Jenny Bird

Writer for The Ampersand Magazine at Washington University, contributor at Feast and Field, The Click, St. Louis Magazine, Nat Geo Family, National Geographic Magazine, Rogue Collective

United States

Freelancer based in St. Louis Missouri. Graduate of NYU Arthur L. Carter School of Journalism.

Portfolio
Arts & Sciences
10/23/2023
Photo essay: Researching retirement in the Himalayas

Geoff Childs, professor of sociocultural anthropology, has been researching demographic trends in Nubri, a highland Buddhist community in Nepal's Himalayas. He's done fieldwork there since the '90s when he began studying demographic processes such as historical migrations and fertility transitions in the region.

Arts & Sciences
06/05/2023
Protect and preserve

What does a building mean to a community? Ask Michael Allen, lecturer in American culture studies, and he'll tell you a building is more than a physical structure. Preserving the built environment can act as a "storehouse" against the forces that sweep in and change communities, he said.

Stlmag
05/20/2022
A guide to getting outside near St. Louis

Luke Church jumped out of a plane for the first time 14 years ago on a Saturday afternoon. It was so thrilling, he went back the next day and jumped three more times. Since then, Church has completed more than 7,000 jumps of varying degrees of intensity, while helping fellow skydivers get their fix.

Arts & Sciences
09/01/2023
Black Pastoral: A conversation with MFA student Ariana Benson

Ariana Benson, a second-year student in the English MFA program, will publish her first poetry collection "Black Pastoral" in September. She wrote much of the collection during COVID when the pandemic compelled her to leave London, where she'd been studying poetic practice as a Marshall Scholar.

Environment
06/07/2022
How to fight invasive plants-one bite at a time

It's fine to shop at farmers markets and grocery stores for recipe ingredients. But what if you could gather some of them by foraging-and, at the same time, help rid your region of non-native plant species that are harming America's ecosystems? According to the National Wildlife Federation, about 42 percent of today's threatened or endangered species are at risk because of invasive species.

Arts & Sciences
03/06/2023
Small-town mayor pushes for big changes inspired by WashU education

Tyrin Truong's feet still ache. More than two months had passed since the WashU alumnus ran for mayor of Bogalusa, Louisiana, and his feet were still sore from 10 months of door-knocking up and down the nearly ten square-mile city. He'd known that's what it would take for a 23-year-old Democrat to oust a two-term Republican in a red state.

The Click
04/15/2021
In a Resource Desert, Cutting-Edge Shelter Helps Pet Owners Close to Home | The Click

(EAST ST. LOUIS, Illinois) - "Food deserts" or "healthcare deserts" are communities that lack access to vital resources due to the scarcity of supermarkets, grocery stores, clinics or hospitals. Gateway Pet Guardians, a nonprofit organization in southern Illinois, is addressing the problem of resource deserts for pet owners and their animal friends.

Family
08/01/2022
How gardening with native plants can teach kids eco-stewardship

Over the past year, Anne King and her five-year-old daughter have grown native plants in their Portland, Oregon, yard to attract wildlife like birds. Although she knows that gardening can be beneficial for childhood development and overall well-being , gardening with native species-plants that occur naturally in a place without human assistance-can go even further, introducing children to complex concepts like ecosystems, pollinators, and biodiversity.

Arts & Sciences
04/18/2023
Five poems to read for National Poetry Month

1. "Love Poem in the Black Field" by Ariana Benson. Benson is a current MFA student in the English department. In 2022 she won the Furious Flower Poetry Prize, and her book "Black Pastoral" won the 2022 Cave Canem Poetry Prize.

The Source
04/11/2023
McPherson wins Guggenheim Fellowship

Author is among 171 winners of award from John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Edward McPherson, an associate professor of English in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, has won a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship.

Arts & Sciences
03/30/2023
Augmented reality allows students to practice Italian in a virtual classroom

It all started with Pokémon Go. Iva Youkilis, teaching professor in Italian in the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, watched as her three young sons grew obsessed with the augmented reality game. As she drove them around to find and "capture" virtual pokémon on their phones, she began learning the names and attributes of different pokémon figures - whether she wanted to or not.

Stlmag
08/15/2022
St. Louis researchers shape understanding of long COVID

It was March 2020, and Dr. Ziyad Al-Aly felt as disoriented as everyone else. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, he was forced to work from home rather than at his office at the Washington University School of Medicine, where he is the director of clinical epidemiology, or at the Veterans Affairs St.

Arts & Sciences
03/15/2023
Quinn awarded grant to compare neurotropic markers in human and primate milk

E.A. Quinn, associate professor of biological anthropology, has received a grant from the Leakey Foundation to study how neurotropic hormones in human and primate milk affect brain growth. E.A. Quinn Humans have very large brains at birth and experience rapid periods of brain growth during infancy.

