Lake Windemere Stewardship
Columbia River Basin
Interviewee
Kalista Pruden
Lake Windemere Wildsight Project
Interviewer
Alison M. Jones
NWNL Director and Photographer
Lake Windemere in British Columbia, Canada, on August 13, 2008
Introductory Note
NWNL launched the first of its 70 expeditions in 2007 in British Columbia’s Rocky Mountain Trench, thus beginning our documentation of North American and African watersheds. This Canadian reach of the Columbia River is known for its beauty, dramatic peaks and one of the world’s great wetlands.
We met Kalista who was working for the Lake Windermere Wildsight Project. She led our team on a boat tour of L. Windermere to witness its pollution and degratation. She led us on a trek up a forested tributary of the Columbia River.
In 2008, NWNL was again in B.C. to open our Kootenay Gallery photo exhibit, and Kalista, on summer break from graduate school, was again working with Wildsight. So, we met to discuss neededenvironmental protections and community education. Kalista’s enthusiastic dedication will be a great gift to the Canadian Columbia River Basin.
Outline
AN EMERGING CONSERVATIONIST
LAKE WINDERMERE DATA MONITORING
POLLUTION in the LAKE
ZONING & RECREATIONAL PRESSURES
LAKE WINDERMERE PROJECT’S OUTREACH
CLIMATE CHANGE
DEVELOPMENT & ZONING
LOCAL and MIGRATORY SPECIES
A PASSION for STEWARDSHIP
WHAT MAKES A GOOD STEWARD
DIFFICULTIES of WORKING in the FIELD
The SCIENCE in STEWARDSHIP
SUCCESSFUL MESSANGING
AN ENDNOTE from a POST-INTERVIEW RAMBLE
Key Quote It would be great to learn from those [stewards and scientists] who’ve “been there and done that” – and then try to work that knowledge into today’s efforts here [in the Columbia River and its wetlands], before we’ve “been there and done that too.”
All images © Alison M. Jones, unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved.
AN EMERGING CONSERVATIONIST
NWNL Kalista, it’s great to reconnect and have another chance to thank you for the assistance here in British Columbia last year when we launched our first NWNL expedition through the Columbia River Basin from here to the Pacific Ocean. Tell us about yourself and your focus.
KALISTA PRUDEN I grew up in Cochrane, Alberta, and yet the last 4 years I’ve lived in the Columbia River Valley. Many from Alberta Valley come here on family vacations, have cabins here, and even stay here. I was never here as a kid, or prior to moving here. I came simply for a change – and it’s probably the best decision I could have made. I fell in love with this place. It is my home now and I can’t imagine living anywhere else. So I’m going to Lethbridge College in Alberta to study environmental appreciation and environmental stewardship ethics.
Since my career focus is on renewable resource management, my program is very diverse, covering everything from ecology to soils, forestry practices, geology – and water quality! I enjoy this program, since I am a bit of a naturalist. I enjoy the outdoors and spent a lot of time in nature I was a little kid. My grandma was a botanist. My dad’s a forester. So naturally, I spent a lot of time outside; and since my mom’s a hippie too, that supports my environmental appreciation.
For the last two summers I’ve been working for the Lake Windermere Wildsight Project. It is good for me as Wildsight is basically the environmental organization in the East Kootenays and Southern Interior Rockies Region.
I enjoy my work and feel like I’m doing good things for the world. Since the Lake Windermere project encompasses everyone, I get a very feel-good, non-controversial feeling. The project focuses on monitoring and increasing stewardship and awareness for our waterways. The project also provides information to our local decision-makers to guide and assist their political decisions regarding lake management.
LAKE WINDERMERE DATA MONITORING
NWNL What do you monitor in Lake Windermere?
KALISTA PRUDEN We sample 3 sites in the lake and 4 tributaries that enter the lake (including 2 major tributaries: the Columbia River’s flow into the lake and Windermere Creek). Also, we’ve recently added 4 smaller tributaries for sampling: Abel Creek, Brady Creek, Goldie Creek and Holland Creek.
