Dr. Loren Mathews conducts regular water sampling as part of the statewide Adopt-A-Stream program. Her water quality testing helps ORK track potential issues and her training adds more AAS volunteers to our ranks.
“Mother, Mother Ocean, I have heard your call” are the lyrics I remember hearing play in the background on family sailing trips around South Florida and the Keys growing up. On one particular trip, my fascination with marine life inspired me to take a cushion sea star off the sandy bottom and stow it in the anchor well so that I could dry it out and later take it home as a souvenir. It didn’t take long before a mysterious pungent smell coming out of the boat revealed my secret treasure and future career goals of becoming a marine biologist to my parents.
When it came time for me to graduate from high school, I could think of no better place to answer my call than the University of Miami. The next time I came across a cushion sea star, I was on a research vessel with a tape measurer in hand and a notebook nearby to record my data.
Fast forward over two decades, and I now have the chance to cultivate that same passion for exploration and observation in my own two boys, the hundreds of Georgia Southern college students I teach every semester, and the people I get to work with through the Ogeechee Riverkeeper and Georgia Adopt-A-Stream programs.
The creeks in Statesboro and our watershed may not be salty and turquoise blue, but they keep my toes in the sand and the sound of water flowing in my ears. My hope is that everyone, no matter where they live and work, finds a way to connect to the natural world around them and is inspired to get involved with one of the many opportunities there are to care for it.
-Written by Dr. Loren Mathews