Join us in welcoming OWC's newest Watershed Stewardship Assistant, Rachel Morris!
Growing up outside of Ottawa, ON, Rachel was always outside, whether cross-country skiing, cycling, or plain old exploring. She has always been fascinated by plants and animals, and loves to poke around looking for new creatures! As a teenager, she worked on her family’s pasture-raised beef farm in Essex county, Ontario, and gained a love of working outdoors and a lifelong interest in sustainable food production.
Rachel (right) with her coworker, Molly the cattle dog (left), on the family farm.
Rachel (left) with Indiana the red-tailed hawk (right), a non-releasable educational ambassador for his species at Wild Ontario, University of Guelph.
Rachel pursued a degree in biodiversity at the University of Guelph, ON. While at school, she was lucky enough to volunteer with an on-campus organization called Wild Ontario. Wild Ontario is an environmental education program that uses non-releasable raptors (birds of prey) to teach people about wildlife. Her hands-on volunteer work consisted of feeding, training, and doing educational outreach with non-releasable birds of prey including hawks, falcons, and owls. She loved learning about Ontario’s different raptor species, from their appearances to their behaviour. Rachel also fell in love with science education when she learned how animals can connect people with each other and with nature.
Rachel worked in a research lab at Guelph that was studying the movements of native bumblebees across landscapes. She learned to radio-tag bumblebees and maintain the radio towers that tracked their movement. Following the bees around allowed her to observe how closely connected the insects, plants, and water were in every system. Later, she worked for a different lab that studied domestic and native apple trees growing in the wild, which allowed her to travel across southern Ontario and do fieldwork in many different ecosystems. This inspired her to travel to Alberta to learn about a whole new landscape!
Left: Rachel doing fieldwork at Short Hills Provincial Park, ON. Right: A bumblebee with a radio-tag tracker attached to its back at a rare research site.
Rachel taking a break from seine netting at Little Doctor Lake, Northwest Territories.
Just before she finished school, Rachel had the opportunity to travel to the Northwest Territories on a field course to learn about freshwater ecology, remote fieldwork, and land-based food systems. It inspired her to pursue work in stewardship and to continue to learn more about water. She really values the opportunity to take care of such a precious resource.
In her free time, Rachel likes to hike, boulder, and look at plants. She is getting to know southern Alberta and is so far really liking what she sees, from the prairies to the Rockies (and everything in between)! She looks forward to connecting with the watershed and getting to know its residents this field season.
