A priority area in the larger Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative (Y2Y) geography, the Upper Columbia region is characterized by its healthy grizzly bear populations, higher densities of wolverine, old growth forests and rare mountain caribou. Home to one of the world’s only inland temperate rainforests, research shows the Upper Columbia – with its high alpine peaks and deep snowpacks – will be an important refuge for many different species as the impacts of climate change intensify.
“It’s a significant ecosystem that plays a big role in large landscape conservation, so Y2Y has chosen to put energy and effort here and has been able to fundraise to do that because it’s recognized on a global scale,” says Nadine Raynolds. “Those ecological values also tell you the story of the issues that we have here.”
As the Upper Columbia Program Manager for Y2Y, Nadine’s conservation focus is on the North Purcell and North-Central Selkirk ranges of the Columbia Mountains where, over and above climate change, threats include forestry impacts from logging and road building, substantial loss of old growth, as well as adventure tourism and recreation.
“As a science-based and collaborative organization, we work with a wide range of researchers and partners,” said Nadine. “One of the recent projects is a study on the ecosystem services provided by the region. The Upper Columbia is a major hot spot when it comes to carbon storage and freshwater provision.”
Y2Y is currently working with researchers at UNBC on a recreation ecology project that is trying to understand the intensity of human use on the landscape and overlay that with wildlife habitat and use. Ideally, this research will feed into land use planning and management decisions, allowing for healthy wildlife and recreation areas. Nadine also works directly with the three wolverine scientists in the Columbia Basin, helping to coordinate outreach for their citizen science work, and teach people how to be “wildlife wise” in the backcountry.
“One of the things we have been advocating for is a modernized land use planning process for this region,” said Nadine. “To see Indigenous Peoples and the Province work together, along with communities and stakeholders, to make informed and great decisions that will allow both people and wildlife to thrive.”
Working with Selkirk Innovates, one of Y2Y’s initiatives is to support communities in getting ready to engage in land use planning.
Nadine’s passion for environmental advocacy and education goes back to her childhood in B.C.’s Lower Fraser Valley where she spent summers on canoe trips and hiking excursions. She recalls writing songs about the earth in elementary school and joining the environmental and outdoor clubs in high school. Her involvement organizing a youth conference on global awareness in Grade 9 was a harbinger of her career to come.
Nadine first learned about Y2Y after moving to Alberta to complete her BSc in Environmental Science at the University of Calgary.
“I was inspired and impressed by the vision, and as a budding youth environmentalist appreciated the opportunity to learn from and advocate alongside some of Y2Y’s leaders.”
While in Calgary, she started a chapter of the Sierra Youth Coalition, which hosted some of the first environmental activist conferences in Alberta in the late 90s. After graduation, she moved to Canmore where she worked as the Campaign Coordinator with Wildcanada.net, which gave her the opportunity to research issues and partner in the development and delivery of strategic communications for many conservation campaigns.
Shortly after completing her MA in Environmental Education and Communication at Royal Roads University several years later, her husband landed a teaching position in New Denver in 2006 and Nadine finally was able to realize her dream of living in the Kootenays. Based in her new home office, she developed her thesis project from concept to reality and, as founder and director of the Redfish School of Change, she managed this innovative experiential field school for young environmental leaders for five years.
From there Nadine went on to become a researcher with Selkirk’s College Applied Research and Innovation Centre, a position that overlapped with her time as a municipal councillor in New Denver for two terms (“it was a really nice meshing”), before joining Y2Y. At the time her position was fairly new with just one person in the role before her.
“I think something I’ve brought to the organization from my work in the social sciences is the research around people,” said Nadine. “In conservation work, we talk a lot about grizzlies and caribou and wolverines, but this is also really about people and our impact and our choices, whether we’re going to be stewards on this landscape.”
While forestry, adventure tourism and recreation are currently very real threats to the Upper Columbia’s ecological values, Nadine says it’s important to offer people in those industries some sense of security and a way to imagine how they can contribute to a more sustainable or “nature-positive” economy. Y2Y commissioned research on emerging economic opportunities for the Upper Columbia which offers several recommendations.
With land-based reconciliation and Indigenous-led conservation as priorities, Y2Y’s Exploring Ethical Space workshops bring together the best of Western science and knowledge and the best of Indigenous law and story to help create shared understandings and a foundation for finding solutions together.
“Supporting Indigenous and rural communities in the Y2Y region is central to our work,” said Nadine. “When applying an Indigenous world view, do we say land use planning or land relationship planning? Let’s think about our relationship to the land and how we’re going to listen to and uphold these laws that for so very long allowed for harmony on the landscape.”
