The Water Weaver’s Launch Site

It all began with an idea.  I was preparing to retire and I wanted to find something meaningful to give back to the people who supported my long research career.  As I was planting a few ideas around my network, it was the expedition idea that took root, blossomed somewhat wildly in the beginning, and ultimately grew into the more structured, flowing garden it is today.

Inspired by Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (then celebrating its 60th anniversary), the expedition concept became a collecting of local peoples’ water reconciliation stories and experiences along the journey ahead of me.  Rachel deftly explained the emerging evidence and dangers facing natural systems as a direct result of our “advances in modern science.”  She drew attention to the misuse and impacts of human-created chemicals such as DDT (dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane), and she challenged the science community’s disregard for the natural world when financial gains were part of the discussion.

Rachel Carson was vilified by industry and many government leaders in the 1960s. However, her persistent presentation of the misuse and impacts of our emerging technologies on nature and people was the catalyst for the contemporary environmental movement.  Rachel’s Silent Spring message fed into the creation of the United States Environmental Protection Agency in 1970, and Canada’s Department of Environment in 1971.

Fittingly, the Weaving Waters Expedition will begin in the place where Canada began its full-fledged efforts to address the mistreatment of our water world, the Canada Centre for Inland Waters (CCIW) in Burlington, Ontario.  Since its inception, the CCIW has been the focal point for Canadian research into all types of wastewater and its impacts on aquatic ecosystems.  The CCIW is home to Environment and Climate Change Canada, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Canadian Coast Guard, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.  Another reason to start the expedition here was the location which is one of Canada’s most polluted waterways, Hamilton Harbour, but also a place where many people have come together and are working very hard to restore this ecosystem.

In future blogs, I will write more about Rachel and similar stories by Water Grandmothers of the First Peoples of this land.