AMI VITALE

And I think we talk a lot about the loss of healthy ecosystems, and I’ve seen that ripple effect of how, ultimately, it does impact humans. But I think developing this connection with these creatures made me realize that it is so much more than that. It is like a loss of our own connection to being wild and who we are. And the wonder. The wonder that all these creatures we share this planet with bring us.

NARRATION

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been obsessed with other animals. As a kid, I would dress up as a zebra or a leopard for weeks at a time and refuse to change. My bedroom was full of every stuffed animal and National Geographic issue you can possibly imagine. So I’ve always been inspired by the storytellers who document the incredible beings we share this planet with. And this week, I’m honored to be joined by one of the best: renowned wildlife photographer and Nat Geo Explorer Ami Vitale. Ami has spent decades covering some of the most crucial and gripping stories of our time, from war zones to documenting the efforts to save an entire species. And in doing so, she found a deeper kinship with both human and non-human life.

My name is Willow Defebaugh and this is The Nature Of. Each week, we’ll look to the natural world for insights into how to navigate the experience of being human. This week, we’re exploring the nature of wildlife and conservation. Let’s listen as Ami shares stories from the field, from rehabilitating orphaned elephants to her time spent living as a panda.

Willow Defebaugh

You have spent your life capturing moments that so many of us will never get to experience. Moments that are beautiful, heartbreaking, and so completely wild and tender. When I saw you speak, you shared about a near-death experience almost, during your time—I think you were in Gaza, right? Do you feel comfortable sharing about that moment and how it kind of led you to shift your approach in covering human stories?

Ami Vitale

Yes. OK. So early on in my career, I was asked to bring back the most violent, dramatic images to illustrate these conflicts. And it wasn’t just Gaza. It was every conflict. It was the same thing. It’s what my editors wanted. It’s what I thought the audience expected, and I did that. I got close to the front lines, got into the action. It was terrifying, but I was like, this is what everybody was doing, and I thought what I needed to do.

And I started asking even my colleagues and I remember they were like, “Well, if I don’t make those images, somebody else will and I’m going to lose my job.” Because all of us were freelancing. And it was like, you’re just also trying to make a living. The thing that stopped me in my tracks was that I was late running to a building where I knew something was happening. And in the moments as I was running there, all the batteries in my camera dropped out. I had flipped a little switch and everything came out and I stopped and I’m picking up all of the batteries. And in that moment, a helicopter out of nowhere comes and just vaporizes that building I should have been in.

And in the moment, I literally got all the batteries in my camera and I take a picture and there’s just soldiers and people from the building running out toward me. And I get one picture and start running. After that happened, in that same week, I went and I was continuing to cover the violence and I was walking back to my hotel and I heard music coming out of this building. And I just start walking. I’m just like, what is that? What is that? And I walk up and the stairs were dark and I’m walking up these dark staircases toward the music and through the crack of an open door, I see this beautiful expression of love in the middle of all of that; and this couple getting married in the middle of all of this chaos around us. I just thought, wow, first of all, that humans everywhere want the same things and we need to do a better job of sharing how resilient we are and how people are seeking love and safety and a better life for their children, just like all of us.

And to me, it wasn’t the story that my editors wanted, but that was the story. That was the story of human resilience and connection. So that people can relate and not just see all of these people in this war-torn place as other than me and somehow different. The same thing we do with the animals, that they’re different. We are different. There’s an arrogance in that. No, we’re not. It’s a good time to share this quote Richard Powers had from one of his—

Willow

My favorite.

Ami

—books. I’m just going to read it because I love it and I think it—basically, he talks about, “There are four good things worth practicing. Being kind toward everything alive. Staying level and steady. Feeling happy for any creature anywhere that is happy. And remembering that any suffering is also yours.”

And I think about that a lot. I’ve had the privilege of working in so many places where there is so much not just human suffering, but creatures suffering, the environment suffering. And I come back and I know it’s mine. I know it’s all of ours, and that grief lives in me.

Willow

It’s almost a double-edged sword in a way because, I mean, our grief is our love. Right? We grieve because we love. And so when we stop ourselves from experiencing the grief of what’s happening to this planet and what people are doing to each other, then we’re also cutting ourselves off from the love.

