Kaatscast: the Catskills Podcast

In 1845, a feudal land system that had survived the American Revolution finally met its match in the hills above Andes, New York — and the clash left a county undersheriff dead and hundreds of farmers under arrest. The...

What did Beethoven's piano actually sound like? At the Catskill Mountain Foundation's Piano Performance Museum in Hunter, New York, you don't have to wonder — you can sit down and play one. Brett Barry visits the museum...

<p>Every spring, something remarkable happens in the tidal waters of Black Creek in Esopus, New York: tiny, translucent eels — just an inch and a half long and barely the weight of a postage stamp — swim in from the...

<p>Kaatscast walks a stretch of the Finger Lakes Trail in Delaware Wild Forest with Heather Houskeeper — herbalist, long-distance hiker, author, and founder of the School of Plant and Place Connection — to talk about...

<p>The Catskill Park's most visited corridor — Kaaterskill Falls and the Kaaterskill Clove area along Route 23A — may be heading for a major management overhaul. In this extra edition, host Brett Barry sits down with...

<p>After nearly 30 years wading Catskill streams, Dany Davis has learned that rivers don't just carry water — they carry time, memory, and if you're paying close enough attention, a few life lessons too. Now retiring as...

<p>For a hamlet of just a few hundred people, Pine Hill punches well above its weight. This week, Brett Barry visits the Pine Hill Community Center to mark its 25th anniversary — and to find out what it actually takes...

<p>Brett Barry visits Anna Plattner and Justin Wexler at their 95-acre forest farm in Cairo, New York, home base of Wild Hudson Valley — an educational organization dedicated to inspiring learning and building...

<p>In this episode, host Brett Barry joins Jan Jaffe, board president of Wellington Blueberry LLC, outside the shuttered Wellington Hotel on Main Street in Pine Hill, New York — a 12,000-square-foot, 19th-century...

<p>Hoppy Quick has been chainsaw carving bears in the Catskills since 1979 — but he'll tell you he's not an artist. He's a spiritual being who found himself through the bear.</p><p>In this wide-ranging conversation, we...

<p>Singer‑songwriter Steve Koester, the creative force behind Two Dark Birds, joins Brett in the Kaatscast studio for a deep, generous conversation about songwriting, place, and the long arc of making music in the...

<p>In this episode, we visit Pogliani Select, purveyors of artisanal, estate‑grown olive oils and aged balsamic vinegars sourced directly from small family farms across Italy and Croatia. From the hills of Tuscany and...

<p>In this special long‑form conversation, Brett Barry sits down with legendary angler‑writer and publisher Nick Lyons, now 93, whose life has been shaped by water, words, and the Catskills. From a childhood spent...

<p>New York State Historic Newspapers Project with Chuck Henry</p><p>Episode Overview</p><p>Dive into the largest state newspaper archive in the country! Chuck Henry, Project Lead for New York State Historic Newspapers...

<p>Prescribed Fire in the Catskills: Restoring a Lost Tool</p><p>In this episode, Brett sits down once again with Ryan Trapani, Director of Forest Services at the Catskill Forest Association, to explore the surprising...