Alton Harestad

Biography

Dr. Alton Harestad was an outstanding teacher, mentor, and supporter of students. Over his career at Simon Fraser University, which spanned almost 30 years (1981 to 2009), Alton supervised close to 40 graduate students who focussed on wildlife species ranging from bears, marten and wolverines, to snow geese, owls and songbirds. Alton taught over two thousand undergraduates and acted as a committee member for an additional 155 grad students. There are literally hundreds of SFU grads around the province and across the country, who have made, and continue to make, significant contributions to wildlife conservation, all influenced by Alton.

Alton held other academic roles at SFU, including Acting Director of Cooperative Education, Director of Animal Care, Director of the Centre for Pest Management and Director of the Environmental Sciences program. The Alton Harestad Book Award was created in Alton’s honour to celebrate outstanding graduates in Environmental Science. In recognition of his passion and commitment he was awarded SFU’S Teaching Excellence award in 1988. He wholeheartedly shared his expertise with media and the community. His trademark enthusiasm will be fondly remembered by his students, and the SFU community.

Alton was also a very dear friend, mentor and supporter. Having recently retired from almost 30 years of teaching at BCIT I know without a doubt my career would not have been so rich and fulfilling were it not for Alton Harestad. What follows is my personal experience as Alton’s student and friend. Hopefully it will give an idea of how dedicated Alton was to those he taught. My story is just one example of Alton’s lasting impact on the lives of his students.

In the sports world some coaches are described as “players’ coaches”. Alton Harestad was most certainly a “student’s professor”. He was someone who always put his students first. He could have spent more time publishing papers but instead invested his time and energy into mentoring future wildlife biologists and wildlife managers. I was so fortunate to be one of those who benefited from Alton’s dedication to teaching and mentoring.

Alton was my undergraduate professor in Biological Sciences at SFU and he was also my graduate supervisor for my MSc in Wildlife Ecology. As a student in his undergraduate Vertebrate Biology course I remember well visiting him for the first time in his office. Who can forget his bushy beard, his welcoming smile and the twinkle in his eyes? Alton was an expert on Mustelidae (weasel family) and I had photographed River Otters in Bowron Lake Provincial Park. He was kind, supportive and showed keen interest in my photos. I was so impressed by how much time he spent with students without any indication that he had other things to do. That was Alton.

A couple of years later, near the end of my undergrad, I was walking by his office and heard him call out ‘Catt come in here, I want to chat’. He wanted to know if I had applied for any scholarships for graduate studies. I told him that I hadn’t as my plan was to take a break from studying and explained that after the upcoming final exams I was heading off on a six-month trip to the South Pacific. He nodded, pulled out a piece of paper and created a labelled table highlighting the “pros” and “cons” of applying for scholarships then … and not in the future.

Suffice to say, he was encouraging and supportive, and it was agreed that ‘now’ was a good idea. We sat down right away and he even helped me fill out the application forms! About six months later, after collecting my mail from an American Express office in Alice Springs, Australia (forwarded by my parents) I learned that the application had been successful and I was awarded an NSERC scholarship for two years of graduate studies. That gift of education was all due to Alton.

After returning to Canada, I worked as a Park Naturalist in Kootenay National Park in the BC Rockies. While presenting an evening program in one of the park campgrounds, who should show up to say hello after my talk? None other than Alton Harestad. We spent the following day in the field exploring the park and he taught me so much. As we walked he showed me hidden tunnels in the grass created by small mammals and I’ll never forget how he pulled a piece of grass from the meadow and created a sound that moments later resulted in a lone wolf’s howl in response. True story.

We arranged to meet with Kootenay National Park’s Chief Park Warden to discuss possible research topics. I admitted to Alton that I was pondering doing graduate studies in eastern Canada and not at SFU. He said no problem—and offered to send me contact information for prospective graduate supervisors. Later that summer though, I thought to myself if this fellow is going to do all of that for me, why not stay at SFU and be one of his graduate students? That was the best decision I have made in my academic career.