Ami

Love. Oh my God.

Willow

And that’s what we need to be in. And your work, your photographs really connect people to that shared love. And I love that in the powerful story you just shared, it was about love. That was the image, that was the story, and it speaks to so much of what we’re talking about here, which is that the story can’t only be the violence and the destruction. Because I question—and we talk about this a lot with Atmos—is how much that really motivates people, versus inviting people back into love with each other and with this planet. Because we are moved to protect what we love and who we feel kinship with. And these moments, like that moment you described seeing the wedding, understanding that love is something that we all have in common, and that you depict so beautifully with your photographs with more than human life, too.

I want to go back to something you alluded to also, your time in northern Kenya at the Reteti Elephant Sanctuary. I know that you’ve said that it wasn’t just people taking care of the elephants there, it was the elephants also taking care of the people. What can you share about your time there?

Ami

So Reteti is the first Indigenous-owned and -run elephant sanctuary in all of Africa. They rescue all kinds of animals now too. That is really unique. I mean, what that means is it’s the community rescuing orphaned animals. Elephants are very difficult to rescue, by the way, but they are rehabilitating them and then eventually re-wilding them, which is a very difficult thing to do.

And I met them, oh, back in 2013 when it wasn’t even there and they had this ambitious dream to make an elephant sanctuary. But at the time, everybody laughed at them and said, “You don’t have funding. You don’t have the political power to get all of the permits and to get the permissions to do this.” And I met them and thought, of course they are going to do this and have just sort of stuck with them from the first elephant that arrived in 2016 until today where they also, by the way, they’re doing so many things differently. Everything. From hiring Indigenous women, Samburu women, which has never been done to be elephant keepers, to really looking at their nutrition.

And so they were from the very beginning looking around at nature at what wild elephants eat and trying to add some of those things in nature, like spirulina and just making these formulas. So in the past, across all elephant sanctuaries, they use milk formula made for humans, this powdered milk formula. And it works, but it’s about a 50% success rate in the first two weeks.

Willow

Wow. Fifty percent.

Ami

Fifty percent because they’re switching. Imagine, they come in traumatized. They are so intelligent, and the keepers are there around the clock. They stay with them day and night. They try to feed them every three hours. And during the pandemic, though, they got really nervous because they realized we ship in the milk formula. They are in a very remote part of Kenya. And they thought, what happens if we can’t even get this? We should start looking to nature for a solution.

And so they were like well, goats eat the same browse, the same material that the elephants do in the wild. Maybe we should look at goats. And so they started analyzing goat milk and then doing some tests. And it turned out not only did it work, they went from a 50% survival rate in the first two weeks to a 98% survival rate.

Willow

Incredible.

Ami

So I love this story so much because it’s a metaphor for all of us right now. We are in a terrifying, tumultuous moment, but it is in these moments that maybe we can find a better way of doing things. And so for example, I was just back there this past year for another incredibly emotional moment when they released 13 of the elephants that came in kind of at the beginning when it first opened. And Kapai, I remember her when she was 1 week old and just such a courageous—I just want to back up also and talk about the intelligence of these animals. They have lifespans as long as us. They can literally die of heartbreak. They feel. They have the emotional intelligence I think even more than—a lot of humans have shut that off. Elephants have not. Anyway, Kapai became the matriarch of the herd, meaning she came in and they’re all orphans and she’s also an orphan. But she became kind of the mother of all of the orphans.

And flash forward to last year, it was time to release them. They were all healthy and strong. They didn’t need their milk anymore. They could survive in the wild. They knew that. And Reteti said, we’re not going to do it how it’s done in the past where you dart them, push them into crates, then drive them over rough terrain, release them to a place they’ve never been. How confusing. And so they were like, we live in this place that is surrounded, a million acres surrounded by mountains. We can release them here. We can let them get to know the terrain around here, let them know where the water sources are in case another drought comes. Let them know their surroundings.

And so the day came and it was time to release them, and the whole community came out. The women were singing songs and prayers and they opened the gate and the herd goes rushing out, except Kapai realizes what is happening. She turns around and comes back and touches her trunk on all of the keepers who took care of her. And people will interpret it however they want, but she knew what was happening. I really believe that. The keepers believe that. And then they left and they went straight to the mountains where they’re safe, away from humans, reintegrating with wild herds. They put GPS collars around them so they can monitor them also for the safety of the nearby villages in case they get close. They always say, we are not saving the elephants. The elephants are saving us.