While our parameters differ, many are very similar. In some tributaries, we use18 parameters; and in other tributaries we monitor for very little. In the 4 new tributaries, we sample for a few extra parameters. We also do fecal coliform and bacteriology sampling at some public beaches on the lake. We’ve collect that data over a 5-year period, so we see a long-term picture and can try to defer some trends from that data. At the end of our 5-year program for sampling, we’ll compile all data and send it to a limnologist. They’ll review it for us and produce a fabulous report on what’s happening in the lake for our decision-makers and stakeholders in the lake. We’ll then help explain what’s happening, what must change and how folks can help the lake’s ecology keep our lake healthy.
If we don’t have a healthy lake, it can impact the economy, mostly in Invermere and the many Columbia Valley communities around Lake Windermere. They really depend on Lake Windermere as the center of the recreation-based economy here. It attracts many tourists since everybody loves water. Why wouldn’t you want to live next to the lake? It’s a popular recreation destination those from out of province, particularly Alberta. But if we don’t have a healthy lake, our economy here could very well crash. You’d see people not eating at restaurants. If you can’t recreate on the lake, people won’t want to come vacation and spend their money here. That brings money into the valley, so that could be really devastating to our economy.
The importance of Lake Windermere is one of the main reasons we sample its water. Of course, the main reason is to keep the lake healthy.
POLLUTION in the LAKE
NWNL What are the threats do you see on the lake now? Increased population? Second homes? Development issues? What regulations there are for those intertwined issues?
KALISTA PRUDEN The main pressures on Lake Windermere that we see are development, recreational pressures and general use. There’s been a huge boom in development around Lake Windermere over the past 10 years, but mostly in the last 5 years. I’ve seen a huge, huge boom in the amount of houses being built along the shoreline, or a bit upland of the lake’s shoreline. All houses on the east side of the lake – its most developed side – are on septic.
They’re not tied into a municipal sewage treatment facility or water treatment facility, so they pull water out of the lake for their drinking water, and then they have septic fields or tie pits. Some of the old, old cabins and homes like that have still “toilet pits” along the lake. Sometimes – usually during high-water periods when the water table rises – their septic fields or their toilet pits leach into the lake. Then we see large spikes of fecal coliform samples due to septic leaching. WE’ve also seen increases in phosphorous and nitrogen, nutrients which can come from several different sources. One source is the 9 golf courses within a 1/2-hour drive of Lake Windermere. There are 4 more 30 minutes north of the lake.
They’re not the only ones. It can also come from septic leaching. It can come from people putting fertilizers on the lawns. Some of the beautiful $3 million homes right on the beach have nice big lawns mowed right up to the water’s edge. There are miraculously (!) no weeds on them, so they must be spraying pesticides. So that’s another issue.
ZONING & RECREATIONAL PRESSURES
Other regulations address zoning issues defining where you can build certain types of developments. There’s a Regional District on the east and southwest sides of the lake, and the District of Invermere on the northwest side. The Regional District also comes up along the southwest side as well.
The lake is bordered by First Nations lands. Currently there’s nothing on those lands, although in the future the First Nations may want to benefit their people on the reserves by developing economies around the lake with jobs. We.ve seen a few proposals come in for marinas and other development.
The lake has many marinas already, so it’s obvious that recreational pressures are huge. Boating is a big one. On the Canada Day long weekend 3 years ago, our volunteers counted 225 boats on the lake at one time. That’s an immense number for our lake, because it’s only 18 kilometers long, and 1-kilometer wide on average. The lake itself is only 3.4 meters deep on average, so it’s quite shallow and small. Thus, boat wakes can have a huge impact on the lake itself. They also contribute to impacts of increased nutrients which get stored in the sediment on the lake’s bottom. So when a boat or other activity stirs up those sediments, those nutrients get reintroduced into the water column impacting plant life and causing nitrification, which can lead to shutting down the lake for all recreation.
There aren’t too many regulations pertaining to the lake’s recreation. There are general Provincial and Federal regulations for water bodies, except maybe on some weekends if we see really high numbers of boats on the lake. No rules regulate how many boats can be on the lake. And there are no speed restrictions that would lessen collisions or protect wildlife.
