Cole Mannix & Andrew Anderson – The Hard Work of Building a Better Food System
Mountain & Prairie with Ed Roberson
Release Date: 08/20/2025
Jason Gardner Returns – Fire, Leadership, and What Really Matters
Mountain & Prairie with Ed Roberson
Jason Gardner is a retired Navy SEAL who now works as a top-level leadership instructor with Echelon Front. Over his thirty-year career in the SEAL teams, he served in combat operations in Somalia, Iraq, and Afghanistan, later becoming Command Master Chief of SEAL Team Five and Training Detachment. Since retiring from the Navy, Jason has worked with hundreds of organizations as a leadership instructor and strategic advisor, helping teams apply high-stakes leadership principles to business and life. He now lives in a remote corner of northeastern Washington with his wife, Iris, and their two...
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Todd Ulizio – Farming, Attention, and a Life Well Rooted
Mountain & Prairie with Ed Roberson
Todd Ulizio is the co-owner of Two Bear Farm, an organic vegetable farm in Whitefish, Montana, that’s quietly become a cornerstone of the Flathead Valley’s local food community. Alongside his wife Rebecca, Todd has spent nearly two decades growing food, building soil, and figuring out how to make a small, values-driven farm work in a world that doesn’t always make it easy. Todd’s path to farming was anything but direct. He grew up in Connecticut and followed a traditional educational and career path, eventually becoming an accountant at a prestigious Big 6 Firm. Experiencing success...
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Sammy Matsaw Jr. – Salmon, Sovereignty, and the Long Work of Healing
Mountain & Prairie with Ed Roberson
Sammy Matsaw Jr. is the Director of the Columbia Basin Program at The Nature Conservancy, where he works at the intersection of salmon recovery, tribal sovereignty, and large-scale river restoration across one of the most complex watersheds in North America. In this role, Sammy helps guide conservation strategies that span state lines, political boundaries, and cultural histories—while keeping people, relationships, and responsibility at the center of the work. Sammy grew up on the Shoshone-Bannock Reservation, surrounded by salmon stories, land-based learning, and a deep sense of...
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Ed’s Appearance on “My Favorite Things”
Mountain & Prairie with Ed Roberson
Today’s episode is a bit of a departure from the usual format. I’m re-sharing a recent conversation I had on my friend Brendan Leonard’s new podcast, . I’m sure most of y’all are already familiar with Brendan’s work, but for those of you who aren’t, he’s an author, illustrator, filmmaker, and creator of . Brendan’s new podcast is built around a simple but fascinating premise: conversations about the books, films, art, and creative works that have helped shape a person’s life and career. In this conversation, we spend less time on what I do, and more time on what’s...
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Mike Schaedel - Restoring Balance to Fire-Adapted Landscapes
Mountain & Prairie with Ed Roberson
Mike Schaedel is the Western Montana Forest Restoration Director for The Nature Conservancy, where he leads some of the most ambitious and collaborative forest restoration work happening anywhere in the West. Based in Missoula, Mike works at the intersection of science, community partnerships, and land stewardship—helping restore fire-adapted forests, reduce wildfire risk, and improve the health and resilience of landscapes across the region. Mike’s career path is super interesting and anything but traditional. He grew up in Portland, fell in love with the mountains through rock climbing,...
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SHED SESH: September & October 2025 Book Recommendations
Mountain & Prairie with Ed Roberson
This month marks ten full years of my bimonthly book-recommendations project—a decade of weird little paragraphs about the books that grab my scattered attention. Whether you’ve been here since the beginning or signed up five minutes ago, thank you. I’m still baffled anyone reads these things, but I’m grateful all the same. To mark the occasion, I recorded a late-night solo episode from The Shed, diving deeper into each of my September & October picks: why I chose them, what stayed with me, and the sometimes-unexpected lessons I gleaned from each of them. Or you could just describe...
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Devon O’Neil — On Nature’s Power and the Price of Adventure
Mountain & Prairie with Ed Roberson
Devon O’Neil is a journalist, author, and longtime friend of mine whose new book "The Way Out: A True Story of Survival in the Heart of the Rockies" is one of the best pieces of outdoor nonfiction I’ve read in years. The book tells the harrowing true story of a backcountry ski trip near Leadville, Colorado, that turned tragic—and the years-long process of understanding what really happened, and how a mountain town wrestled with loss, resilience, and the complicated relationship we all have with risk and wild places. It’s gripping, deeply reported, and beautifully written—equal parts...