One of the women working there ignored a wound she had on her leg and it was going septic, and she didn’t realize that. She just kept doing everything she needed to do. And then one day, Linguesi, an elephant, went and got mud and started packing her leg with the mud because that’s how elephants treat their own wounds. He did it again. I think she said he did it three times. And she was like, OK, Linguesi’s telling me something. And she went to the doctor and the doctor’s like, “You could have died.”

Willow

Incredible. I mean, what a clear, perfect example of healing nature also healing us.

Ami

Yes.

Willow

And care as reciprocity.

Ami

Yes.

Willow

Beautiful. Now we’re just going deep into your stories, but you spent years with pandas.

Ami

Oh yes.

Willow

Dressing as a panda even at times.

Ami

Yes.

Willow

What was it like being that immersed? Because that is dedication.

Ami

Yeah. Well, it’s harder to rock a panda suit than you might think. The ears were falling off.

Willow

I have a feeling you rocked it.

Ami

And so the idea was Dr. Zhang Hemin, who is affectionately called Papa Panda, he was pushing the envelope, reimagining rewilding and saving the species from extinction. We knew there weren’t many of them in the wild. And so he had this idea that they should breed 300 of them in captivity because that would give them enough genetic diversity that even if they went extinct in the wild, they could keep the species alive for 100 years at least. So that was his goal.

And then they did that, which is a whole other story we could get into. It took decades to crack the code. The panda was thought—it was this species without a sex drive and the pandas, you can’t breed them. And no, he figured it out. It was that females only have 24 to 72 hours in a year to get pregnant, and you need to give her a selection of—she needs to choose who her partner is.

Willow

It’s good to be choosy.

Ami

Yes. So once they did that, and by the way before that—

Willow

Relatable.

Ami

—they were literally wheeling television sets showing the pandas videos. Can I say panda porn?

Willow

Yeah.

Ami

It was like they were doing that trying to get them excited and doing everything to try to get them to breed. And then he finally figured it out. No, it was just this. The next piece of the story—so I worked on it for three years, and I kept going back to cover different pieces. And then the wild part was like, okay, we need to send some of these captive-born pandas back to the wild. But you can’t just send them back. They will die. After one generation in captivity, they don’t know how to be wild anymore. So they have to go through this very elaborate training program and they have to learn how to survive in the wild.

So Papa Panda was like, “Well, the biggest threat to pandas is humanity. We don’t ever want them to feel comfortable around anybody that is here.” So we would all kind of have to hide and be in these crazy panda costumes, which were scented with panda urine. And the reason is they go by smell, not sight. I meet people that are total crazy about pandas. I love them, but my whole life was not pandas before I started the story. It did become that.

Willow

Well, you were living as one.

Ami

I mean, people still send me panda things. But no, you get into their lives and they really are the most magical creature. The way they have adapted, I mean, I love this. It’s such a beautiful metaphor again, of adaptation. And so they are vegetarian, love that.

Willow

We love that.

Ami

They basically were carnivorous bears, like all bears. And over millions of years, adapted—scientists think so that they didn’t have to compete with other predators for food. And so they basically adapted their digestive system. They even developed a sixth thumb so they could hold the bamboo better. And they just hang out in these thick bamboo forests eating bamboo, a lot of it, like 40 pounds of it every day. They’re just these really magical bears.

And when you look at them as little babies curled up in a ball, they almost look like the yin and yang symbol. They’re like these symbols of peace in a way, and I kind of believe that. I think that for a long time they used them as a diplomacy, a tool. They started to give pandas out first to Richard Nixon, and that’s how we got the first pandas here.

Willow

Richard Nixon was given a panda?

Ami

Two.

Willow

Two pandas.

Ami

Two pandas.

Willow

Did not know that.