Along with increasing development, huge money is coming into this valley, creating jobs and economies. So, nobody asks for limits on homes built on the lakeshore. New homes are just multiplying without enough regulation. Fortunately, however, the District of Invermere is implementing a pesticide bylaw, which could immensely help the health of the lake’s ecosystem. Fortunately, that bylaw is in “second reading” right now and should pass sometime this fall.
LAKE WINDERMERE PROJECT'S OUTREACH
NWNL Do you think Lake Windermere makes an interesting case study for other lakes along the Columbia? And conversely, are there lessons to be learned here from how other lakes address similar problems? That’s an upstream/downstream, lake-to-lake question.
KALISTA PRUDEN The Lake Windermere Project is a very extensive project with many outreach efforts including community education, stewardship, our sampling and partnerships at all levels of government. Recently the Lake Windermere Project was recognized internationally as an excellent pilot project for lake management around the globe.
They invited our Program Manager, Heather Lescheid, to go to Italy this fall to make a presentation on the Lake Windermere Project and to create a template on our project to share with the Living Lakes Conference attendees in Italy in September. So she’ll present a nice video and template on what we do for the world to view and use for lake monitoring and stewardship of their own. We are also communicating with British Columbia groups doing lake monitoring in in the Columbia River Basin region; and we partner with the BC Lakes Stewardship Society.
We are in touch with many stewardship groups from other lakes. We can give them tips and connect them to fisheries, biologists and professionals who can help them, because we deal with those professionals on a regular basis through our program.
CLIMATE CHANGE
NWNL How is climate change affecting Lake Windermere?
KALISTA PRUDEN We’re not 100% sure yet of its effects here. We’re starting to see differences now, but since we didn’t sample consistently in the past, it’s hard to infer specific conclusions as to possible changes from climate change or global warming. So we have no answers to that yet. But we very well might see a pattern in another couple years when we’ve had a longer stretch of monitoring.
We can study past sporadic studies done on Lake Windermere to compare those numbers could maybe form some conclusions. But for now, it’s hard to do so until you have a longer set of data.
Meanwhile, it seems another big factor regarding the lake’s future is increasing lakeshore homes and a lack of building codes to protect runoff into the lake.
DEVELOPMENT & ZONING
NWNL So this rapid development underlines the need for building codes and zoning!
KALISTA PRUDEN Recently, the regional district around the lake did an official community plan (hereafter, OCP) for the basic Lake Windermere area. It hasn’t been finalized yet, but hopefully it will incorporate good changes. We had good public consultation and input on the plan via workshops and other events. I attended some of those workshops, so my input may be in the plan. I look forward to seeing the results. Hopefully there’ll be good changes around the lake in terms of what types of developments can go where.
It’s crucial that this community plan gets passed, because now there’s really no zoning, and that allows for fragmentation of the landscape, especially because the rock here comes out in trenches, forming basically a wildlife highway. If we start seeing developments here and there and all over the place, i.e., suburbia central – which is basically what’s going on now- it will fragment the landscape and wild species’ habitat and migratory paths. That would be leave them meandering around all these developments instead of just going straight up the valley.
NWNL What other issues concern you in how they are affecting the lake? We’ve discussed development. pesticides on lawns and golf greens, climate change monitoring, regulations and zoning. Are there any local proposals for even greater regulation and better zoning, or any other problems we should discuss?
LOCAL and MIGRATORY SPECIES
NWNL Are there any organizations working on establishing or reinstating migratory corridors, like Yellowstone to Yukon?
KALISTA PRUDEN The Yellowstone to Yukon Initiative basically deals with the more southern reaches of this Rocky Mountain Trench, I believe.
There are no specific groups in the Columbia Valley working on establishing or protecting migratory corridors, other than those focused on the Columbia Wetlands. Ellen Zimmerman, with Wildsight, has been steadfastly promoting conservation of the Columbia Wetlands for a very long time. [NB: Our NWNL interview with Ellen Zimmerman on her successful documentation that allowed Columbia Wetlands to become an internationally-] recognized RAMSAR wetlands. Currently, Columbia Wetlands Stewardship Partners have been trying to establishing boating regulations to support birds and wildlife during their migratory periods. That would protect our great “migratory highway” through this Rocky Mountain Trench and the flyaway zone that goes up through the Columbia River Valley.
