A small science team working on private prairie land since 2011.
We're ecologists, ranchers, field biologists, and community organizers restoring native grassland and wetland ecosystems across Saskatchewan.
Who we are
Mission
We restore and protect native grassland and wetland ecosystems in Saskatchewan through science-based conservation and landowner partnership, and we report our results publicly.
Vision
A Saskatchewan where native prairie is a living, expanding landscape and biodiversity is part of the rural economy.
Our story
Prairie Futures Society was founded in 2011 by a group of Regina-based ecologists and ranchers who had grown frustrated with the either/or framing of prairie conservation: the assumption that meaningful ecosystem protection required keeping agriculture out.
They believed lasting conservation in Saskatchewan required working with the people who own and work the land.
The founding group included grassland researchers from the University of Saskatchewan, two multi-generational ranching families from the Qu'Appelle Valley, and a wetland biologist who had spent a decade mapping pothole loss across the province. The combination of scientific rigour and agricultural reality was deliberate, and it's still the core of how we operate.
The people who live closest to the land are often best placed to protect it, given the science and the support to do so.
Our values
- Science-based. Every decision is grounded in peer-reviewed ecology. We publish our methods, data, and outcomes, including when results don't go as planned.
- Transparent. Annual reports, open-access survey data, and public presentations of our work, including the years a seeding failed.
- Landowner-centred. Conservation in Saskatchewan happens on private land. Our model starts with what landowners need and builds from there. We are guests on every site we work on.
- Long-term. Grassland restoration takes decades. We don't pursue projects we can't follow through on. Once we commit to a site, we're there for the full monitoring cycle.
The team
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Dr. Rachel Whitehorse
Executive Director and Lead Ecologist
PhD, University of Saskatchewan. Twenty years of research in native grassland ecology, including landmark studies on soil carbon dynamics under prairie restoration regimes. Rachel leads all science partnerships and chairs our research committee. She grew up on a mixed farm north of Swift Current and still spends June in the field.
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Ben Fournier
Conservation Projects Manager
Ben spent fifteen years running a beef operation in the Qu'Appelle Valley before transitioning to conservation work after participating in one of our early landowner programs. He now coordinates all landowner partnerships, leads easement negotiations, and serves as the primary contact for new landowner enquiries. He knows the agricultural calendar, the spring mud, and the skepticism, and he has the patience and credibility to work through all three.
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Lily Chen
Field Biologist
MSc, University of Regina (Plant Ecology). Lily leads all annual plant and vertebrate surveys, develops our monitoring protocols, and manages our species occurrence database. She has a particular expertise in native grassland forb identification and has contributed to several provincial botanical assessments for COSEWIC-listed species. In the field, she is exceptionally fast.
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Owen McAllister
Community Science Coordinator
Owen runs our volunteer field day program, coordinates community science contributions to our annual surveys, and manages our education outreach, including school visits and the youth naturalist program we run in partnership with the Saskatchewan Wildlife Federation. He came to conservation through birding, which is approximately the right origin story.
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Greta Sandoval
Communications and Grants
Greta writes the grants, files the reports, manages our public communications, and handles all media enquiries. She has raised over $1.8 million in competitive grant funding since joining in 2017, and she can explain a transect to a funder in one paragraph. Without her, the lights would not stay on (her words, frequently).
Science and partnerships
Who we work with, and on what.
- University of Regina. Ecology Lab partnership for monitoring protocol development, species-at-risk surveys, and peer-reviewed publication of annual survey results. Dr. Patricia Lavallee serves as our external research advisor.
- Ducks Unlimited Canada. Wetland restoration collaboration, joint funding of the Chaplin Lake Complex Restoration, and shared access to DUC's provincial pothole inventory for site prioritization.
- Saskatchewan Wildlife Federation. Landowner outreach, co-sponsorship of the youth naturalist program, and volunteer recruitment at field days.
- Nature Conservancy of Canada. Collaborative easement structuring on multi-parcel projects and joint access to NCC's long-term monitoring data for southern Saskatchewan.
Our numbers
As of the 2025 field season
- Acres of grassland and wetland restored or protected
- 12,000
- At-risk species tracked in annual field surveys
- 47
- Active landowner stewardship agreements
- 38
- Peer-reviewed publications since 2019
- 4
Publications
We publish every year's survey data on this site, and we send selected analyses out for peer review. These are the papers so far.
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2024
Long-Term Vegetation Response Following Native Grass Seeding in Degraded Northern Great Plains Cropland: A 10-Year Assessment
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2022
Burrowing Owl (Athene cunicularia) Occupancy Rates in Managed Grassland Corridors vs. Isolated Remnant Patches: Evidence from the Qu'Appelle Valley
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2020
Prairie Pothole Restoration and Waterfowl Breeding Pair Density: A Six-Year Analysis of 18 Restored Wetlands in South-Central Saskatchewan
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2019
Soil Carbon Accumulation Rates in Restored Native Grassland vs. Tame Pasture: Implications for Prairie Carbon Programs