Dr. Sheena Spencer has been elected as the new chair of the Okanagan Basin Water Board Water Stewardship Council. Dr. Spencer is a Research Hydrologist with the Ministry of Forests, an adjunct professor at UBC Okanagan, and a member of the Watershed Ecosystems Project.

Known for her dedication to watershed research and community collaboration, Sheena brings broad expertise to her leadership role. As Chair, Dr. Spencer hopes to promote collaboration and partnerships, advocate for healthy watersheds in the face of climate change and other impacts, and integrate Indigenous knowledge into Water Stewardship Council initiatives.

Additional Information:

Dr. Spencer  conducts research on the hydrologic response to forest disturbance/regrowth and runoff generation processes in headwater catchments. She the research lead for the Upper Penticton Creek Watershed Experiment, a long-term forest hydrology research site.

Research Publications

On Tuesday, May 27^th, Watershed Ecosystems Project (WEP) members Rheanne Kroschinsky and Dawn Machin presented at the Canadian Water Resources Association National Conference held in Penticton, British Columbia on the unceded, traditional and ancestral territory of the Syilx Okanagan peoples.

The conference drew nationwide participation from various levels of government – First Nations, local, regional, provincial, and federal; non-governmental organizations; industry; and academia. The theme of the 2025 conference was, “Living Between Waters – Connecting Water & Resilience”, with programming emphasizing the importance of partnership development, multi-level and inter-agency coordination, Indigenous stewardship and decision-making, and the creation of a resilient vision for a shared water future.

In their presentation, graduate students Rheanne Kroschinsky and Dawn Machin shared their collaborative learnings over the past four years of partnership and project development, with a focus on the need for inclusion and recognition of Syilx water law, policy, processes, and authority in decision-making for the sqʷʔa (Peachland Creek) community watershed.  This presentation illustrated the WEP’s community-engaged, interdisciplinary approach to governance development in Peachland, allowing time for critical relationship development and equitable collaborative design.

Rheanne guided the audience through the background of the WEP’s Governance activity design and objectives, the challenges identified and potential pathways for more sustainable and inclusive decision-making in Peachland. Dawn then offered insights into Syilx frameworks for water governance, the impact on water relationships as a result of colonization, and persevering Syilx assertion of rights and title through contemporary water relationships and impactful Syilx-led processes (such as Okanagan salmon restoration).

Both presenters highlighted the importance of relationships rooted in trust, transparency, and reciprocity, as being central to water governance processes – emphasizing the critical need for allowing ample time for these to develop, with equal contributions from all partners from the onset. They also highlighted the importance of identifying shared priorities for watersheds – common ground on which to establish partnership and co-create a shared watershed vision.

Watershed Ecosystems Project co-hosts gathering on the intersections between climate change and water

On April 9-10, 2025, researchers from across disciplines gathered on both UBC campuses for the Climate + Water Symposium, a two-day event that explored the complex relationship between water and climate change.

Organized by the Climate Solutions Research Collective, the symposium was co-hosted by the Watershed Ecosystems Project team at the Okanagan campus, and UBC Sustainability at the Vancouver campus. Over the course of the two program days (one held at each campus) speakers and panelists discussed critical issues like water justice; the relationships amongst climate, water and power; and the role of the university institution in innovation, leadership, and impact.

The Day One plenary at UBC Okanagan, “Water Justice in a Changing Climate”, featured Watershed Ecosystems Project co-investigators Jeanette Armstrong, Syilx scholar (Syilx Knowledge activity), and John Wagner, environmental anthropologist (Governance activity). This session was moderated by graduate student Rheanne Kroschinsky.

In his comments, Dr. Wagner reflected upon his early research with Dr. Armstrong in the Shingle Creek Watershed and discussed the impact of settler-colonial legal frameworks and the denial of Indigenous water rights as critical to understandings of contemporary water regulation in British Columbia. As an implication of colonial frameworks, Dr. Wagner highlighted how these themes emerge in his recent work on the Columbia River Treaty, which perpetuates an exclusionary and extractive water management approach – to the detriment of Columbia ecologies and communities.

Dr. Armstrong offered reflections on Syilx water governance frameworks, illustrating the deep and reciprocal relationship that Syilx peoples hold with water, and the direct connection between watershed and Syilx community health. Further, she discussed the implications of water and riparian degradation on Syilx culture, sovereignty, and rights and title.

Dr. Armstrong highlighted the need for Syilx leadership in water governance, the importance of collaboration, and the need for emerging structures to recognize Syilx authority and their vital role in watershed decision-making.

