From Cows to Salmon: Kaitlin Guitard’s Journey in Sustainable Food Production

With the Pacific Ocean as her backyard, Kaitlin Guitard (Class of ’18) ensures salmon are healthy from “egg to plate” and keeps a keen eye on food processing safety at Mowi Canada West.

Since childhood, Kaitlin had wanted to work with animals, initially aspiring to become a veterinarian. Guidance from a career counsellor in Grade 10 directed her to the pre-vet and animal science programs at Dalhousie’s Faculty of Agriculture.

“I'll never forget the day the counsellor turned the screen and showed me pictures of the campus. I saw a picture of a cow in a classroom setting, and I was so excited,” Kaitlin shares. “I remember going home and telling my parents ‘I'm going to this university, this is it.’”

At the Agricultural Campus, she worked closely with animals and explored various facets of food production, learning that raising healthy animals is key to profitability and welfare. Her training in biology, particularly microscope work, seamlessly translated into her career.

After graduation, Kaitlin swapped one coast for another, relocating from Nova Scotia to British Columbia. The transition from agriculture to aquaculture was both challenging and very rewarding.

“The steepest learning curve was, I guess, living on a fish farm. It’s completely different than anything I’ve ever experienced. You need a whole new set of skills: learning how to drive a boat, navigate tides, and work with the ocean.”

Kaitlin spent the first three years at Mowi living and working on the water. She started as a sea-site technician, responsible for growing healthy salmon straight from a hatchery at a remote site. She monitored ocean environment, fed the fish, and maintained the floating house she lived in. Soon she was promoted to water quality technician. In this role, every morning she would steer her new boat from site to site, collecting water samples and monitoring oxygen levels and potential threats, such as plankton and jellyfish. Every now and then, the ocean’s unpredictability threw her schedule into disarray, highlighting the need for annual tsunami drills and constant agility.