Ami

Yeah. But it was called panda diplomacy. It was in the news again last year because when things were getting rocky between China and the United States, they brought their pandas back. And then the United States and China renegotiated because people… And I think this is such a great metaphor for me, too, I realized this. I started getting too politically in the weeds with upset about things, and I realized, no, these animals can bring us all together. That is one thing everybody can relate to and we have this shared love. So, I think we need people on all parts of the political spectrum, but I think animals bring us back and remind us. It’s like this safe place we all can rally behind.

Willow

Yeah. So I write this weekly newsletter for Atmos called The Overview and each week I look to a different species, whether it’s an animal or plant for human lessons that can help us navigate life. And I’m always amazed by the responses I hear back from people who have stories about why this particular animal means so much to them. And I really do believe that our kinship and the love that we feel for other beings, it is what we have in common. I think we just have forgotten it, or many people have forgotten it.

Ami

Yeah.

Willow

Okay. Now we can get into—

Ami

Yeah. The pandas—

Willow

The big one.

Ami

—to rhinos.

Willow

Yeah. You have devoted 16 years of your life to documenting one of the most important conservation stories of our time: the life and death of Sudan, the last male, northern white rhino. How did that experience shape you, not just as a storyteller, but also as a human being? And feel free to start with some context for anyone who’s unfamiliar.

Ami

Yes. Well, and it’s still going on. I think this will be a story I work on forever. I’m going to back up to December of 2009. I heard about this audacious plan to move four northern white rhinos from the Czech Republic to Kenya. We are in this tiny town called Dvůr Králové, beautiful, surrounded by a lot of nature, but it is an industrial town.

It also has this very interesting story. Back in the sixties, very controversially, this Czech politician basically started bringing species from Africa and creating this safari park. So this was around the moment when I was starting to understand that at the backdrop of all of the horrors of the world was our natural environment. So I’m starting to look for stories to try to talk about what’s happening. And at that time, I didn’t even realize the wildlife crisis. I mean, now we know we’re going through the sixth extinction, and this fact came out recently that we’ve lost 73% of the world’s wildlife in the last 50 years alone.

But I didn’t even know that back then. I heard about this plan to move these rhinos to Kenya. So I go in December 2009, it’s snowing. They’re in this brick enclosure with iron bars. Something about being so close to this really ancient, hulking creature stopped me in my tracks because you look at them and immediately understand that they have been on this planet so much longer than all of us. They look prehistoric and I felt like I was standing next to a unicorn. Because what was so unexpected to me was this deep sense of wonder I felt in his midst. Really unexpectedly, this rhinoceros changed my life. And what struck me was that only 100 years ago, there were probably tens of thousands of these rhinos roaming the open plains of Africa. And on this day, there were only eight, all living in zoos, that were known to be alive.

And so Kenya was chosen because it’s safe. It was considered the safest place to bring rhinos. They flew four of them and I started this story which, interestingly, nobody really wanted back then. And I was like, this is a really important story, and I’m sorry people don’t get that, but I’m going to just go for it. And it became the most important story of my life. Like everybody, we thought that the open air and room to roam might somehow stimulate them to breed. Or I thought it could be a story of watching extinction unfold in my lifetime. I would go back. And the thing is, we imagine, we see all these pictures of rhinos roaming the plains, and the truth is they have to be guarded around the clock by heavily militarized men.

Now, when I began this story, I did all of this research and I noticed that it was always being told from the perspective of usually white men talking about conservation and what was happening and that this was a poaching war, and that the solution was to militarize and fight the poachers. And I just started asking one, to me, really obvious question: What do the people living with the wildlife think? There’s indigenous communities that we often forget can be the best protectors. And I just wondered why I wasn’t really seeing many of their voices.

And so with that question, it has led me down this path and helped me find the most incredible stories. Because it turns out, yes, they do care. There are people committing their lives, like spending 10 months a year with these animals, protecting them. Not just the rangers, but the keepers, the caretakers, the communities that are absolutely engaged living with the wildlife. I wondered why we weren’t amplifying their stories. I’m so struck by everywhere I go, it’s often the people that are the most marginalized, have the least, who are making huge impacts. Not just for their communities, but for the planet.

Willow

And can you share a little bit more about how the story progressed and where it is now?