Day One programming also included the panels, “Climate, Water and Ecosystem Resilience” and “Watershed Governance and Management in a Changing Climate” which offered multidisciplinary insights into critical linkages between surface water sources, ecosystem services, resilience and sustainability, and increasingly intense weather events as a result of a changing climate. These panels also discussed the essential features of inclusive, collaborative, and adaptive approaches to governance and decision-making.

For detailed summaries on 2025’s Day One sessions, and information on Day Two programming, please visit https://climatesolutions.ubc.ca/news-and-events/launching-climatewater-symposium-exploring-water-justice-through-changing-climate.

The Climate Solutions Research Collective is working on developing programming for the 2025/2026 academic year, and is open to suggestions and feedback for activities. You can connect with the Climate Solutions Research Collective team at: https://climatesolutions.ubc.ca/contact-us.

A new publication by Watershed Ecosystems Project researchers, CORRIE GREAVES, DR. ADAM WEI and DR. LAEL PARROTT

Greaves, C., Wei, X. & Parrott, L. Setting the Limit for Cumulative Effects: a Regional Safe Operating Space for Maintaining Ecological Resilience. Environmental Management. 2025. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00267-025-02122-4

Is our collective footprint undermining the ability of ecosystems to adapt, respond, and thrive? 

In a new paper, “Setting the Limit for Cumulative Effects: a Regional Safe Operating Space for Maintaining Ecological Resilience”, published in a special edition of Environmental Management, Watershed Ecosystems Project researchers address this question by proposing a model for measuring cumulative effects relative to a safe operating space (SOS) grounded in ecological resilience. Corrie Greaves, Dr. Adam Wei, and Dr. Lael Parrott outline practical considerations for implementing this model in cumulative effects assessments based on six attributes of a resilient ecosystem: diversity, connectivity, modularity, memory, openness, and feedbacks.

A regional safe operating space (SOS) for maintaining a resilient ecosystem. Figure inspired by the resilience pillar artwork developed by the Tahoe-Central Sierra Initiative (2020). Figured produced in Biorender.

The regional SOS for each attribute of a resilient ecosystem is delineated by an upper and lower boundary (hashed lines). When the magnitude of cumulative effects pushes ecosystems beyond the boundaries of the regional SOS, society can no longer be confident that further human impacts will not erode the ability of the system to adapt and transform to further disturbance, thereby risking the ecosystem structures, functions, and processes on which society depend. When a system is within its regional SOS for resilience, it may still be able to accommodate and recover from additional human disturbances.

A regional SOS may serve as a powerful tool to understand how our collective footprint may be undermining the ability of ecosystems to adapt and respond to future disturbances. This research proposes a regional SOS for resilience model that could serve as a stepping-stone in a much larger agenda that aims to improve the accessibility of ecological resilience in this important sphere.

Watershed Ecosystems Project Graduate Student and UVIC Centre for Global Studies Visiting Governance Graduate Student Fellow Rheanne Kroschinsky, presents “University Extension as a Bridge for Hydrosocial Communities: Exploring the Rescaling of Water Governance in BC” with Oliver. M. Brandes at the Centre for Global Studies Global Talks series.

Dr. Jeannette Armstrong, OC, Ph.D., speaks about her research on the recognition of Syilx Governance Rights in the watershed.

Thank you to UBC’s team in the Community Engagement office and Rheanne Kroschinsky for writing and sharing the following article about the Peachland Watershed Community Engagement workshop held in November 2023:

Peachland and the Watershed Ecosystems Project Work Together to Promote Collaborative Watershed Science and Governance

The workshop was supported by the Partnership Recognition and Exploration (PRE) Fund. We are grateful to the Community Engagement office for assistance in facilitating this important aspect of our community engaged research.

The Community Engagement office provides support, services and strategic direction for local community groups, organizations and individuals so they can access resources and engage in mutually beneficial relationships with UBC.

Corrie Allen speaks about her research at the Peachland Community Engagement Workshop.

This past June, Emmi Matern represented the Watershed Ecosystems Project and UBC Okanagan at the Canadian Water Resources Association 2024 National Conference in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

The conference, titled “Bridging water research and practice: Mobilizing our collective knowledge”, was primarily attended by representatives from government and industry, and the various academic contributions at the conference were well-received as a bridge between research and applied practice. This theme is receiving attention across Canada, from stormwater research and management in PEI to flood prediction in the Southern Lakes region of the Yukon, to the work being done by the Watershed Ecosystem Project team in the Okanagan.