NWNL Let’s talk about species in and around Lake Windermere which migrate through, noting the more iconic, dramatic, and charismatic species, as well as the more endangered and endemic.
KALISTA PRUDEN Located in the interior Douglas fir forest region, Lake Windermere has many, many species of plants and animals that are at risk in that forestry zone. There are many species associated with shoreland and aquatic habitats, so that indicates that we have many of those critters in the Lake Windermere ecosystem.
Notably, we have great blue herons, which are blue-listed in British Columbia. I see them quite often out there fishing when I’m out sampling along the lakeshore and its wetlands. We also have many osprey and bald eagles. During the migratory season, tons of predatory birds and migratory waterfowl use the lake for short periods in their north-bound flight, or in the wetlands where they would nest and spend the summer season. We have several plant species at risk in the Lake Windermere area, especially Nuttall’s sunflower. I just wrote an educational article on the Lake Windermere ecosystem that I should have brought it with me. I’ll send that to you.
NWNL What invasive species do you have to deal with?
KALISTA PRUDEN There are invasive species pretty much everywhere now. Where there are people, there are invasive species! So, yes, we do have some invasive species around Lake Windermere – but nothing of very high concern so far. Although with the amount of recreation and people coming into the area, the lake is at a high risk for more and more invasive species to come. Fortunately, we haven’t yet identified any invasive species of mussels, or invasive aquatic plants like Eurasian Watermilfoil. We have identified many invasive terrestrial weeds that are found pretty much everywhere now, including knapweed, leafy spurge, and other weeds.
Luckily we haven’t found any purple loosestrife yet. The Lake Windermere project will be conducting an aquatic-plant mapping program next summer. We’ll mark the current plant beds of invasives and compare those to previous aerial photographs we’ve taken. Our mission is to see if the plant beds have extended. We’ll also be out there snorkeling and identifying plants to make sure that we don’t have any of those nasty invasives in areas we haven’t tagged.
A PASSION for STEWARDSHIP
NWNL Kalista, what excites you and stirs your passion? Where does that passion come from?
Who have your mentors been? How do you think you can make a difference?
KALISTA PRUDEN My interest in this field basically started when I was very young, thanks my parents and grandparents. My dad has taken me fishing, hunting and hiking since I was a tiny little girl in a baby backpack. My grandma used to have a cabin up in Alberta on Burnstck Lake. We spent time there in summer, and even in winter sometimes. My grandmother’s a botanist, so we went on walks all the time. She pointed out all of the plants and told me what they were. She taught me which were poisonous so I wouldn’t touch them – and which were edible, so I could pick them and eat them.
My grandfather was an avid birdwatcher, as was my grandmother. My mom is a total hippie, so we went camping all the time. She’s just a very love-the-birds, love-the-trees kind of a person, and that really wore off on me. I’ve grown up an immense appreciation for ecosystems and how they’re connected – every little rock, every piece of grass,,,. everything is important to me/ I also have a bit of Native American heritage as well. My grandfather and my father both have Métis status in Alberta, although status doesn’t really mean anything to me. I think that when it’s part of your heritage, it should always be part of your heritage. I cherish that heritage dearly, and I deeply appreciate First Nations’ values of living off the land; respecting the land and the animals; and our sharing the land it with everyone – and all the animals and creatures on the earth.
We’re here to take care of this land for everyone and not just for our use. I got these values from growing up in a family with those values as well. My passion now is to protect the environment and make sure we’re protecting and holding it in trust for future generation. We can’t just use it for our own purposes, because it’s not ours. The environment is everyone’s, including all the creates on the earth. That’s my passion. That’s my goal. That’s what I would like to continue in the future. I enjoy working with Wildsight, because they have many similar values. I’m not sure now if I’ll work for Wildsight like Ellen for the rest of my life; or if I’ll pick my own battles and choose where I want to go.
I do know however that what I’m doing now makes me feel good now. So I’m going to keep doing it and hope to be doing it in the future — although I would like to be able to have a more powerful voice in decisions made in our local area, or even in British Columbia, and maybe in Canada, especially regarding the use of our resources. I’m excited.