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Carli Kierstead – Wyoming Forests and the Work of Keeping Water Flowing
Mountain & Prairie with Ed Roberson
Carli Kierstead is the Forest Program Director for The Nature Conservancy in Wyoming, where she leads efforts to understand and restore some of the West’s most critical—and often overlooked—ecosystems. From beetle kill and wildfire to drought, Wyoming’s forests face a range of challenges that ripple far beyond the state’s borders. These high-country forests are the headwaters of several major river basins, providing water to millions of people across the American West. In this conversation, Carli and I dig into the past, present, and future of Western forests—how management...
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Bex Frucht — Story Wrangler! Vibe Steward! One of a Kind!
Mountain & Prairie with Ed Roberson
Bex Frucht is a force of nature—a storyteller and community builder whose work blends performance, land, and small-town life in the American West. Based in Livingston, Montana, she’s the founder of TMI Live, a storytelling series that celebrates vulnerability, humor, and human connection, and for the past three years, she’s been the “vibe steward” of the Old Salt Festival, where her talent for bringing people together has become legendary. Whether she’s hosting a show, coaching storytellers, or emceeing a fundraiser, Bex radiates generosity, intelligence, and positivity in a way...
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Yvon Chouinard – The Perpetual Pursuit of Simplicity
Mountain & Prairie with Ed Roberson
Yvon Chouinard needs no introduction. The founder of Patagonia, pioneer of clean climbing, co-founder of 1% for the Planet, and lifelong advocate for simplicity and wildness, he’s one of the world’s most influential environmental leaders. Now in his mid-80s, Yvon continues to live, work, and fish by the same principles that have guided him since his dirtbag climbing days: live simply, take responsibility for your impact, and keep finding meaning through deep, direct engagement with nature. His newest book, “Pheasant Tail Simplicity: Recipes and Techniques for Successful Fly Fishing,”...
info_outlineThis episode was recorded live on stage at the 2025 Old Salt Festival in Helmville, Montana, where I had the honor of sitting down with two of the people at the center of this ambitious experiment in food, land, and community: Cole Mannix who is the President and co-founder of the Old Salt Co-op and Andrew Anderson who is the manager of the J Bar L Ranch.
If you’ve been following Old Salt, you know it’s much more than a beef company. It’s a bold attempt to rethink how ranching families, local communities, restaurants, and consumers can work together to create a food system that’s resilient, regenerative, and deeply rooted in place. What strikes me most about Cole, Andrew, and the Old Salt team is just how hard they are working to make this vision a reality. They’re juggling ranching, processing, restaurants, and festivals—businesses that are notoriously difficult on their own—and somehow doing it all with an open spirit of generosity, collaboration, and humility.
In this conversation, we dig into the early days of Old Salt, the failures and lessons that shaped it, and the risks of scaling up in an industry designed to squeeze out small producers. We talk about why they chose to take the harder road of building restaurants and hosting a one-of-a-kind festival, how they measure success beyond the spreadsheet, and why they believe community is as important a product as the beef itself.
Even if you don’t work in food or ranching, the lessons here resonate for anyone trying to build a purpose-driven business. We cover everything from balancing mission and margins, to leading with vulnerability, to learning how to grow without losing sight of your values.
Cole and Andrew are quick to admit they don’t have it all figured out, but their candor, persistence, and vision make this a conversation I know you’ll find as inspiring as I did. Enjoy!
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- Old Salt Co-op
- Old Salt Festival
- Old Salt team
- Full episode notes and links: https://mountainandprairie.com/cole-andrew/
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TOPICS DISCUSSED:
- 0:00 - Intro, spirit of generosity
- 3:38 - Starting at the beginning of Old Salt with Cole
- 6:51 - Getting to know Andrew with J Bar L
- 10:18 - Ranching families coming together
- 14:51 - Lessons learned
- 19:29 - Getting to the festival, controversies
- 24:37 - Measuring success
- 29:20 - Realities of meat processing
- 34:47 - Restaurant business
- 38:49 - What we need to know (empower producers!)
- 42:11 - Start of audience Q&A, snack sticks
- 44:14 - Q: How did you forge this path?
- 47:26 - Q: If not the festival, what would the community touch points be?
- 49:42 - Q: Succession planning
- 54:41 - Wrapping up and thank yous
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