MEET OUR AMAZING TEAM OF MONARCH AMBASSADORS
We are thrilled to have an inspiring and dedicated team of Monarch Ambassadors from across North America who help to make the Monarch Ultra project successful in reaching a broad audience, promoting meaningful dialogue at the local level, and supporting logistics of the relay run. The Monarch Ambassadors are an impressive lineup of runners, conservationists and pollinator advocates who are spreading awareness about our project through their networks. These networks are made up of people and organizations who actively support conservation efforts that protect our Earth, and all the spectacular species living on it. We are grateful to be connected to this community of Monarch Ambassadors!
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Dawn Pond
Dawn Pond has always being interested in plants and completed an undergraduate degree in Plant and Soil Science but it wasn’t until moving to Canada to study pollination where she really found a passion for the relationship between plants and their pollinators. She lives in Peterborough, Ontario and is a proud member of the Peterborough Pollinators community group. She is also the Downtown Vibrancy Manager with the DBIA. Dawn is an art enthusiast and enjoys producing drawings and prints inspired by plants and pollinators. She created Monarch butterfly prints to help the Kickstarter campaign for the Monarch Ultra and is now a Monarch Ultra Ambassador.
Russell Stubbles
Dr. Russell Stubbles was a professor of park management and tourism in the Dept. of Horticulture, Forestry, Landscape and Parks, College of Ag-Bio Sciences at South Dakota State University, Brookings, SD. He began graduate faculty status in 1995 and served on numerous graduate committees, including as chair. He was one of three original faculty involved in the team teaching of the new Integrated Natural Resources Management capstone senior course for the College. Russell is the founder of Monarch City USA, a non-profit organization that supports monarch education programs nationwide by getting municipalities to become supporters of the monarch butterfly by planting milkweed and nectar plants.  
Jo Hayward-Haines
​Jo Hayward-Haines was born in the USA. Jo and her husband, Paul, moved to Canada in 1976 to raise their three children, Tim (Bluestreak Records), Avery (CTV – W5) and Emily (Metric).  As an artist, activist and teacher, she established a school for Dalits in New Delhi, a bilingual arts centre in Smooth Rock Falls, Ontario and the Victoria Peace Project in Fenelon Falls.  She currently lives in Ennismore and is one of the founders of Peterborough Pollinators.  Active in the Council of Canadians, Transition Town Peterborough, the Sacred Water Circle, 4 R Grandchildren and the Raging Grannies, she is dedicated to engaging with others to solve problems of social and environmental injustice.
Suzanne Slear
Suzanne Slear is the President of Environmental Concern (EC), a non-profit corporation located on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland. During Suzanne’s 20 years working with EC, she also served as an officer on the U.S. National Ramsar Committee for 15 years, and attends the annual meeting of the Trilateral Committee for Wildlife and Ecosystem Conservation and Management as the USNRC representative. Suzanne’s passion for plants and natural habitat has expanded from a few jades on her window sill in college to supervising the creation of schoolyard pollinator habitats, and acres of Monarch butterfly habitat on EC’s campus and throughout the Mid-Atlantic Region. Suzanne is thrilled to be a Monarch Ultra Ambassador, and to be part of a network of environmentalists and runners from three countries working together to promote the conservation of natural habitat and to increase the awareness of the amazing journey of the Monarch butterfly.
Carl Wright
Carl Wright grew up on a traditional family farm in Southern Ontario. Learning from his father, Carl learned about the importance of sustainable farming. This was reflected by his dad’s deep loving care and stewardship of the land. When Carl was 15, his father died of a heart attack. The only place he could find strength and comfort was immersing himself in nature. This has resulted in a lifelong love for our natural areas. Carl took up running at 55 after a dire ultimatum from his doctor to get his blood pressure and cholesterol down. At 60, Carl has run many distances including 10 ultras. As a writer, Carl maintains the blog Old Fellow Goes Running.