Newsletter - January 12, 2023

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NEWSLETTER

JANUARY 2023

TOPICS INCLUDE:

SAW Conference
SAW Conference Speakers
Producer Funding Opportunities

We envision people caring for their local watersheds, resulting in clean, healthy lakes, rivers, and creeks that will support humans and wildlife for years to come.

SAW Conference Details

Connect with innovative minds looking to advance watershed health and nature-based agricultural solutions in Saskatchewan.

The 15th Annual Saskatchewan Association of Watersheds Conference is less than a month away!

Learn about tools to sustain healthy watersheds, irrigation in Saskatchewan, funding opportunities for agricultural producers, improving crop nutrient use, indigenous agriculture partnerships, and improving marginal land use! We will also have a special keynote speaker focusing on mental health in agriculture!

We hope to see you there!

Ticket sales end on January 24, 2023.

For more information, please visit our website, www.saskwatersheds.ca or contact us by phone at 306-541-9902 or email at info@saskwatersheds.ca

Continuing Education Units (CEUs) are available for CCA, CPAg, CPSS, and CPSC conference attendees!

2.5 CEUs

Nutrient Management – 1.0
Soil & Water Management – 0.5
Crop Management – 0.5
Professional Development – 0.5

We still have room for exhibitor booths at the conference trade show and businesses wishing to sponsor. Click on the button below for more information.

SPONSORSHIP/EXHIBITOR OPPORTUNITIES HERE

Meet a few speakers!

Meet the Keynote Speaker - Lesley Kelly, or High Heels & Canola Fields!

A marketer by trade and entrepreneur, Lesley farms with her family on their 7000 acre grain farm at Watrous and is the head and heart behind the alias High Heels & Canola Fields, where she dispels myths about agriculture and brings consumers and farmers together. She learned of the disconnect while building a snack food company using the grain grown on her farm.

Lesley has been a leader in advocating for mental health in agriculture. She has been part of a Canadian campaign that has raised over $129 million dollars for mental health community initiatives across Canada and co-founded the Do More Agriculture Foundation whose mission is to break barriers, support all farmers in taking care of their mental well-being and bring much needed resources to the industry. She was recognized by the Regina YWCA with the Women of Distinction award for this work.

She is also a cohost of "What The Farm" podcast, Director for Saskatchewan Wheat and when Lesley isn't in the field, you can find her running to the hockey rink with her two sons, learning how to cook for a harvest crew and spending time with her husband.

Keynote Event - When Stress is More Than a Season

🕖 January 31st at 7 PM

When Stress is More Than a Season: Farming can be both a rewarding and demanding occupation where farmers experience highs and lows and mounting stress. Everyone feels stress, and there can be lots of negative stress on the farm. As farmers, we know how to recognize stress in our livestock, crops, and equipment. But do we know how to recognize when stress is too much for us and what we can do to help get through those stressful times? In this presentation, Lesley will share 5 tips using her "Weather the STORM" strategy and the things she’s learned that have helped her family and farm get through stressful times that will then help to inspire others, whether on the farm, off the farm, working with farmers, etc.

Dave's presentation Maintaining Soil Health as an Adaptation to Climate Change, is on February 1st at 9:20 AM.

Meet Dave Sauchyn

Dave Sauchyn is the Director of the Prairie Adaptation Research Collaborative at the University of Regina. His research interests are 1) the climate and hydrology of the past millennium, and 2) planned adaption to minimize the adverse impacts of climate change. Dave has given almost 500 invited presentations on aspects of climate change. He is lead author of the Prairie Provinces chapters in the current and previous national assessments of climate change.

Meet Arlie LaRoche

Arlie LaRoche, her husband Brett and their two children live on their own farm near Saskatoon. Arlie is the founder of Farm One Forty, a local business that produces pasture raised pork, grass fed beef and lamb, honey, vegetables and grain. In 2019 Arlie and her family partnered with two others to create Odla Restaurant & Market on Broadway in Saskatoon. The restaurant uses ingredients from Farm One Forty as well as other local farms to create a menu that is simple and delicious and highlights the bounty of our province.

Arlie will be presenting Reconnecting Folks with Real Food on February 1st at 10:35 AM. Her presentation topics include holistic management on the farm, regenerative agriculture, and agrotourism.

Tasha's presentation, The Origins of Water Walking, is on February 1st at 1:00 PM, where she will help attendees connect with water through Indigenous perspectives.

Meet Tasha Beeds

Dr. Tasha Beeds is an Indigenous scholar of nêhiyaw, Scottish-Metis, and Caribbean ancestry from the Treaty 6 territories of Saskatchewan. She activates from connected roles: as a mother, kôhkom, creative artist, poet, Water Walker, and a Midewiwin iskwêw from Minweyweywigaan Lodge out of Roseau River First Nations and Wiikwemkoong Unceded Reserve.

Tasha has been recognized for her research and community activation at an international and grassroots level. Her collective work highlights and celebrates Indigeneity while promoting Indigenous nationhood and sovereignty. She has been privileged to be taught and gifted the Water Walk teaching.

She has walked for the Water for 12 years now, all around the Kawartha Lakes, the Otonabee River, the Great Lakes, and Junction Creek River in Sudbury. Her most recent walk was in 2021 for the Saskatchewan River, where she walked 1100 km in 36 days.

VIEW THE AGENDA HERE

Prairie Watersheds Climate Program (PWCP)

Application forms are not published or available to the public. Applicants must work with their PWCP coordinator to complete and submit their application(s). Note that submitting an application does not guarantee approval.

Do you have any questions? or want to apply? You can find your local PWCP coordinator by clicking on the button below.

Accelerating adoption and implementation of on-farm beneficial management practices to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and support production efficiency, sustainability, and resiliency on farm operations.

PWCP Funding Streams

Nitrogen Management
Rotational Grazing
Cover Cropping

Meet the Team!

Each of our newsletters features two of our staff members to help you get to know us better.

Nicole Moffat

Agri-Environmental Watershed Coordinator

Nicole is the Agri-Environmental Watershed Coordinator for the Southeast District, where she works with producers to help them implement best management practices through the Prairie Watershed Climate Program (PWCP). She also helps deliver watershed programming in her district. Nicole was born and raised in Regina and studied geology at the U of R. Before working for SAW starting in 2022, she worked as the Program Lead of WUQWATR (watershed organization), and before that worked as a geologist in the potash and oil exploration industries. Nicole has two cats and two young children she loves to take camping in the summers. She loves anything outdoors, sports, painting, and swimming.

Maddie Gould

Communications & Administrative Assistant

Maddie works primarily in SAWs communications, including managing SAWs social media, website, and newsletters, and aiding in event planning. She was born and raised in Saskatoon and also raised on her grandparents farm near Smeaton. She worked in pharmacy for 12 years and studied Integrated Resource Management at Sask Polytech. She began working in environmental roles in 2017 starting with the NSRBC (watershed organization) and for a potash company. She has worked for SAW since 2022 and currently resides in Saskatoon with her husband, two dogs, cat, beared dragon, and tropical fish. She enjoys anything outdoors, reading, and visiting museums.