The King's Connection Magazine Volume 24 // Number 1 | Page 23

ALUMNI PROFILE

NORTHERN STEWARD

Alumna assesses
environmental effects in
Canada’s north
By Josh Noble, Manager of Alumni Relations

F

or alumna ANNE MACLEOD (B.Sc., ’05) a typical
work day could take her anywhere from her home base
of Whitehorse, Yukon, to southern B.C., to Baffin Island,
Nunavut. MacLeod, a wildlife biologist for Environmental
Dynamic Incorporated (EDI), is making a career of her
passion—understanding the interactions between the
environment and industry, particularly as they relate
to birds and mammals.
“I’ve had the opportunity to see some amazing things. At one
point I worked close to the calving grounds of the Bathurst
caribou herd [a barren-ground caribou herd in Nunavut and
the Northwest Territories]. I’ll always remember looking out
and seeing thousands upon thousands of caribou. It was
just breathtaking,” says MacLeod.
MacLeod, originally from Houston, B.C., started her
post-secondary journey at King’s in 2001. An ambitious
bachelor of science student, she took on a job with a local
forest biologist in Houston during the summers. This job,
together with her degree from King’s, led her to her first
permanent job in environmental consulting in Smithers, B.C.
Working close to home, she was able to see the tension
between environmental protection and economic growth in
her community. After a number of years working in Smithers,
MacLeod was offered a job with EDI in Whitehorse, Yukon.
In her current role as a wildlife biologist, MacLeod works
on a variety of projects relating to wildlife research and
wildlife management; however, the majority of her work
is in environmental effects assessments. In this role, she
assesses prospective developments and works with
developers to minimize environmental impacts related
to development. This process involves running various
field studies to document the wildlife and wildlife habitat
present in an area prior to development, analyzing the
potential effects of the proposed development on those
species, and making recommendations to limit any impacts
to those species. If a site is approved, MacLeod and her
colleagues create mitigation and monitoring strategies to
be sure that environmental threats are diminished and all

effects are chronicled. In this way she and her colleagues
play an important role in weighing the environmental, social
and economic benefits and drawbacks of development in
Canada’s north.
In one interesting case, MacLeod worked with the Arctic
Raptors Project , through EDI, to monitor populations of
cliff-nesting raptors in Nunavut—a project supported in part
by King’s Associate Professor of Biology Dr. Kerri McFarlane.
The nest sites that EDI monitors are located near a mining
development on Baffin Island and provide valuable insight into
the interactions between northern m