Role Model Videos: Career Options for Women -- Aquaculture

The “Career Options for Women: Emerging Opportunities” videos introduce your female students to high-wage careers in traditionally male-dominated occupations. Each program reveals the personal experiences and insights of successful women in technology and trades occupations, and sends the all-important message to women and girls that the sky is the limit!

Aquaculture

This 24 minute video features profiles of three women who have embarked on careers in the aquaculture industry (also known as aquafarming.)

• Sondra Lambie, a nursery technician who cultivates large shellfish crops
• Camille Wiencke, a fish health technician who cares for farm-raised Chinook salmon
• Nancy Émard, a trout farm owner who sells about 100,000 fish annually

Additional information from co-workers and supervisors supplements each job profile.

Developed in 2006, the Career Options for Women series is an outstanding resource for schools wanting to attract women and girls to science, technology and trades.

Note: These videos are interspersed with Canadian salary and labor statistics, which are similar to the numbers in the United States. As there is a no-return policy on these publications, please make sure to look at the preview video clip for the DVD(s) you are ordering.

Sondra -- Nursery Technician

When nursery technician Sondra Lambie was growing up, she did a lot of fishing and camping with her Dad and really enjoyed the outdoors. She also tended to be the messiest kid in the family. This was her "informal training" for the work at Island Scallops, where Sondra nurtures a variety of shellfish until they're ready to go out to farm sites. There's a lot of hands-on work; it can get quite messy and really wet.

Sondra gained her first experience in aquaculture while still in high school. There, she was a member of the salmon enhancement club which sparked her interest in a career in aquaculture. “I love the fact that I get to raise animals, I like looking under the microscope and seeing these live things, this life that I am basically creating and nurturing along."

Sondra loves working in aquaculture because of the beautiful rural areas it puts her in. She lives right by the ocean and her “backyard is endless.”

Camille -- Fish Health Technician

While going to work for some people can involve traffic jams and parking problems, that's not the case for fish health technician Camille Wiencke. She goes to work by boat.

Camille's job is to look after the health of the Chinook salmon at a fish farm. Camille doesn't actually treat the fish - that's a veterinarian's job - but she monitors and checks the salmon regularly to make sure that there are no problems. “Don't think that going to school will teach you everything. Make sure that you try to spend a couple of months on a farm.”

Aquaculture has given Camille an opportunity to travel and gain international work experience. She has been exposed to many different species in France, Scotland, New Zealand, Turkey and now in Canada.

Camille really enjoys the diversity of her job. She spends a lot of time working outside in the fresh air. However, when the west coast becomes the "wet coast", Camille's indoor tasks are a welcome diversion.

Nancy Émard -- Trout Farm Owner

Trout farm owner Nancy Émard sells about a hundred thousand fish every year, mostly to sports fishing outfitters who charge the public to fish in their lakes. Running a successful trout farm is no small accomplishment. Nancy chops the wood to heat the building where her stock is raised, feeds the fish in the ponds year round and monitors their health, then harvests and delivers the final product and deals with all related business matters as well.

Nancy runs the farm by herself. In winter, she usually works 10 hours a day, but in summer, her days can be as long as 18 hours. Any time of the day or night, she has to be ready to respond to anything that goes wrong. There can be very little time between fixing a problem and losing an entire pond of fish.

Fish don't talk, but Nancy understands what they need or want just by looking at them. She gets a real sense of accomplishment raising trout and customer satisfaction is her biggest reward. “Working on a fish farm is a lifestyle. It's a quiet life, but it's a busy life.”