I’m applying to an international student conference on lake management and global warming in November in Japan. I would like to learn more about how other countries manage their lakes and their water ecosystems. I’ll then compare that to how we do it here in Canada and bring back what they do in some countries that could be better than we do here. Hopefully I could help encourage – or flog – those trying to implement new management strategies here. It would be great to learn from those who’ve “been there and done that”- and then try to work that knowledge into today’s efforts here [in the Columbia River and its wetlands], before we’ve “been there and done that too.”
NWNL How would you advise students just starting? How would you explain why Lake Windermere study it takes five years – a long time to a 12-year-old -and yet that even that’s not enough for the global climate change study. Would you share specific incidents or specific species that were exciting to you and paint a verbal picture using details you have encountered?
KALISTA PRUDEN I’ve always been interested in environmental issues, and I’m an avid subscriber to National Geographic magazine. It’s inspired me. One month we received a National Geographic magazine with a cover picture of the Amazon rainforest, completely mowed down, with only 1 tree left for agricultural purposes. What had been forest – not just 1 tree – had been all burned. They do that down there. They slash and burn for agriculture.
I was heartbroken by this photo, and so, read the whole article. I was just torn because the Amazon forest is such an immense resource and we’re just slashing and burning it for agricultural purposes to feed the the world. This is not just a local problem. Now it’s a global problem. Rainforests, like wetlands, help regulate global temperatures and warming gasses. They provide carbon storage.. There’s so much biodiversity in that immense habitat. We don’t even know what’s in a square meter of a rainforest yet. They find new species down there all the time on a frequent basis. So, it just broke my heart to see that this was happening. I knew I had to do something about this, and off I went to school
That big change for me wasn’t entirely due to that one magazine. It probably did make me focus on environmental sciences.. Part of the reason why I went back to school was also because of a series of events in my personal side of life that had occurred up to that point. I lost the best-paying job I had ever had – and we had just purchased a house. But I had to readjust my whole plan. This now is my dedication. I’m dedicated to make sure the animals and everything on the earth can flourish and have a place to eat, a place to roam around, and a chance to be free.
WHAT MAKES a GOOD STEWARD
NWNL There are many specific qualifications for entering this business of conservation, including the time commitment and the patience needed. You must als be able to find and encourage those will to listen and learn. What qualities do you rank as critical in this business of conservation?
KALISTA PRUDEN Patience is an immense quality that you must have for working in the environmental field, because anything you do in this field takes time to see results.
To have a sense of accomplishment, it takes time to make and to see those results. Especially in Canadian environments, change takes a long time – especially if working with governments, or where everything must go through people first. It takes an immense amount of time to get the support and all information you need, especially in science. You need facts. You need proof to support your justification for changes. It takes a long time to monitor things, and to even see if we need to make a change. Monitoring demands a long period of time to see what’s going on and if anything requires change.
So, patience is crucial in this field, but there’s hope for me, because I’m young. Thankfully, I have a lot of time to see changes when we need changes, and if so, to see their results!
DIFFICULTIES of WORKING in the FIELD
KALISTA PRUDEN This field of environmental conservation that I’m coming into can be really, hard on your nerves and on your emotional state. Some aspects are so, so hard to deal with. You just want to see change happen – now! Sometimes you see things happen that you think are so silly and degrading to our environment. You wonder how could someone do that, right? But degradation happens; and many folks don’t think about potential consequences of their actions on the environment and rest of the world.
As I came into this field, these things were so obvious, because I already had a lifetime’s worth of background in my upbringing as to why we shouldn’t do certain things. But many people don’t. We’re approaching a 3rd generation being brought up in cities, completely disconnected from the land – whereas a couple generations ago, most people grew up on a farm or on acreage somehow connected to our resources. I think it’s important when entering this field to keep in mind that not everyone knows, and not everyone thinks about it. So yes, you must just keep hammering away at getting your message across to people that don’t yet know about these issues. It seems hopeless at times, but if we just keep at it, eventually we’re approaching change. I can see it in the future.