That fall, back at SFU, we continued our discussion of thesis topic options. I was keen to do research on charismatic megafauna. Perhaps wolves? bears? bighorn sheep? Alton once again pulled out a piece of paper and asked me: What are your career goals? How many field seasons are you keen to carry out? What do you want to get out of this graduate degree?

Based on our earlier discussions with Parks Canada, we learned that they were interested in gathering data on the relationships between forest fires and wildlife communities. Research on small mammals was an option, but we decided on investigating how bird communities respond to changes in forest composition and complexity following forest fires. My thesis title became: Bird Communities and Forest Succession in Kootenay National Park, BC.

Alton was an outstanding thesis supervisor. He joined me in the field during my first season. He edited my thesis drafts as quickly as I was able to provide them to him. He was also a very early riser, often up at 4am and at the university not much later. He invited me to join him for early morning breakfast at the university but I think I only lasted a couple of mornings. He did that every working day!

Alton knew that teaching was one of my career goals so he was supportive of me taking one term to teach a Wildlife Management course at BCIT while I was writing my thesis. At that time I also applied for a scholarship to study overseas upon completion of my MSc. My application was successful and not long after my thesis defence I found myself on a plane heading to East Africa to do post-graduate studies at the College of African Wildlife Management in Tanzania as a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar.

Studying in Africa was a major life influencing experience and Alton was with me (in spirit) all the way. There were highs and there were lows. The college location was quite isolated and many evenings were spent reading books or listening to Radio Canada International on my shortwave. I still remember how surprised I was when I tuned into Radio Canada and heard one of Alton’s SFU graduate students being interviewed. She was doing her graduate research on wolverines in the Yukon. I was thrilled! Upon returning home, Alton helped facilitate an opportunity for me to co-teach an ecology course at SFU alongside Dr. Bob Brooke.

A year or so later I was back working with Parks Canada in the Rockies when I received correspondence from Alton about an opportunity to teach in Indonesia. Alton had been asked to participate in the SFU coordinated Eastern Indonesia University Development project by teaching an Introductory Ecology course at one of the member universities in Southeast Sulawesi. Alton was unable to do so and he recommended me as a possible alternative. That recommendation resulted in teaching contracts at three different universities in Eastern Indonesia over a two-year period.

While still teaching in Asia I had a phone interview for a permanent teaching position at BCIT. The experience gained through teaching at SFU and Indonesia proved invaluable and fortunately, I was successful. When I returned home and shared the news with Alton he was so supportive and enthusiastic.

Throughout my BCIT teaching career Alton helped in many ways. He shared lecture notes and often dropped by as a guest lecturer. He shared his experiences of serving on the Scientific Panel for Sustainable Forest Practice in Clayoquot Sound. This was particularly of interest both to me and my students because my father was arrested for blockading logging trucks in Clayoquot at the same time as one of my brothers was working for Interfor, one of the logging companies doing the harvesting in the Sound. Alton even helped edit a magazine article I wrote about logging in Clayoquot and our family dynamics.

With Dr. Ken Lertzman, Alton created and presented a fabulous seminar on how to write a thesis, which over the years, he shared with over one thousand graduate students and faculty. Throughout my career I did my best to emulate Alton’s outstanding methods in my own teaching: “Tell them what you’re going to tell them; Tell them; then Tell them what you told them”. I don’t think I ever reached Alton’s award-winning level, but I sure had fun trying!

Outside the classroom Alton was just as generous and supportive. Once while looking for a project he could work on with his son I offered up my dilapidated Nisson Pathfinder for $1, so they could fix it together. But Alton’s son had other ideas and within a week had sold it for $1000. Alton was as surprised as I was but to put things right (in his mind) Alton made a $1,000 donation to the Ozmer Catt memorial endowment at BCIT that I had created after my father’s passing. Alton never missed a beat.

Over the years Alton counseled me on many things: career choices, finances, mortgages, job opportunities, and even my love life. He always wanted to know how I was doing. In 1999 Alton was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. Over the final years of his life, I visited Alton and his wife Kristie frequently. He always smiled. He told stories and made me laugh, and always had encouraging words despite his own personal challenges. I miss him dearly.

Personal notes by Daniel Catt, SFU Alum & Past Student of Alton