Ultrawilding! Steve Mushin on blowing the lid off rewilding, joy & creativity

The RegenNarration Podcast

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Steve Mushin is an award-winning industrial designer and inventor, and an old mate from when we both were part of the team at CERES – the legendary community environment park in inner Melbourne. He’s also now the author of children’s book ‘Ultrawild: An audacious plan to rewild every city on earth’ (Allen & Unwin). Eight years in the making, it's an intricately illustrated book exploring visions for rapidly transforming cities to reverse climate change and species extinction. The book contains over 100 ludicrous sounding, and just maybe possible inventions, illustrated with over 1,000 drawings. It’s packed with curious facts on everything from how plants and fungi share resources and the soil engineering power of megafauna, to insect and mechanical flight, high-tech microbe-powered toilets and much more.
It took me a little while to pry the book from my boy’s hands for a read. And it’s fair to say my brain was bending with the force of Steve’s lens on the world - always a welcome thing. Equally welcome were the parts of our conversation here where we delved into how rewilding might square with the rapid mass deployment of industrial technologies like renewables, EVs and so on. As well as how it might square with a vegan or omnivorous diet, with Steve firmly in the vegan camp, and me? Well, long-time listeners of this podcast will have heard some of my journey from vegetarian to omnivore, largely through the experience of the podcast. Yes, here’s a bit of the George Monbiot/Allan Savory stouch - without the stouch!
Head here for automatic cues to chapter markers (also available on the embedded player on the episode website), and a transcript of this conversation (please note the transcript is AI generated and imperfect, but hopefully serves to provide greater access to these conversations for those who need or like to read).
Recorded online with Steve at home in Aotearoa New Zealand on 5 April 2024.
Title slide: Steve at work (supplied).
See more photos on the episode web page, and for more behind the scenes, become a subscriber via the Patreon page.
Music:
Green Shoots, by The Nomadics.
Regeneration, by Amelia Barden, from the film Regenerating Australia.
Mirari, by Spoonbill (the YouTube film clip).
The RegenNarration playlist, featuring music chosen by guests (with thanks to podcast member Josie Symons).
Find more:
And for the kids, Steve speaks with our young son about his book, on Yeshe Interviews – coming soon.
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Chapters

1. Music, Preview, Introduction & Supporter Thanks (00:00:00)

2. Steve & AJ’s death-defying wild adventure (00:03:45)

3. How’d the book come out of this era? (00:07:30)

4. The story piece, and how to encourage imagining different futures (00:12:45)

5. A 500 year vision for an amazing rewilding story in Wellington NZ/Aoteoroa (00:19:15)

6. Human rewilding – de-mechanising ourselves (00:22:35)

7. The value of these ‘what if’ exercises applied in the consensus work of Jeff Goebel (ep185) (00:25:45)

8. Exploring some points of tension - starting with how rewilding squares with mechanised industrial technologies (00:27:15)

9. And do veganism & meat-eating need to be at odds with each other? (inc. ref to George Monbiot, Alan Savory, David Marsh, Tammi Jonas, Darin Olien, Bruce Pascoe, Wooleen Station, Kachana Station) (00:34:05)

10. Rewilding Cities for a Sustainable Future (00:50:39)

11. Closing with a special story and piece of music (00:57:15)