Meet Nadira Mitchell: Inspiring future generations of wildlife stewards
Curious about beavers? Families are invited to discover just how remarkable these hardworking animals are during the final event of Western National Parks’ Junior Ranger Summer Film Series on Saturday, August 8, at The National Parks Store in Tucson.
Beginning at 10 AM, Watershed Management Group will lead hands-on activities exploring how beavers shape waterways, create homes for wildlife, support healthy ecosystems, and even help reduce the impacts of wildfires. As excitement builds for the event, we caught up with Nadira Mitchell, Restoration Ecology Coordinator at Watershed Management Group, to learn more about the organization’s work, her role helping coordinate beaver conservation efforts in Arizona, and why she believes these remarkable animals have so much to teach us. Then, at 10:30 AM, families can settle in for a screening of the animated film Hoppers (2026), complete with free popcorn and Junior Ranger giveaways. The free event is open to all, though reservations are required and space is limited.
Watershed Management Group (WMG) is dedicated to developing community-based solutions that support both thriving communities and healthy environments. The organization envisions a future where people and the natural world prosper together, providing communities with the knowledge, skills, and resources needed to create sustainable relationships with the places they call home.
Mitchell’s work brings that mission to life. Through WMG’s River Run Network, she helps coordinate restoration projects, the Annual Bi-national Beaver Survey on the San Pedro River, and the Arizona Beaver Working Group. She also coordinates Sustainable Desert Living Series classes through WMG’s Living Lab and supports the Santa Cruz Watershed Collaborative. Her personal motto, Be the Beaver!, perfectly captures her enthusiasm for one of nature’s most influential engineers.
Connections to the past; visions for the future
For Mitchell, beavers represent something much bigger than a single species.
“It’s thinking about our past of a watershed that used to have more water and asking ourselves, ‘What can we do to have that back?’”
That perspective is rooted in a lifelong relationship with the Sonoran Desert.
Born and raised in Arizona, Mitchell grew up in southwest Tucson just beyond the city limits, where undeveloped desert stretched outside her front door. Her mother, who is from the Navajo Nation, instilled a deep respect for the natural world from an early age.
“My front yard always had a lot of vegetation,” Mitchell recalls. “There’s a desert landscape to explore and bear witness to.”
Some of her earliest memories center on the dramatic transformation that arrived with the summer monsoons.
“I grew up interacting with the environment in my front yard. The most memorable experiences when I was a kid were during the monsoon season when everything would change in a way. Everything was lush after the rains. There would be snails in the front yard and I would collect them and tally them. Even at that young age, I was already participating in the scientific observation of the world.”
Her mother also taught her an important lesson about stewardship. As a child, Mitchell would spend hours outside, observing her natural world. She remembers documenting the snails with crayons. But she always returned them to their environment.
“My mom always taught me to put them back in their habitat so they wouldn’t be brought harm...She always taught me to respect all beings.”
Mitchell dreamed of spending her life outdoors helping wildlife, but she didn’t yet know that passion could become a career.
“I always imagined being outside with wildlife and helping them, but I didn’t know what a job in the field would look like.”
Everything changed after volunteering at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum and by participating in a mentorship program that connected students with mentors at the University of Arizona.
Those experiences helped her realize conservation could become her profession. Mitchell earned a degree in Natural Resources with an emphasis in Wildlife Conservation and Management from the University of Arizona in May 2024 before completing a research assistantship with the U.S. Forest Service. She later joined Watershed Management Group as an apprentice after volunteering on the San Pedro River Beaver Survey and eventually came on board full time.
“I get to have that wildlife passion within my life as a young professional,” she says, excitedly.
Throughout her work, Mitchell is equally passionate about ensuring conservation efforts include the people who have cared for these landscapes for generations. She believes environmental work is strongest when it centers Indigenous knowledge.
“People aren’t seen as directly involved as part of the system,” she says, reflecting on the separation between people and the systems of conservation, something that stands in direct contradiction to many Indigenous ways of being. “Bringing Indigenous knowledge and Indigenous people to the forefront of this work is so important because if it’s not done in involvement with them, it’s not seeing the full picture.”
Conservation and education
That philosophy guides her work with the Arizona Beaver Working Group, a voluntary statewide collaborative initiated by WMG that brings together organizations, agencies, researchers, and Tribal Nations to develop shared goals for beaver conservation across Arizona.
“It’s bringing us all to the same table to create collective goals and working together to implement those goals,” Mitchell says. “One of my goals was making sure from the get-go we have Tribal Nations involved and at the table.”
That collaborative spirit is one reason Watershed Management Group and Western National Parks are excited to partner for this special event.
“Nadira brings a deep, firsthand understanding of the vital role beavers play in desert riparian ecosystems, and her collaboration has greatly enriched our Junior Ranger program,” says Angela Seidler, WNP Program Manager.
“I am deeply grateful that she has shared her time, expertise, and perspective to strengthen WNP's programming. We are looking forward to welcoming her back for an in-person adult program in the near future.”
Both organizations believe education is one of the most powerful ways to inspire stewardship. By helping young visitors discover the incredible role beavers play in healthy ecosystems—and by connecting those lessons to the landscapes and waterways they call home—we can encourage the next generation to care for the public lands that are so important to our history, heritage, and well-being.
Learn more and register for the Junior Ranger Summer Film series event on August 8 at 10 AM, featuring an activity with the Watershed Management Group and a free screening of the film Hoppers (2026).
By Julie Thompson
