The bees are beginning to buzz, leaves are breaking out of their buds, and the warm weather has arrived in full force—it’s finally springtime! As we transition from a tumultuous winter of swinging temperatures and sporadic precipitation, many of us are asking the same question: what kind of water availability and weather can we expect out of the summer?
Within a context of moderate political polarization and an increase of fake information online, the OWC bridges divides to bring people with many different perspectives together and build cooperative action. Neutrality is a key piece of this mission—but what does being neutral mean? Why is neutrality important and how does it shape OWC’s work?
Do bumble bees make honey? Do they die after stinging? What’s the difference between honey bees and bumble bees, anyway? Get the answers in this blog.
Like a river with many tributaries that join to form a larger body of water, the OWC is made up of many pieces. Maybe you’ve seen OWC planting willows or taking water samples from a creek, or spoken to us at events throughout the watershed—but what makes all this work possible? As a charitable non-profit organization, where does our funding come from, and how do we make decisions? What do we do to help communities and ecosystems in the watershed? To answer these questions, we’re taking a peek behind the curtains at OWC.
The bees are beginning to buzz, leaves are breaking out of their buds, and the warm weather has arrived in full force—it’s finally springtime! As we transition from a tumultuous winter of swinging temperatures and sporadic precipitation, many of us are asking the same question: what kind of water availability and weather can we expect out of the summer?
Within a context of moderate political polarization and an increase of fake information online, the OWC bridges divides to bring people with many different perspectives together and build cooperative action. Neutrality is a key piece of this mission—but what does being neutral mean? Why is neutrality important and how does it shape OWC’s work?
Like a river with many tributaries that join to form a larger body of water, the OWC is made up of many pieces. Maybe you’ve seen OWC planting willows or taking water samples from a creek, or spoken to us at events throughout the watershed—but what makes all this work possible? As a charitable non-profit organization, where does our funding come from, and how do we make decisions? What do we do to help communities and ecosystems in the watershed? To answer these questions, we’re taking a peek behind the curtains at OWC.
Farming Smarter might look similar to the many agricultural operations around Lethbridge, but hiding inside its nondescript buildings are some far-from-ordinary equipment and tools. We’re here to hear from Lewis Baarda, the on-farm research authority and Field-Tested Manager at Farming Smarter, about their work in crop innovations.
If you have been following the work of the OWC, you may have noticed that we invest significant time and effort in restoring Alberta’s landscapes with our many partners—planting willows on streambanks to reduce erosion, building beaver dam analogues, installing wattle fencing, removing invasive plants so native species can thrive, and more. But why does this work matter?
Here in Alberta, our grasslands are the result of many thousands of years of shaping and influence, from both geologic processes and the animals that came before us. Today, every field I pass is a reminder of the constant effort involved in keeping grasslands thriving through sustainable grazing management.
On Oct. 30, 2025, the Alberta legislature introduced Bill 7: Water Amendment Act, which would make several changes to the Water Act around water use reporting, transferring licenses, moving water between basins, and more. In this blog, we summarize what the most significant of these changes mean for the Oldman basin and for water license holders in our watershed.
