Alberta RiverWatch Braves The North Saskatchewan River

Did you know the origin of the North Saskatchewan River is glacial run-off from the Columbia Icefields?

Or that the river is over 2,800 km in length and eventually feeds Lake Winnipeg on its way to the Hudson Bay.

Even though this river is an important life-sustaining waterway for Strathcona County and all other communities along its path, not many residents hold an interest in the river or know much about it.

Alberta RiverWatch is planning to change public perception of the North Saskatchewan.

Sherwood Park adventurer Neil Hosler and Strathcona Wilderness Center environmentalist Jason O'Donnell operate the Edmonton chapter of Alberta RiverWatch, a program founded by three Calgary teachers in 1995.

To expand on the Alberta Education curriculum for environmental sciences, the Calgary teachers acquired several rafts to help with a more accurate census of a river and a hands-on study of water quality.

Hosler notes that before the rafts were available, students received mere snapshots of a river and its condition, but not the entire portrait.

Beyond Books Institute, the non-profit organization operated by educators to fund the program, has various sponsors from provincial and federal government agencies, Shell Canada and Aqualta, who contribute essential funds for rafts, equipment and science kits.

RiverWatch has since expanded to Edmonton with guides Hosler and O'Donnell hosting as many as 46 high school classes (over 1,500 students) last spring. They are both professionally trained in water safety and environmental education.

The two guides, each in a separate raft with their own group of students, offer interpretive discussion as they steer and the students paddle. Topics of conversation range from the North Saskatchewan as a natural highway for animals, to pollution control and water treatment.

Aside from the scientific knowledge they freely share, Hosler and O'Donnell are such outdoor enthusiasts, it is easy to see they have spent plenty of time on the rivers they travel. They can offer insights on flora and fauna, historical Edmonton, some known locations of dinosaur fossils or observations of such wildlife as bank beavers, fish and birds.