Earth Day Talk 2026 + Photo Contest Awards

April 22, 2026

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• Awards
• Grasslands
• Talk

Text by Jill Girgulis, photos by Loreen Ayuda and Pamela Narváez-Torres

We celebrated Earth Day here at AWA with a talk night + photo contest awards ceremony!

We started the evening with the announcement of the winners of our Earth Day Photo Contest, which saw 153 photo submissions narrowed down to 32 finalists. The contest included two categories: people’s choice, and staff choice. For the people’s choice category, 590 votes were cast by the public to determine the winning photo submitted by Anett Meszaros. For the staff choice category, Bob Acton submitted the winning photo. Both winning photos will be featured in an upcoming edition of our quarterly magazine, the Wild Lands Advocate.

In acknowledgement of 2026 being declared the International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists (IYRP), the second part of our evening was dedicated to a presentation by Kaitlin Mercier. Kaitlin is the coordinator for the Southern Alberta Native Seed Collaborative (SANSC) and works at EcoLogic Horticulture, a native plant nursery and seed supplier near Strathmore, AB. In her role at EcoLogic, she consults with engineers, restoration practitioners and industry to select the right native seed and native plant material for each project.

In her presentation, “Improving Supply of Native Seed for Restoration Projects in Southern Alberta,” Kaitlin shared the challenges facing the local native seed industry and restoration projects and provided an update on SANSC’s progress towards advocating for and facilitating the growth of a sustainable, locally sourced native seed industry here in Alberta. You can watch a recording of the presentation here.