Stlmag
11/01/2022
Where to go ice-skating in St. Louis

Ready for some winter fun? The St. Louis area features many ice-skating rinks open to the public, offering plenty of opportunities to lace up the skates and do some laps with the family. Enjoy the city's iconic ice rink any day of the week-no matter what the weather throws your way.

Arts & Sciences
01/25/2017
The Ampersand

From the Civil War to the 21st century, Black women have fought to become physicians. A new book by Jasmine Brown, AB '18, tells the story of the barriers Black women pursuing a career in medicine have faced throughout ­history.

Stlmag
08/16/2022
Where to volunteer in St. Louis right now

When it's time to volunteer, it can be a challenge to decide where to donate your time-according to one report, there are nearly 15,000 registered nonprofit organizations in the St. Louis area. Consider these 20, mostly smaller, organizations where your efforts are bound to go a long way.

Stlmag
04/07/2022
How Ready Readers is increasing literacy equity among St. Louis' youngest readers

The best part of Angela Sears Spittal's week is the half-hour she spends reading storybooks to a classroom of 4- and 5-year-olds. Although she's the executive director of Ready Readers, the St. Louis nonprofit that sends volunteers into 250 classrooms a week for storytime, she's dedicated to participating as a volunteer reader herself.

Family
03/29/2022
Your family can fight invasive species-by eating them

Matthew Bruckner and his two kids spent a Maine vacation eating wild blueberries straight from the bush. Returning home, they wondered what else they might forage. Soon the Washington, D.C., family found wild blackberries in the alley behind their house, in dirt patches around the city, and in a nearby natural urban woodland.

The Click
12/06/2021
Opinion: The Scouting Feud - The Click

Girls have broken another barrier: they can now join the Boy Scouts. But the Girl Scouts object. What happens if progress means the loss of all-female spaces and networks of support? One recent girl's weekend, somewhere between sad-song karaoke and the board game "Telestrations After Dark," I brought up scouting to four of my mom friends, whose kids are the same age as mine.

Feast and Field
03/31/2022
California adds the "SLO Coast" as a new wine region

The U.S. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau designated the "SLO coast" as California's newest American Viticultural Area (AVA) earlier this month. The area is in San Luis Obispo (SLO) county and lies on the coast in a nearly 100-mile long strip about halfway between California's two largest cities, San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Feast and Field
04/18/2022
10 agricultural influencers you need to be following

In honor of Earth Day on April 22nd, meet 10 inspiring agriculture influencers who love and celebrate the earth and all its offerings. Angelique Taylor and Kip Ritchey The folks at Smarter by Nature give us a nearly daily dose of inspiration.

Feast and Field
03/24/2022
MacKenzie Scott gives $50 million gift to 4-H

Billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott has pledged $50 million to youth 4-H programs. The donation is the largest in the organization's 120-year history. Scott is a novelist and philanthropist who was married to Jeff Bezos, helping him start Amazon in 1994.

Feast and Field
04/07/2022
Craft brewer Athletic targets new customers with an alcohol-free light beer

Athletic Brewing Company has jumped into the light beer game with a brand new "clean, crisp, everyday" offering, Athletic Lite. Targeting athletes, drinkers who want a temporary break from alcohol and those who have given it up entirely, Athletic Lite opens up the non-alcoholic beer category to a wider audience than ever before.

Feast and Field
03/14/2022
Meet Jodie Ferguson, our new Sweet & Savory chef extraordinaire

We are thrilled to introduce our readers to the award-winning chef of our new culinary series, Sweet and Savory. Jodie Ferguson is the chef-owner of Clara B's Kitchen Table, a food truck (named after her grandmother) that serves food inspired by both Ferguson's Texas upbringing and her grandmother's native Louisiana one.

Feast and Field
03/23/2022
Pharm Table wins 'Best Patio for Brunch' from San Antonio Magazine

Pharm Table, a San Antonio-based restaurant specializing in organic, local and gluten-free meals, has won "Best Patio for Brunch" in San Antonio Magazine's Best of the City 2022 Awards. Helmed by chef Elizabeth Johnson, who the James Beard Foundation called a "food is medicine guru," Pharm Table promotes plant-forward comfort foods while eliminating inflammatory ingredients.

Feast and Field
03/22/2022
First oat-based butter offers an alternative to nuts

Oat Haus Granola Butter, the first oat-based spread, provides those with nut allergies a delicious option on their morning toast. Founded in 2018 by Ali Bonar, it was featured on the business funding competition show Shark Tank in 2021.

