (photo by Eric Albrecht), Erica Goode (photo courtesy of Erica Goode), Ray Levy Uyeda (photo courtesy of Maggie Shannon), Andrew Vietze (photo by Lilly Hurd/Find Her in the Highlands), Heather Valey (photo by Dave Showalter), Makeba “KEEBS” Rainey (photo by Gabrielle Clark/@honeywatercreative)
We are honored to introduce a handful of the contributors who helped make our Spring 2024 issue of National Wildlife® magazine an insightful, inspiring read.
RANDY EDWARDS is a lifelong Ohioan—“every minute of it”—based in Columbus. On reporting “Water Water Everywhere,” he says, “Having grown up very close to Lake Erie when it was still in pretty bad shape, and having watched all of this interest in protecting the Great Lakes, it would be great to see that happen for the Ohio River.” Edwards has covered environmental issues for more than 25 years, most recently for Columbus Monthly and The Nature Conservancy. See more at wordriffle.com.
ERICA GOODE has worked at publications including Inside Climate News, STAT and The New York Times, where she spent 18 years writing and editing on topics from human behavior, criminal justice and climate change to the Iraq War. While “still interested in all those other subjects, my roots are in science writing”—such as “Are Entomologists as Endangered as the Insects They Study?”—“and I always seem to return to it,” she says. Follow her on X @egoode.
RAY LEVY UYEDA, a reporter and writer who lives in Oakland, California, believes “every story is a climate story.” In helping tell those stories—including “A Colossal Need for Native Seed,” as well as past assignments for Civil Eats, The Guardian and YES!—her job, she says, is to “provide the mic to people who may not have had the space to share their experiences.” Read more at raylevyuyeda.com.
MAKEBA “KEEBS” RAINEY, a Harlem native who lives in Philadelphia (“Birders in Living Color”), says joining Black Lives Matter Philly and a fellowship with New York’s The Laundromat Project helped her “connect my art making and my art activism.” She also credits the collective Vox Populi, as well as her mom and her high school art teacher—shout-out to Jessica Straus—with her development as an artist. See her work on Instagram @justkeebs.
HEATHER VALEY first photographed a purple martin roost in Austin, Texas, several years back (“Making Room for Purple Martins on Public Property”). “I showed the photos to a lady who taught me birding, and she said, ‘That’s only one part of the story,’” Valey recalls. Valey eventually learned that, in many places, the birds primarily nest on private land. “And I thought, Oh, wow. In Austin they don’t.” See more from the Arvada, Colorado, resident at heathervaley.net.
ANDREW VIETZE's more than two dozen books include This Wild Land, about his ongoing work as a seasonal ranger in Maine’s Baxter State Park. With “Artificial Intelligence Is Watching Wildlife,” he was most surprised by his own reaction to tech in the outdoors. “When I started at Baxter, part of my job was busting people for listening to Red Sox games,” he says. But cameras helping protect wildlife? “I found I’m comfortable with it.” See more at andrewvietze.com.