Ami

Oh, yes. So back in 2018, I got a call because Sudan, he was old. He was 45. It was time. He was suffering. So they called me and said, “Hurry, come back to Kenya.” And I raced to get back there, and the scene that I saw was all of the keepers, it was raining, and everybody just surrounding Sudan. Each of the keepers went up to give their last goodbye and Joseph Wachira—I only took two pictures because I didn’t want the sound of my camera to disturb this sacred moment, and I have this image of Joseph leaning in to say goodbye.

And it was amazing. Like, Sudan knew, too, that everybody loved him. It’s crazy that every time I talk about it, it’s still so raw because that day, it was the moment that this beautiful species, these beautiful creatures, these wondrous—when you spent this much time with them, it’s so different than when you’re just seeing an animal you don’t have a connection with. I just couldn’t believe they were now functionally extinct and this was it. And that it meant future generations will never get to experience these creatures.

The thing I am haunted with was the silence on that day. I mean, usually nature, there’s a lot of noise in nature. And on that day, there was this really haunting silence. All you could hear was the muffled sobs of everybody who loved and protected him, and it was just like this foreshadowing. This is what a world without wildlife will be like and what it will sound like without these magical creatures. And I’ve thought so much about this moment and what it means for humanity. And I think we talk a lot about the loss of healthy ecosystems, and I’ve seen that ripple effect of how, ultimately, it does impact humans. But I think developing this connection with these creatures made me realize that it is so much more than that. It is like a loss of our own connection to being wild and who we are, and the wonder. The wonder that all these creatures we share this planet with bring us.

Willow

It’s so emotional. I mean, thinking about that silence as being foreshadowing, it’s chilling. And speaking of our grief being our love, I mean, I feel it so deeply just sitting with you and hearing the story. You’ve shared a couple of times the stat of 73% of wildlife having been killed in the last 50 years. How do you personally process the grief and how do you transform that?

Ami

I sunk into that despair for a second, and then I realized, well, this is not the appropriate response right now. We have to get to work because there’s amazing people out there. And that happened with the rhino story, too. In the darkest moment, when it feels like there is no hope and that this is the end, this incredible team of just a few individuals are doing everything they can in the last moment to save these species. They have been working on this for quite a long time, but there’s things that stop the progress. But they persisted.

And even through the pandemic, the Biorescue team, which is this amazing team from Germany, the Czech Republic, Japan, Kenya, it’s many countries working together, and they made, oh gosh, dozens of trips and were taking the oocytes, that’s the immature eggs, from Fatu, the younger female, because both of the females were actually unable to breed. And so they realized that they could take those eggs and they had 24 hours to get them to a lab in Italy. They froze semen from some of the deceased male northern white rhinos before they passed away knowing extinction was coming.

So today they have created 35 viable pure northern white rhino embryos, and they also, last year they made the world’s first IVF surrogacy and it worked. But tragically, they’ve just had ups and downs. Because of climate change in Kenya, they had droughts and then just these massive floods and right after the floods unearthed a bacteria, so it did kill the surrogate mother and her fetus. And it was just this heartbreaking moment. They did not use the northern white rhino embryo for that, though. They wanted to test with the southern white rhino embryo. But it’s signaled now the future lies in, the hope lies in creating a surrogacy program where they get surrogates, they have to find the right surrogates, and it’s a much more elaborate thing. Very complicated. So I won’t go into all of it, but I actually believe in the next few years we will be seeing northern white rhinos again on the plains of Africa.

And this story does give me so much hope, but I think also we should not wait for technology to save all of us. I love that the rhino work that they’re doing is actually—they’re already working with the Indonesian government, because the Sumatran and Javan rhinos are also endangered species, critically endangered. And so they’re going to be already working to save them so that they don’t wait until it’s just two females.

Willow

I want to highlight the fact that this team is comprised of people from a number of different countries because it makes me really feel that saving—

Ami

Takes all of us.

Willow

It takes all of us, and also saving the other beings we share this planet with, saving this planet will also save us and our humanity. And how this conversation started, talking about conflict, it’s all connected.

Ami

It’s so interesting you say this. So I left conflict for many reasons, but one of the other things was that just on a professional level, it was so cutthroat and aggressive. And I was like, oh, I’m going to move to conservation, with this very idyllic view of it. Conservation is also cutthroat and I think it is so misguided because people were criticizing the panda story, because they’re like, why are we saving pandas? Basically, they think that conservation is coming from one bucket of money. It is not, and that we’re not all competing for the same resources. It is going to take innovation and ingenuity and creativity and working with local people everywhere. That’s the way forward, and I’m so glad you brought that because it’s a perfect metaphor.

