Berries, botanists and icebergs: UFV professor takes a summer journey to the far north

Dr. Lauren Erland (right) has joined Adventure Canada for Arctic cruises the last two summers, serving as the ship botanist.

This summer, while most of us are tending gardens or soaking up the sun, UFV’s Dr. Lauren Erland will be heading to a colder climate — the Arctic.

The director of UFV’s Berry Environmental Resilience Research & Innovation (BERRI) Lab is taking a cruise with Adventure Canada . Serving as the ship’s botanist, she’ll help travelers see a side of the north that few expect: vibrant, diverse plant life thriving in the cold.

“I give presentations explaining what plants are in the region we’re in and how climate change is affecting them,” Lauren explains. “When people think of the Arctic, they don’t think about plants. They picture polar bears, icebergs, and rocks, but there’s actually very diverse and cool (no pun intended) plant life up there.”

Adventure Canada is a women-led company with Indigenous ownership. They run small expedition cruises — 200 passengers max — designed for people who want to learn about the environments and cultures they’re traveling to.

Lauren joined them for the first time last year and recalls visiting Beechey Island, where the Franklin expedition gravesites are. Even in such an inhospitable environment, Lauren was delighted by the biodiversity, and she marveled at the knowledge and resourcefulness of the Inuit peoples who’ve inhabited the land and used its resources since time immemorial.

“There was quite a bit of plant life there, similar to what we find in our high alpine areas, and I had a few people come up to me afterwards saying it changed their view of the region,” she says. “It’s not a barren landscape, and it’s interesting to see people who’ve never been there before have their perspectives shaken and reframed.

“The people. The culture. The landscape. If you have the chance, I’d recommend for anyone to go.”

Lauren first visited the region for a research project at Resolute Bay (Qausuittuq) in 2019, and she still has plants from that trip in the BERRI Lab.

Last summer’s route went from Greenland to Resolute Bay and back down again, crossing the Davis Strait twice. This year’s route again starts at Greenland but takes a southern course above northern Quebec that includes Iqaluit, and Cape Dorset (Kinngait).

“That’s a berry highway through there,” she enthuses.

Lauren says there’s a fascinating group of people on these expeditions. She loves interacting with Inuit knowledge keepers and learns a lot speaking with geologists and photographers. She finds the discussions inspiring.

“I got to walk across the arctic tundra with writer Margaret Atwood ,” Lauren says with a grin. “It’s just a really cool group of people.”

The expedition is an abrupt departure from Lauren’s day-to-day during the UFV academic year. Most of her time is spent in the cozy confines of the BERRI Lab on the Chilliwack campus, focusing on grading papers, filling out student progress reports, and putting together funding requests.

The contrast of being on a boat in the wide-open ocean, exploring arctic plant life — she describes that as a kind of botanist heaven.

“While I love what I do, it’s nice to take a break from my day job while getting inspiration back for the research that we do at the BERRI Lab,” she says. “It’s a good refresh and reset to generate new ideas and come back to UFV excited and ready to get going again.”