In 2023, Luce received a grant through North Grenville’s Arts and Culture Development Fund to launch Nature Journaling North Grenville. The year-long program invited adults and kids to join Luce on monthly walks on local nature trails, followed by hands-on art instruction to document their observations on paper.
“My secret objective with this program is for people to feel more invested in protecting our local ecosystems”, says Luce. “I hope that the more people spend time in nature, noticing its rhythms and feeling connected to our non-human neighbours, the more they will care about protecting these green spaces.”
Living close to Kemptville Campus, Luce walks its trail network frequently, watching the patterns of its inhabitants throughout the seasons. It was a natural fit for her to partner with the campus for her winter nature journaling workshops, introducing others to the trails, forests and fields at this 633-acre public site. After each walk, Luce facilitated discussion and creativity in the campus greenhouse, encouraging artists of all ages to explore their impressions in ink, pencil, and watercolour. (Summer walks were followed by plein air art classes, but it’s hard to paint with frozen fingers!)
“The workshops were the first time where I taught groups spanning several generations all together. Some sessions had children as young as 3, teens, adults, and seniors. In these mixed groups, I was thrilled to see how confident children felt sharing their observations as we walked through the forest. Nature journaling creates equality amid a mix of levels of experience and literacy. Every perspective, observation, and idea has something to offer the group and how we look at our environment as we walk.”
As part of the project, Luce also created her own artwork from her outdoor observations. A hand-drawn map of Kemptville Campus’ trails features beautiful watercolour illustrations of some of the plants and animals she’s spotted on campus: a White-tailed deer, Downy woodpecker, Barred owl, Colt’s foot, Trout lily, and Eastern garter snake. Luce and the campus hope her map will be another tool to encourage residents and visitors to spend time in natural spaces, paying attention to the many creatures with whom we share this land.
“In the twelve years that I have lived beside and visited the campus green spaces, my family and I have had some remarkable wildlife sightings,” says Luce. “Recently, we frequently observed a flock of roughly 500 Snow buntings who spent the winter foraging for seeds in the campus fields and roosting in the tree lines (they migrate south from their Arctic breeding range). One year in early spring, we discovered a group of Yellow-bellied sap suckers tapping into trees. We followed them for a while and my daughter — who was only 3 at the time — spotted half a dozen butterflies scattered over a single tree trunk. We were shocked as it was still only early April. We observed that the butterflies (Mourning cloaks, which hibernate over the winter here) were drinking the sap from the trees through the holes made by the birds. It was an incredible revelation about the complex relationships that exist between seemingly disconnected species. With few to no blooms that early in the year, the butterflies depend on the birds to create food sources for them.”
Nature Journaling North Grenville wrapped up its first edition in November 2024, but Luce hopes to continue with similar events in the future. In the meantime, she wears many creative hats in our community — teaching at Algonquin College, offering art workshops at her new home studio, and creating her own work through printmaking, painting, sculpture and more.
“Nature Journaling North Grenville is the kind of partnership we are thrilled to host at Kemptville Campus,” says Annie Hillis, Campus Executive Director. “Bringing people together to enjoy nature, physical activity, art, and learning — it’s such a great combination of what the campus has to offer. We are fortunate to have so much natural habitat here, and as stewards of the land it’s important for us to support a range of opportunities for outdoor education.”
Whether you’re new to Campus trails or a seasoned local “nature nerd,” we invite you to get outside this spring and explore. Keep an eye out for Meredith’s map, and — who knows — you just might have your own wildlife spotting to add to the map after a stroll on the trails!
For media inquiries, please contact:
Marta Zwart
Marketing and Events Coordinator
mzwart@kemptvillecampus.ca