Why Do You Save Them?

a work in progress short documentary

The Story

According to Sally, the lake abutting her road “has been here a long time. And so have the newts.” The ranchers, like her family, are relatively recent arrivals. When Chileno Valley Road was built to carry their cattle and eggs seven miles to the market town of Petaluma, it solidified in stone an ill-fated intersection of humans and amphibians. Having had no say in the matter, the amphibians have more or less gone about their business. They continue to migrate, each winter, in and out of the long-lived lake. And because this “new” road forms a perilous border across the breadth of their route, the aforementioned ill fate is theirs.