Welcome to Our Hen House. This is Jasmine Singer. And this is Marianne Sullivan. And this week,

Marianne will be speaking with Peter Allegona, who is the author of The Accidental ecosystem,

People and Wildlife in American cities.

I'm so excited about this interview. Urban wildlife is one of my favorite topics, and we don't get into it as much as I would like us to on our headhouse, but today we are. Yeah, I know I am always

fascinated by interviews about urban wildlife as well.

And as you can tell from the title of the book, he takes this really interesting approach,

the accidental ecosystem, that the urban habitats are actually ecosystems.

And they're not, the animals just don't end up there in some horrible,

miserable way that they don't belong there. They're actually making a life there, a lot of

different kinds of animals. And we all kind of, you know, have noticed that that's true.

The stories, you know, years ago there were no stories of coyotes in the middle of Manhattan.

It's changing and animals are just adapting as they always do to the mess we have made and they're saying,

well, some of this actually works for us. So we're going to find out what works for us.

Anyway, I'm encapsulating the ideas which are pretty complex in which we get into an

interview and I really loved it. Yeah, I can't wait.

Very cool.

So how are you feeling, by the way?

You know, what do you ask?

I'm getting much better.

I'm getting much better.

Every day my knee gets better.

I had knee surgery recently for those who have not been listening to every episode.

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