Feast and Field
03/16/2022
Roulaison Barrel-Aged Reserve Rum wins a 2022 Good Food Award

The Barrel-Aged Reserve Rum by Roulaison Distilling Co. has won a 2022 Good Food Award, placing in the south region. The rum is aged in casks that originally held bourbon, rye, brandy and single malt. It's put in barrels at a maximum of 110 proof to extract less bitter oak tannin and mature with more complexity.

Feast and Field
04/01/2022
Award-winning baker opens new Chicago location

James Beard honoree Greg Wade has launched a new production facility for his award-winning bread on the west side of Chicago. Publican Quality Bread is a town favorite, supplying whole-grain long-fermented loaves to over 100 of the city's top chefs and restaurants and to many independent retailers.

Feast and Field
01/28/2022
Eat the invaders: is invasivorism the next food trend?

You've heard of plant-based diets and locavorism, but how about invasivores? In the fight for sustainability, cooks are beginning to focus on eating invasive species. The term was first used by conservation biologist and University of Vermont professor Joe Roman around 20 years ago.

Feast and Field
04/06/2022
Brewery releases first gut-friendly probiotic beer

Singapore-based craft brewery Brewerkz has teamed up with food tech start-up Probicient to make the world's first probiotic beer. Red Billion Probiotic Raspberry Sour Beer is a tart berry-red beer, packed with a fruity freshness of raspberries and 1 billion CFU (colony forming units) of bacteria, the minimum amount considered to be an effective probiotic.

Feast and Field
03/11/2022
Oats star in a timely new beer for St. Patrick's Day

Irish Whiskey Cask Scottish Oatmeal Stout, a beer celebrating Celtic culture, is now available in the U.S. Originally developed a decade ago by Scottish brewer Innis & Gunn to mark St. Patrick's Day, this limited-edition beer hadn't been available in the U.S. until recently.

Feast and Field
03/01/2022
Banza launches a chickpea version of the "perfect" pasta cascatelli

Banza has partnered with inventor Dan Pashman for a chickpea version of cascatelli, his revolutionary pasta shape. This protein-packed, gluten-free variety will be available online and in Whole Foods stores starting in March 2022. Cascatelli, which roughly translates to "little waterfalls" in Italian, is a short pasta with a flat trough in the middle and ruffled sides, maximized to catch sauce.

Feast and Field
03/09/2022
Museum dedicated to Mexican cuisine opens in Los Angeles

LA Plaza Cocina, the country's first museum celebrating Mexican food and cooking, opened last month in Los Angeles. It is an expansion of the downtown LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes, a cultural center devoted to Mexican heritage.

Feast and Field
02/21/2022
Absinthia's Bottled Spirits releases a new beverage with an infamous past

Absinthia's Bottled Spirits has released Absinthia Barrel-Aged Absinthe, a new version of their award-winning Absinthia Blanche. This farm-to-glass certified organic absinthe is made with California grapes plus botanicals from Oregon, including fresh wormwood (artemisia absinthium,) star anise, fennel seed, and coriander seed. Absinthia Spirits' traditional distillation process uses copper pots and vintage Swiss recipes.

Feast and Field
02/01/2022
French authorities discover widespread vanilla scam

France's Director-General for Competition Policy, Consumer Affairs, and Fraud Control undertook a years-long investigation to determine if vanilla sold on the market was authentic, reported Food Ingredients First. They found that 25% of vanilla products did not comply with regulations.

Feast and Field
02/22/2022
Farmers may soon be able to grow a field of biodegradable plastic

Camelina sativa, or false flax as it's sometimes called, is a commonplace plant, similar to canola. Until recently, it was overlooked compared to the more popular canola, also known as rapeseed. At the moment, camelina is mainly used to produce cooking oil. It can also be used in feed for livestock and fish.

The Click
04/12/2021
A Mayor Willing to Give Up His Town | The Click

(ST. LOUIS) - Curtis McCall Jr. is about to step down as mayor of his small town, and though he doesn't relish the idea, he supports the plan that has put him out of a job. McCall Jr. broke barriers in 2015 when he was elected mayor of Cahokia, a village of about 14,000 in Southern Illinois.

Feast and Field
02/04/2022
Sustainable Alaskan fishing organization seeks trainees

Have you ever thought about getting away from it all and trying your hand as an Alaskan longline fisherman? Alaska Longline Fisherman's Association (ALFA) is currently taking applications for its crew training program. The program is an effort to attract younger entrants into an industry where the average fisherman's age is 50.

