Remembering his cedar canoe
My grandfather's canoe, his pride and joy. Our neighbours out for a paddle in the canoe (Photo courtesy of Asha Swann/NCC intern)
The cedar canoe hanging from my grandparents’ garage roof stands out for good reason. A dusty photo album in the basement with “1993” scrawled in my grandmother’s cursive tells me that this canoe is older than I am, though...
An introduction to Ontario's snakes
Blue racer (Photo by Joe Crowley)
Here in Ontario, the most common snake I’ve come across is eastern gartersnake, quite often in my own backyard. Around two weeks ago, I went hiking with a friend and saw two small gartersnakes slither near the trail. While my friend...
One weekend in nature across Canada
Dark-eyed junco at Shaw Wilderness Park (Photo by Katie Diespecker)
Every summer, the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) hires student interns to work in a variety of areas across the organization. This year’s communications interns, Asha Swann and Katie Diepspecker, lived in different parts of the country:...
My three months as NCC's national communications intern
Gillies Grove trail (Photo by Asha Swann/NCC intern)
I highly anticipated being part of the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) team this summer. For as long as I can remember, I’ve been passionate about animals and the environment. In middle school, I became obsessed with The Story of Stuff, a...
All about bird houses and nesting boxes
Black-capped chickadee (Photo by Brent Keen)
When I was in elementary school, one of my favourite assignments was decorating a birdhouse. As with nearly all projects made by kids (macaroni necklace, anyone?), my birdhouse was never meant to house birds. It was more of an experiment in mixing...
What we know about lake-safe sunscreen
Shoreline of a lake (Photo by Salome Guruli via Unsplash)
I always felt very lucky that I didn’t inherit my mother’s propensity to sunburn. I wore sunscreen constantly as a child because I was afraid I’d turn crispy from mere moments in the sun. To this day, I always wear sunscreen on...
No Mow May is over, now what?
Dandelion (Photo by Yinan Chen, Wikimedia Commons)
The Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) encouraged people across Canada to leave their lawns alone during May. Or if that was too much, people were encouraged to at least delay the inevitable mow for a few weeks. Where I live, this is relatively...