HOPE for a "GREEN ERA"
KALISTA PRUDEN We’re approaching “The Green Era.” I see more and more people becoming educated, albeit being a bit more disconnected from resources. More and more people are becoming environmentally conscious; recycling and gardening organically; and choosing to walk or ride a bike instead of driving a car. These things help greatly. We just need to keep sending those messages out to the rest of the world. Patience is key. As Ellen Zimmerman stated, stubbornness and tenacity are key— as are patience and passion. Passion helps get others motivated. I get a lot of passion from my instructors at school. They’re all fabulous and mentors to me in this field. They’re all very excited about what they’re doing, and that rubs off on you as spend time with them.
The SCIENCE in STEWARDSHIP
NWNL Kalista, you can have all those qualities; but without the science you’re not as effective. How did getting “the science” under your belt help enable you to fulfill your passion.
KALISTA PRUDEN Absolutely. Yes, I have a passion and a love for the environment, and I want to protect our environment. But also having a scientific education background has strengthened me immensely in this field.. If somebody challenges my viewpoint on an environmental issue, I can back it up with data and facts that help immensely and give me that extra edge. When someone asks, “Why do you think this, that or whatever?” Then I can say, “Well, I think this, because of x, y and z that affect things in these certain ways. ” Folks respond, “You know, that helps out a lot.”
NWNL Have people ever challenged your specifics on turbidity or similar scientific data?
KALISTA PRUDEN I’ve have talked with people about their recreational impacts on the lake ecosystem. Many think their motorboat has little impact on the lake, because it’s a small jet boat, with a small wake. Well, any wake will have an impact, whether big or little – and a jet boat has a very high-speed jet of water coming out of that boat. That can really tear up the bottom when jet boats enter shallow water, because without an outboard engine, they can get into very shallow water which stirs up the bottom. That creates turbidity in the water which makes it difficult for everything in the water to breathe or see – just as if on land we had a big dust cloud in front of us.
Jet boats also stir up nutrients and toxic substances trapped in the sediment. Basically, sediment is a storage vessel. When it’s stirred, everything trapped inside spills out to water plants or animals to ingest or inhale into their bodies. That can create some real problems. When people hear that I can back up my warnings with facts, they must stop and think about their actions and the initial opinions they’ve taken on that issue, and usually responses I get after such conversations is, “Oh, well, I didn’t know that;” and they go away thinking about it. Perhaps they might change their opinion, or will drive a little slower, maybe not drive into shallow water…, or maybe they might just get rid of their boat all together. That would be nice.
SUCCESSFUL MESSAGING
KALISTA PRUDEN To get people to listen to our messages we need a personal connection. When you open the doors to a personal connection, then people are often a bit more receptive to what you have to say. I’ve learned that several times over in my experiences, while working with many different types of people in this field in just the short time I’ve been in it. If you can set up a personal connection, they are open up to you. But if you offer a very solid statement or opinion, and you’re a very closed person, it can be very difficult to negotiate with people – or even communicate with them in general. So, I like to have a very open mind; and my friendly personality helps me a lot with that. I am just naturally very open so I find I can talk to most people without too many issues.
NWNL Kalista, just like last year when we first met you here on the lake, you’ve been wonderfully open and generous with your time and knowledge. Thank you!
AN ENDNOTE from a POST-INTERVIEW RAMBLE
KALISTA PRUDEN So these tracks here look like mink, and you can bet there’s one here. A mink is a fur-bearing animal here in the Columbia Wetlands and along the Columbia River. They’re a member of the weasel family with very pungent musk glands that they use to mark their territory. Their very, very thick fur is evidence they’re an aquatic/terrestrial species that roams along waters’ edges to their food.
These little tracks over here look like sandpiper tracks, likely a spotted sandpiper; or possibly even a killdeer. Either way, the tracks are those of a short bird, just poking along the shore looking for bugs and anything it can eat along there.
NWNL Kalista, thank you for sharing your knowledge and passion for the little critters and your big solutions worth striving for in this Upper Columbia River Basin. Good luck to you in what I am sure will be a successful and gratifying career.
Posted by NWNL on September 28, 2024.
Transcription edited and condensed for clarity by Alison M. Jones.
All images © Alison M. Jones, unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved.