Abstract Submission Details
Help us create a dynamic and rewarding conference program by submitting an abstract for the upcoming June 2026 conference. Use the form below to submit your abstract by March 20, 2026. Please note we are unable to extend this deadline.
Key items:
- Use the NCC26_Abstract_Template to ensure your abstract fits our formatting requirements. When attaching your abstract to the submission form, please ensure your file name adheres to this format: first author’s (or presenting author’s) name ( last and first), followed by the preferred session, and end with a unique keyword (PresenterLastName_PresenterFirstName_PreferredSession_UniqueKeyword). For example, submitting an abstract for author Rick James under Session C with keywords Blue Lake should have the following filename: JamesRick_SessionC_BlueLake.docx.
- If you are submitting more than one abstract as a the presenting author, please change the unique keyword (e.g., JamesRick_SessionC_BlueLake.docx & JamesRick_SessionC_CatfishCreek.docx), or use a number to distinguish between submissions (e.g., JamesRick_SessionC_BlueLake1.docx & JamesRick_SessionC_BlueLake2.docx, etc.).
- Complete the short questions in the submission form below (presenting author’s information, abstract title, keywords, preferred session(s), format (oral or poster), previous Natural Channels Conference experience, and other bio info).
- To help choose the preferred session(s) your abstract applies to, you can read descriptions of our sessions below.
- Although our final program isn’t set, we anticipate submitted abstracts for oral presentations to be allotted 15-20 minutes for presentation and fielding questions.
Please ensure that all contributors are aware of this abstract and agree to being part of it.
All abstracts are to be submitted no later than Friday March 20, 2026.
Abstract Template
Additional Information
While all abstracts will be considered, not all can be accommodated within our program. The NCC Program Committee and Co-chairs will build the conference program from the submitted abstracts. You will be informed of acceptance by email in April 2026.
The Natural Channels Initiative and the Natural Channels Conference is a not-for-profit entity, thus presenters with accepted abstracts are kindly requested to register for the conference as an attendee.
Session Descriptions
River corridors continue to face increasing pressure from climate change, urbanization, and shifting land-use patterns. The need for robust, adaptive management and monitoring strategies has never been greater. This session explores the intersection of long and short-term monitoring and adaptive decision-making, focusing on how data-driven insights can guide the restoration and maintenance of resilient natural channel systems. We aim to highlight practical applications and innovative approaches that allow practitioners to navigate the complexities of physical and biological change in Ontario’s rivers and streams.
We invite abstract submissions that demonstrate how monitoring programs have informed and can inform adaptive management cycles, moving beyond static assessments to dynamic, responsive frameworks. Presentations should illustrate how specific monitoring tools and protocols are being adapted or utilized to track project success, identify failures or a need for adjustments, and satisfy regulatory requirements in a rapidly evolving political landscape.
We specifically encourage submissions that address the following key areas:
- Innovative Biological Monitoring: The application and integration of environmental DNA (eDNA) as a complementary tool for species detection and biodiversity monitoring within river corridors.
- Standardized Assessment Protocols: Case studies or methodology discussions utilizing well established protocols such as the Ontario Stream Assessment Protocol (OSAP) to evaluate channel health, diagnosing impairments, and tracking temporal changes.
- Long-Term Project Monitoring: Analysis of multi-year datasets tracking physical and biological attributes, offering insights into the trajectories of restoration projects and the stability of natural channel designs over time.
- Riparian Restoration: Adaptive strategies for establishing and monitoring riparian vegetation, including responses to invasive species, climate stress, channel morphology and changing hydrologic regimes.
- Hydrometrics: Adaptations in hydrometric monitoring networks and techniques to better capture extreme events, low-flow conditions, and the hydro-geomorphic responses of river systems.
- Regulatory Compliance: Navigating the intersection of science and policy, with a focus on monitoring requirements for permitting, compliance reporting, and the effectiveness of mitigation measures.
This session will provide a forum for consultants, agency staff, researchers, and practitioners to share lessons learned from the field. By examining both successful adaptations and informative challenges, we aim to advance the collective understanding of how to monitor, manage, and sustain healthy, functioning river corridors.
Keywords: adaptive management, monitoring, stream assessment, biological monitoring, eDNA, hydrometric monitoring, geomorphic monitoring, regulatory compliance, standard protocols, OSAP, riparian monitoring, long-term monitoring case studies
Natural channel systems are integral components of healthy ecosystems, providing critical ecological and hydrogeomorphological functions. Effective monitoring and modelling of these systems are essential for informed design, management, and restoration. While traditional approaches have proven reliable over time, they are increasingly inadequate for addressing growing pressures, including climate variability, land-use change, data scarcity, and emerging hydrological hotspots. These challenges reduce model accuracy and confidence, ultimately limiting our ability to assess and maintain healthy natural channel systems.
To complement and extend conventional methods, emerging technologies, particularly artificial intelligence, machine learning, remote sensing, and advanced geospatial techniques, are demonstrating significant potential. These tools offer both intrusive and non-intrusive pathways for improved data acquisition, analysis, prediction, and decision-making, and in some cases represent a paradigm shift in how natural channel systems are monitored and understood. This session aims to highlight innovative applications of emerging technologies in natural channel systems, showcase their integration with traditional approaches, and explore how these methods can improve monitoring, modelling, design, and management across multiple spatial and temporal scales.
Similarly, innovations in modelling continue to support our understanding and predictive ability for managing river systems. With the advent of big data, computer modelling of river systems has advanced from the less intensive 1D modelling to a more involved 2D and 3D modelling. Modelling in all relevant discplines including but not limited to catchment hydrology, channel hydraulics, sediment transport, riparian and other physical habitat enhance our understanding of the river corridors as a whole. In this session, we also invite presenters to explore advancement in modelling, both physical and computer, across a broad range of disciplines.
Keywords: Emerging Technologies, River and stream monitoring, Remote Sensing, Machine Learning, GIS and Geospatial Analysis, River Health Assessment, Non-intrusive monitoring techniques, Physical Modelling, Computer Modelling
Advancing the science of natural channel design requires more than theory, it also requires action. This session explores the critical role of innovation in the construction and implementation of natural channels , knowing that advancing science often requires applying new approaches in real-world situations. While guidelines and models provide a foundation, progress is also made when practitioners advance established methods by testing new ideas in the field.
However, innovation must be approached with responsibility. Natural channels are delicately balanced components of larger ecosystems, and large-scale failures can have significant environmental consequences, as well as putting humans and infrastructure at risk. This session will discuss balancing innovation with risk management, presenting ways that new approaches can be implemented thoughtfully and with safeguards in place.
We invite designers and builders who have implemented natural channel projects to share their innovative approaches. What worked? What didn’t? How did you assess and mitigate risk? And, what will you be trying next? Proponents, managers, and regulators are invited to share perspectives on collaborating with practitioners to implement innovation, and how they approach novel solutions and risk. By openly discussing these lessons, we can collectively refine our practices and foster a culture of informed innovation that benefits science and the environment, as well as all stakeholders.
Keywords: innovation, construction, implementation, stream restoration, natural channel design, constructability, lessons learned, risk management
Interpreting river complexity is central to how natural channels are understood, compared, and acted upon in science and practice. This session focuses on innovation in interpretive frameworks used to organize and classify river form and process, within and across systems from headwaters to outlets. Emphasis is placed on integrative perspectives linking geomorphic processes, ecological functions, and engineering objectives. An important focus is how these integrations inform innovative channel and habitat design, construction, and performance.
The session welcomes applied or conceptual contributions that rethink how river complexity is interpreted and translated into design, management, and decision-making in support of resilient river corridors. Contributions may include how innovative interpretations have informed channel and habitat design, approaches to evaluating geomorphological and ecological performance, and the use of metrics and monitoring to inform practice and measures of success in applied settings. Presentations may span theoretical advances and applied case studies drawn from research, consulting, and management contexts.
Keywords: innovation, river complexity, channel classification, integrating process and function, interpretive frameworks
This session invites researchers, practitioners, and policy-makers to explore the synergies between international approaches to managing resilient river corridors. By looking beyond domestic borders, we aim to identify universal challenges and site-specific innovations that can enhance our collective practice. The discussion will focus on three core pillars of international practice:
- the implementation of standardized monitoring frameworks and morphological assessment tools,
- the professionalization of the industry through specialized certification and training programs, and
- the influence of international restoration organizations on regional policy and cross-boundary collaboration.
By examining the transferability of monitoring protocols and educational standards across continents, this session seeks to bridge the gap between global networks and local applications, defining the next generation of best practices for truly resilient river systems.
Keywords: international approaches, synergies, standardized monitoring frameworks, standardized assessment tools, cross-boundary collaboration, educational standards
Historically, infrastructure design around watercourses has often overlooked the concept of ecological connectivity, as conventional engineering practices tend to simplify dynamic streams for stabilization aims. These conventional techniques can degrade and limit the natural benefits of ecological diversity. While legislation such as Canada’s Fisheries Act provides broad protections for fish and fish habitat, it does not prescribe specific design methods for balancing erosion prevention, ecosystem functions, landscape aesthetics, and infrastructure protection. Instead, designers must navigate numerous evolving guidelines and balance general ecological targets with feasibility, site constraints, and project timelines.
This session will focus on how practitioners are navigating challenges and design solutions for implementing ecological connectivity, such as fish passage and riparian habitat, while supporting stabilization and infrastructure objectives. Presenters are invited to explore topics such as best practices for fish habitat, erosion management project successes and failures, innovative approaches for complex sites, lessons learned from fish passage guidelines across jurisdictions, and balancing regulatory requirements, ecological considerations, and public perceptions with practicality. By examining these perspectives, we aim to identify pathways towards consistent and effective solutions for aquatic ecosystem-and-human friendly infrastructure.
Join us for an engaging discussion on bridging regulatory and technical gaps to improve naturalization outcomes.
Keywords: balance, in-stream design, riparian habitats, ecosystem services, innovative techniques, public perceptions
At the Second International Conference of Natural Channel Systems (NCS) in 1998, costs of building natural channel systems were a significant focus for the conference. Implementation of Ontario Reg 588/17 (Municipal Asset Management Planning for Municipal Infrastructure) initially focused on grey infrastructure. Municipal Studies have recently (2023 – 24) completed O. Reg 588/17 asset plans for green infrastructure such as stream channels in urban tablelands, ravines and valley lands. This Session seeks papers, particularly from a municipal financial management perspective.
Papers may focus on:
- Philosophies for design of NCS in urban areas (such as Engineered Natural Channels) compared to philosophies for non-urban areas;
- Cost estimation for NCS projects and cost inflation over time;
- Channel Asset Management outcomes from completed O. Reg 588/17 studies, including total channel asset $ estimates;
- Prioritization strategies for channels impacted by urban infrastructure (trails, road crossings, watermains and sewers, gas mains and telecommunication conduits) and erosion of public and private property;
- Consideration of channels in urban areas which have natural bed and banks compared against engineered channels (straightened with liners such as gabion baskets or concrete) and recently rebuilt natural channel segments (with a NCS liner) ;
- Financing strategies for a watercourse asset management plan as a function of how it is funded: municipal tax base, water/wastewater rate, grants from upper tier governments; fund raising from private corporations; and
- Benefit- cost assessments.
Keywords: channel assets, urban, O. Reg 588/17, prioritization, valuation, funding, ownership, design life
Conventional “hard” engineering measures for managing flood and erosion risk often disrupt natural systems and lack the flexibility to adapt to long-term changes, increasing risks to habitats, neighbouring communities, and infrastructure. As a result, Nature Based Infrastructure (NBI) are gaining global attention but remain underused in Canada. NBI for flood and erosion risk management are strategies or measures that depend on, or mimic, natural system processes to provide flood and erosion risk management function, while delivering environmental and other societal co-benefits. Recent international guidelines and reviews highlight the need for research, performance assessment, and authoritative design guidance to support broader adoption of NBI for flood and erosion risk reduction in Canada.
This session will showcase work and research by the National Research Council Canada towards the advancement of NBI in particular for riverine flood and erosion risk management. Submissions are also invited from the broader community on a range of topics and related sub-disciplines including, for example: NBI approaches and technical design; project implementation; monitoring; performance assessment; community engagement; environmental, societal, and cultural co-benefits; project case-studies and historical examples; and guidelines and best-practices.
Keywords: Nature Based Infrastructure (NBI), Flood and erosion risk management, NBI design and implementation, Environmental and societal co-benefits
River restoration projects increasingly require collaboration across disciplines, sectors, and knowledge systems to address complex environmental, regulatory, and social challenges. Successful outcomes often depend not only on sound science and engineering, but also on effective partnerships among practitioners, researchers, Indigenous communities, regulators, landowners, and other stakeholders. Although this sentiment is widely accepted, how to effectively manage partnerships and multidisciplinary approaches in practice remains uncertain, and challenges persist in their application within river restoration projects.
This session invites oral and poster abstract submissions that showcase river restoration projects grounded in partnerships and multidisciplinary approaches. We particularly welcome contributions from industry practitioners and researchers who have navigated collaborative projects involving multiple technical disciplines (e.g., geomorphology, ecology, engineering, hydrology, social science, landscape architechure) and/or diverse community and Indigenous partners. Presentations on multi-disciplinary approaches may also explore the interactions between natural processes and human-centred design spaces, and the maintainance of community connectivity.
Submissions may highlight lessons learned from all stages of a project lifecycle and may focus on a range of topics, including (but not limited to) governance structures, co-production of knowledge, integration of traditional and local knowledge, interdisciplinary communication, engagement and managing differing objectives or constraints. Presentations that reflect on the challenges of navigating partnerships and the complexities inherent in multidisciplinary projects are strongly encouraged.
By aligning with the conference theme of Navigating Challenges, Opportunities, and Change, this session aims to foster reflection on how collaborative approaches can both enable and complicate river restoration practice. Case studies that address both successes and challenges, and that offer transferable insights for future projects, will be particularly valuable.
Keywords: collaboration, cross-disciplines, multi-sector, multi-agency, knowledge integration, traditional and local knowledge, community and indigenous partners, case studies, engagement, community connectivity.
Diverse physiographies, geologic settings, weather patterns, and landuses drive the processes in our river systems differently. Landuse and climate change add further complexities to natural riverine processes. As our understanding of these processes develop, practitioners have been refining their approach to studying and managing river systems by recognizing the diversity and interconnectivity of river processes.
We invite abstracts focusing on advancements in our understanding of river processes and sediment transport, and the interaction of human and climatic drivers with natural river processes. This session is intended to showcase developments in both theroretical and conceptual understanding of river processes as well as our practical responses to the management of river systems. We invite practitioners to present their unique experiences that they have encountered in different landscapes in their practice. The concept of uncertainty and how to manage it is becoming integral to river system management and presentations around this are encouraged.
Presentations and case studies highlighting different physiographic and hydrologic settings are also welcome, e.g., ice processes, natural channels in permafrost dominant settings, design in karst settings, hillslope-watercourse interactions, mountain rivers, bedrock dominant rivers.
Keywords: river processes, land use and climate change, sediment transport, uncertainty, resilience, designing for unique environments, case studies
As the cornerstone of the 30th-anniversary program, this session directly mirrors the conference theme by examining the evolution of problem-solving within the industry over the last three decades. The path from a restoration concept to a successful implementation is rarely a straight line, often requiring practitioners to navigate a gauntlet of unforeseen technical, regulatory, and logistical hurdles. This session moves beyond the standard success story to provide a retrospective look at the reality of project delivery, focusing on practical examples of implemented solutions and the invaluable lessons learned from setbacks and failures. By pulling back the curtain on the challenges of the past 30 years, we invite speakers to present honest assessments of how obstacles were overcome and to suggest proactive strategies to avoid similar pitfalls in the future.
We welcome presentations covering the full spectrum of project complexities, including the shifting landscape of permitting, the rigors of water management and erosion control during construction, and the perennial challenges of communication between regulators, owners, and designers. Furthermore, the session will explore the management of unexpected environmental impacts and the complications inherent in integrating natural channel systems with existing infrastructure. By fostering a candid dialogue on what didn’t work and why, this session aims to honor the collective experience of the restoration community and equip the next generation of practitioners with the resilience and problem-solving tools necessary to navigate the complexities of modern river corridor management. Be bold and contribute to what we hope will be an engaging and informative session.
Keywords: lessons learned, pitfalls, overcoming obstacles, collective experience, problem solving