Forestcast Special Episodes

Once spanning nearly 6 million acres in Missouri's Ozarks, the shortleaf pine and oak woodland ecosystem has dwindled to 100,000 acres today. Along with the loss of this habitat, a bird—the brown-headed nuthatch—disappeared as well. However, after decades of woodland restoration, the brown-headed nuthatch has returned to Missouri—by plane.

Two scientists—one who's tracked the aboveground movements of cicadas, and another who's unearthed the belowground impact of these insects—take you inside the many mysteries and forgotten elements of these evolutionary enigmas.

In the 1970s, red spruce was the forest equivalent of a canary in the coal mine, signaling that acid rain was damaging forests and that some species—especially red spruce—are particularly sensitive to this human induced damage. In the course of studying the lingering effects of acid rain, scientists came up with a surprising result—decades later, the canary is feeling much better.