The Click
07/29/2021
The Kansas City Star Advocates for Racial Justice - Against Themselves | The Click

In December 2020, The Kansas City Star, the city's largest newspaper, wrote a scathing article about their own past disservice to the community. At the urging of one of their reporters, Mará Rose Williams, they embarked on a 6-part investigative series, called "The Truth in Black and White," to review and correct the record on previous reporting.

Feast and Field
02/15/2022
Florida orange harvest on track to be lowest since last century

Florida will produce the smallest crop of oranges in more than 75 years, reported the AP. The US Dept of Agriculture released a report in January predicting that the 2021-2022 season will yield only 44.5 million 90-pound boxes of oranges, meaning California's orange crop will exceed Florida's for the first time in years.

Feast and Field
01/19/2022
Yogurt can help lower your blood pressure: Here's how to eat more of it

A recently released study showed that regular yogurt consumption is beneficial for people with hypertension. Hypertension is a major risk factor for cardiovascular disease, which is the leading cause of death worldwide. Dairy foods contain a range of micronutrients, including calcium, magnesium, and potassium, which are involved in the regulation of blood pressure.

Feast and Field
03/17/2022
Ben & Jerry's brings back a sustainable version of Dublin Mudslide

If you are feeling nostalgic, you can visit Ben & Jerry's infamous flavor graveyard, where tributes to discontinued varieties linger on the internet. But one lucky flavor is getting a second chance with a new twist, just in time for St. Patrick's Day.

Feast and Field
02/02/2022
New technology will print beverages at home

Families may soon have a device on their counter the size of a toaster oven that can make any beverage they want in a matter of minutes. It's estimated this would save the average household around 100 containers a month. After three years of development, Cana Technologies is getting ready to launch the first molecular beverage printer.

The Click
02/13/2021
St. Louis Mardi Gras to Proceed Despite COVID-19, Arctic Weather - The Click

(ST. LOUIS) - A scaled back version of the annual St. Louis Mardi Gras celebration, one of the nation's largest outside of New Orleans, will go on this year despite the pandemic and freezing temperatures, organizers have said. This year, traditional events like the pet costume contest will be held online.

Feast and Field
02/03/2022
Plant-based alternatives saved 700K animals in 2021

Chain restaurants' use of plant-based alternative meat products saved the lives of around 700,000 animals last year, reported USA TODAY. Burger King was one of the first fast-food restaurants to offer a plant-based version of their flagship sandwich, the Whopper, in 2016.

Feast and Field
01/21/2022
Smithfield Foods pledges to cut food waste by 50% by 2030

Pork producer Smithfield Foods announced a pledge to halve food losses and achieve zero-waste-to-landfill certification within eight years. They plan to meet these goals by targeting the prevention of food loss and waste before it arises, recovery of wholesome food for donation, and recycling of food loss and waste to other uses, such as animal feed, compost and energy generation.

Feast and Field
01/18/2022
Feast and Field contributor opens a new restaurant

The Plating Society, a new restaurant from Feast and Field contributor Darian Bryan, opened January 11th, 2022 in the Larkin Historic District of Buffalo, New York. The brick-and-mortar location is an expansion of the original version of the Plating Society, a boutique chef service providing fine dining events, catering and cooking classes in unique locations, from homes to yoga studios to the beach.

Feast and Field
01/26/2022
Leftover juniper berries from gin distiller used in a new cheese

A cheesemaker in Estonia has found an unusual use for the juniper berries leftover from gin production. They are putting them in cheese. It was a gin distillery, Liviko, one of the largest alcohol producers in the Baltic region, who approached Andre's Cheese Farm with the idea.

Feast and Field
01/24/2022
Your new post-workout protein drink could be helping the environment

For every cup of strained yogurt that's produced in our country, two cups of whey are created as a byproduct. Whey can be a problem for the environment if it enters into the waste stream. It's naturally acidic, and it can damage surrounding ecosystems by disrupting the pH of groundwater, resulting in lower crop yields, depleting oxygen levels in waterways and negatively impacting aquatic life.

Feast and Field
04/05/2022
Driscoll's announces first indoor vertical strawberry farm

The top-selling berry consumer brand, Driscoll's, has announced plans to build the first indoor vertical strawberry farm. In partnership with Plenty Unlimited Inc, the berry juggernaut plans the groundbreaking farm to serve customers in the Northeastern U.S. "The Northeast is the largest berry consumption region in the U.S., with a dense population of berry-loving customers," said Arama Kukutai, CEO at Plenty.

Feast and Field
01/27/2022
Seed St. Louis to host free community agriculture conference

On March 1-5, Seed St. Louis will offer its 13th annual Community Agriculture Conference. This year's conference will have both in-person and virtual sessions, offering classes and panel discussions by experts from the agricultural community. All sessions will be free and open to the public, though registration is required.