She’s an adventurer with the stickability to do four years’ work achieving a PhD in the obscure subject of ‘Respiration in Giant Cuttlefish Eggs’, Sepia apama, the one that changes colour, all the time wondering whether this topic was likely to get her exciting jobs in amazing places.
From the degree gained in Adelaide, and preferring practical stuff to theoretical work, the first serendipitous job appeared. A mining development company required an environmental impact statement as it was considering the development of a desalination plant in an area that happened to be a major breeding location of the giant cuttlefish.
What Emma likes best is to get people involved in something in the environment. They develop awareness and the realisation there’s work to be done, then take ownership; a long process for some. She’s an influencer, an advocate, someone who speaks for something that has no voice. Her skills are transferable.
A couple of jobs later she was in the furthest place from the sea in New Zealand – Turangi, in the central North Island. “I went from marine molluscs to monitoring terrestrial molluscs,” she grins. I imagine that looking for land snails (Powelliphanta spp. the giant flesh-eating sort) in a beech forest must be like looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack. “I worked with volunteers,” Emma continues. “There was only helicopter access. We camped out in the bush. Sometimes we were searching in the snow. Being out there was amazing.” I understood – alone amongst that silent expanse of trees, it’s like looking at a starlit sky, feeling your size and vulnerability.
Working in bush or marine places and meeting amazing people is another part of her life that Emma enjoys. Volunteering in a survey on Great Barrier Island monitoring a seabird species (the black petrel, Procellaria parkinsoni, Taiko), led her to break some barriers in Peru, South America. Hard to see the connection, isn’t it? The backstory: Emma realised just how endangered the black petrel was. The bird is a slow breeder and its habit of following fishing boats and taking bait exacerbates the problem. It is likely to become extinct within 30 years. She isn’t having that!
Scott using the drone technology; Emma readying herself to do a bait trail
Emma can be stubborn. If she wants something, she does everything in her power to make it happen, she says. She decided she was going to advocate for the black petrel. The bird is migratory. It breeds in summer on Great and Little Barrier Islands in the Hauraki Gulf, flies across the Pacific Ocean and overwinters in Peru, along the coast of South America. She’d go there and tackle the problem from both ends. She’d raise awareness of the black petrel in Lima and the fishing community, go into schools and educate the children (and teachers).
She learnt some Spanish (inadequate as it turned out), applied for a Churchill Fellowship* and got it. “I worked in close liaison with Pro Delphinus, a not-for-profit group in Lima that is committed to the conservation of threatened and endangered marine fauna. They were fundamental in making the work in Peru happen. Without their input I couldn’t have done it.” Collating some resources and ideas, off she went!
*Churchill Fellowship: a once-in-a-lifetime grant ‘Helping people to travel overseas to learn from others and study topics that will advance their occupation, trade, industry, profession or community and benefit New Zealand’. (Wikipedia)
People were amazed at her willingness to spend time and money coming all that way out of concern for a bird. They were most receptive, and with the help of Pro Delphinus, Emma travelled north along the dry barren coast, spreading word of the plight of the black petrel in remote places and fishing villages where no tourist set foot.
This trip won Emma her next job in the playground of the Hauraki Gulf. Imagine it: islands, sparkling waters, dolphins, boats and birds. She got a contract with Forest and Bird doing seabird advocacy work, connecting with the fishing community and wider public for awareness to reduce the impact of fishing-related activities on seabirds. She worked with groups from other cultures, such as the Chinese Conservation Education Trust, to raise awareness of seabirds within their communities. “Good fishermen know a lot about seabirds and do the right thing,” says Emma. “It’s when people who don’t know a lot get annoyed with the birds that incidents can happen.”
I met Emma up in the local bush. I’m a volunteer with the Aongatete Forest Restoration Trust. This Trust was set up to ‘Bring Back the Birds in the forest’. Emma is Project Manager. “The degree of responsibility on volunteers was too much,” she told me. “The Trust got some funding and I got the job to help manage the project and take the pressure off the volunteers.” Over the 12 months she’s been there, I’ve watched the system become streamlined; with plenty of maps and volunteers, baiting days run smoothly and mostly stress-free.
There’s a Volunteers Wednesday once a fortnight. In February Emma had Boffa Miskell, an environmental planning and design company, help complete the baiting job begun by the Saturday volunteers.
Emma would have been in her element: exposing people to the forest and letting them experience the phenomenal amount of work that goes into pest control, of which 99% is voluntary. “Some really keen people are involved with care groups, but they get bogged down with details they didn’t want,” she says. “It’s like running a business without paying anyone.”
The Aongatete forest is located at the top of Wright Road, Aongatete, 10km before Katikati. Easily accessible, it’s a playground in our own backyard, suitable for families, and has a good swimming hole as a bonus. “You can connect with nature for free or go shopping at the mall and spend money,” Emma comments.
“If you’re interested, we’re always delighted to have new volunteers. The tracks are for all levels of fitness and there are jobs for all capabilities, from minding the kohanga (hut) to admin to walking the harder bait lines.”
Emma doesn’t see that using a hammer or emptying possums from traps is a barrier but acknowledges that some women wouldn’t care to do it. “Women tend to be less confident outdoors,” she comments. “My experience is that there is role division, with women more likely to look after the kids, and so become better at those tasks and not at, for example, using a hammer.” She’d like to see herself as a role model. “I believe people ought to do whatever they want and not be constrained by the expectations of society, though I do have barriers,” she grins. “I’m hopeless at curling my hair or putting on makeup.”
Married to Scott Sambell for 14 years, they have an 11-year-old daughter Pippa. Their company, Ethos Environmental, recently won two national awards for Scott’s environmental successes developing and applying geospatial technology to the conservation industry. “Behind every good man is a good woman,” we agree. Scott’s work makes the concept of a Predator-free New Zealand by 2050 quite possible. Neither have 9-5 jobs and are away a lot so they must juggle family commitments. “Pippa has had to become quite used to entertaining herself, but she is often engaged with what we are doing,” says Emma. Indeed, I watched Pippa and her father work a drone, mapping the hillside on which the kohanga is situated to create an experimental 3-D image.
Emma has a wardrobe of other hats she swaps around: volunteer Chair for Glenfern Sanctuary on Great Barrier Island; mother; volunteer with Pippa’s school for environmental groups; flipperball coach; mountain bike rider; and has recently joined a waka ama team.
Dr. Emma Cronin, PhD, Churchill Fellow, doesn’t even see barriers – she just gets out and does it.
Kinsa Hays writes children’s stories, advocates for birds and the environment, meets interesting people and interviews them, and has had her poetry and fictionpublished. She also paints. Find her at kinsahays.com