Emmi presented a poster related to one of her research outcomes, and attended a Q&A period about her poster and its context in watershed management.

Emmi’s presentation, titled “Fragility and societal vulnerability in watersheds: Managing for resilience and risk reduction of linked hydrologic hazards”, presented a new recommendation for decision-makers: Hazards should be viewed as linked processes, not as independent phenomena, and it should be acknowledged that multiple risks can and do occur at the same time. By taking this approach and assessing hazards and risks in an integrated fashion, maladaptive outcomes can be identified and mitigated.

This particular research topic is indirectly related to Emmi’s work on risk-based watershed assessment for her doctoral program. Emmi emphasized the relationships between fragility, vulnerability, adaptive capacity, and resilience in order to provide context for watershed decision-makers that typically only consider a single hazard and risk at a time. For many water management practitioners in attendance, this presentation likely served as an introduction to the relatively new concept of ‘maladaptive strategies’, which has not yet bridged the gap between research and practice.

Emmi Matern, PhD Student, UBC Okanagan presenting at the Canadian Water Resource Association 2024 Annual Conference June, 2024.

CWRA 2024 poster 

In addition to the conference, Emmi attended a tour that showcased key irrigation infrastructure for the South Saskatchewan River Basin. The tour included stops at Gardiner Dam, the Lake Diefenbaker spillway, the Eastside and Westside pump stations, and two local businesses that are part of the irrigation network: Spring Creek Garden and Black Fox Farm and Distillery.

For more information on Emmi’s research, please visit: Urban Water.

Article written by Emmi Moore.

Mackenzie Myers presented a poster titled, “Investigating Timber Harvest Controls on Flowpaths in the Peachland Creek Watershed”, at the Graduates of Earth, Environmental and Geographic Sciences (GEESC) Research Symposium held at UBC Okanagan in April 2024.

Freshwater resources in British Columbia’s forested catchments are under increasing strain due to forest disturbance, including timber harvest. Understanding the impact of timber harvesting on watershed hydrology can inform land use planning to better control peak and low flow events, mitigate erosion and habitat loss, as well as preserve freshwater resources.

Towards this, flowpaths and transit times are hydrological processes that offer insight on ecological and resource sustainability risks following forest disturbance. Previous studies have inferred flowpath and transit time changes from streamwater chemical measurements, but there is a lack of research regarding threshold disturbance levels for significant hydrological changes at the watershed sub-basin level.

 Mackenzie Myers, MSc Student, Department of Earth, Environmental and Geographic Sciences, presenting a research poster at the 2024 GEESC Research Symposium held in April 2024 at UBC Okanagan.

This study, which takes place in the Peachland Creek Watershed in B.C., explores the impacts of various intensities of timber harvest on streamwater flowpaths and transit times.

Streamwater and precipitation chemical data, as well as stable water isotopic data is being collected over a two-year fieldwork period. The sampling process focuses on a range of sub-basins of similar geography and size, with various intensities of timber harvest. Extracted data is applied towards multivariate analysis with the goal of detecting key relationships between timber harvest and chemistry-inferred hydrological process differences.

Research goals include a comprehensive understanding of flowpaths and transit times in selected sub-basins, as well as the determination of factors underpinning relationships of timber harvest and hydrological process changes, and their significance for the sustainability of freshwater resources and ecological health. 

Research results aim to provide watershed-specific disturbance thresholds for significant hydrological process changes in sub-basins. Results may also be applied to broader holistic models and further forest disturbance research in the region. Findings from this research may guide informed land-use planning for watershed management at the municipal and provincial scale.

Article written by Marni Turek (based on the abstract for the poster presentation).

Future of Our Forests:  Preserving BC’s Primary Forests Today to Protect Water and Wildlife Tomorrow

The Interior Watershed Task Force (IWTF) is hosting “Future of Our Forests:  Preserving BC’s Primary Forests Today to Protect Water and Wildlife Tomorrow”, on April 13, 1-5:30 in Kelowna.

Dr. John Wagner will be providing closing remarks.

You can attend in person or virtually via a live Zoom link.  Seating and spots are limited.

REGISTRATION IS REQUIRED. 

To attend in person register here: https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/future-of-our-forests-tickets-865717864437

To attend the live Zoom register here: 
https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZ0kdumrqj4oHNKR1NrJTACilsXBQpzLsu17

Additional Information

Press Release IWTF Town Hall Apr 13-24 final

IWTF TOWN HALL Programme final Apr 13-24