The Biorescue project, when it first began, I’ll never forget it. The very first meeting, there was so much distrust between everybody. I mean lovely humans, but everybody was just like, “Who are you?” So there’s a lot of different people, very different cultures, different ways of communicating, but you should see everybody now. It is like a family. It is such a privilege to be on the front lines and to see this trust and against—

Also, I want to say they are in a difficult place because the backdrop is this war in the Ukraine, which is impacting the funding for this project, and they’re so close to saving the northern white rhino from extinction. And because of the war, all the funding for sciences is now being directed to the military. And it kills me. It’s like this cross in the road that we’re, what are we going to do, the human species? Are we going to devote all resources to killing each other? Or are we going to rally and come together and save what we have?

For anybody that is moved by this, do not stop and wait and think like, oh, what organization should I get involved with? It doesn’t matter. Pick anything. Pick something in your backyard because there are millions of stories in every single issue I work on, every single one of them. Climate change, extinction, deforestation, I mean human rights issues, everything is connected and every one of them has champions out there that you can go and support and change their life.

When I began Reteti, they were super fragile, super vulnerable. That sanctuary could have closed, and it takes rallying behind them, getting the donors to support them. It takes a village, right?

Willow

It takes everyone.

Ami

It takes everyone. So I want this to be a rallying call for more of us. I think about all the ridiculous things we focus on, and it’s fine. You can do that too, but this one feels good too.

Willow

Yeah. I recently heard you say something that really stuck with me, which is that we have to live our lives somewhere between the infinite and the intimate. For anyone listening, how do you personally practice that?

Ami

Sometimes you have to realize on that cosmic level, some things just don’t matter. I think it’s so important to stay grounded, though. Grounded in who you are, grounded in your love and compassion for the world. It’s in all of us. And to be brave, to be vulnerable again, and try. You’ll get rejection and pain and hurt and take it all on. It’s part of being human, but don’t be afraid to get intimate. That is what is going to save all of us. And I’m sorry I’m so emotional today. It’s just—

Willow

I’m emotional listening to it. It’s OK.

Ami

There’s so much beauty in all of us, in all of this world, and I don’t know why we’re all so afraid of each other. I think I’ve been so privileged to see so much, and it has humbled me and shown me that. And that not to be afraid of being uncomfortable, too. I mean, I think I walk towards the things that make me the most uncomfortable because I’m always surprised there’s so little to be afraid of, actually. Really, I mean that on everything from physical to emotional to spiritual, and toward what makes you afraid.

Do it today. Do it now. Go talk to somebody that’s different than you, that might scare you and you might actually change their lives. And they’re going to change your life and it happens in little ways and big ways, but to me, that’s the biggest worry that I’m fighting every day is that we have to not be afraid.

Willow

Intimacy will save us.

Ami

Intimacy will save us.

Willow

I can’t think of a better note to end this conversation on. Thank you so much, Ami.

Ami

Thank you. Thank you so much.

Willow

Truly. Thank you for showing up with so much wisdom and vulnerability.

NARRATION

Walking out of the recording studio with Ami, I knew that we had found our season finale. And as we wind down and look back on the season, I’m left feeling so energized and inspired. For me, each conversation illuminated the problems we face, but more critically the solutions we have and the people who are actively working on them.

Something that kept coming up was that we need everyone, and that includes you. I’d like to invite you to think about where you’d like to take action, whether that’s incorporating biomimicry into your life, getting involved in conservation efforts, finding a deeper sense of symbiosis within your community, or even switching to a few plant-based meals per week.

In other words, my final prompt for you is: What role do you want to play in this ecosystem of change? 

I’m Willow Defebaugh, and this is The Nature Of. Thank you so much for listening. If you enjoyed this season, be sure to rate the podcast and leave a review. And if you have thoughts on what topics you’d like us to cover in the future or have questions you’d like to hear answered on the show, send an email to podcast@atmos.earth. And that’s Atmos, A-T-M-O-S.