By Steve Hubrecht
Local naturalist, Larry Halverson, was honoured with a national Canadian Museum of Nature lifetime achievement award earlier this fall. A celebration to mark the occasion is set for this coming weekend at Pynelogs.
Halverson was announced as the 2022 Nature Inspiration Award lifetime achievement laureate in mid-September and friends and colleagues are marking the occasion on Saturday, Oct. 22 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. at the Pynelogs Cultural Centre.
He told the Pioneer he was “very surprised” to get the award, explaining he’d been out on a six-day backcountry fly fishing trip with his daughter when the news came out. Halverson didn’t hear it until he got home and his wife told him he needed to check his email.
Halverson was humble and pointed to others who have earned the award, saying, “I’m honoured to be in such esteemed company.”
The Canadian Museum Nature gave Halverson the award, not just for his nearly four-decades-long career as a naturalist with Parks Canada, but also for his extensive volunteer efforts to help protect the natural environment of the Columbia Valley, and indeed the planet as a whole. The volunteering includes co-founding the valley’s now-famous Wings Over the Rockies Festival some 25 years ago; the East Kootenay Conservation Project; the Canadian Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Network; the B.C. Biodiversity Centre for Wildlife Studies; Nature Scape B.C.; the Columbia Basin Living Landscape; the Wild Bird Trust of B.C; the B.C. Frog Watch Program; the E-Flora and E-Fauna B.C. electronic atlases; the College of the Rockies and; countless other initiatives.
Halverson was also instrumental in rallying community support to halt plans in 1978 to divert the Kootenay River into the Columbia River system — plans that would have irrevocably altered the world-renowned Columbia River wetlands.
The museum, on its website, cited Halverson’s kindness, humour and ‘just do it’ attitude.
Halverson grew up in Calgary and became fascinated with the natural world as a youngster through family fishing and camping trips and through plain old fashioned mucking around in the outdoors.
“My folks tell me I was always bent over looking at critters. I was always bringing things home: rocks, tadpoles, a wounded pigeon. The pigeon was covered in tar, so I cleaned it up and it became a pet,” he said. “Nature became a passion for me.”
This lead to a degree in biology, and then post-graduate work studying wolves and summers spent working for Jasper National Park.
“It became a career,” said Halverson.
In 1972 he moved to the Columbia Valley for a job with Kootenay National Park.
“That first winter, I leaned on my ski poles, took in the valley and said, ‘I would like to spend the rest of my life here’,” Halverson told the Pioneer. “And I did. I’ve been here 50 years now and raised five kids here. How lucky does it get? I’m a naturalist, which is the best job in the world, and I live in the best place in the world.”
Halverson’s work as a naturalist “had so much variety,” he explained. “One day you’re talking to kids about beaver homes. The next you’re in a Vancouver boardroom helping to decide how to spend millions of dollars on conservation properties. The next you’re flying in a helicopter to go to a burn site.”
His mission through all that work and all that volunteering was to spark a love of nature in those he interacted with.
“That’s the key with everybody: If you can give them an enjoyable experience with nature, then they will see the benefits of it,” Halverson told the Pioneer. “When you realize what’s in your own backyard, it’s amazing. Once you see it, you appreciate it. And when you appreciate it, hopefully, then when it’s threatened, you will stand up to protect it. Nature contributes quite a lot to us. We need to contribute back to nature.”
All are invited to come to the celebration at Pynelogs, which will run from 2 to 4 p.m, and includes a chance for people to share their favourite ‘Larry stories’.
