Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • CAREER FEATURE

Why I made a river my co-author

Anne Poelina gives first authorship to a source with deep knowledge about water — the river itself.
By
  1. Lesley Evans Ogden

    1. Lesley Evans Ogden is a freelance journalist in Vancouver, Canada

Find a new job
Anna Poelina stands in front of the Martuwarra Fitzroy river in the Kimberley region of Western Australia.The still water of the river behind her reflects warm golden hues. Her hand left gestures as she speaks. She wears a peach top with matching peach head wrap holding her silver hair up. A scarf with an aboriginal dot painting design hangs around her neck, alongside a wooden calved necklace and matching earings.

Conservation researcher Anne Poelina made the Martuwarra River of Life a co-author on publications because it is a source of expertise. Credit: Lesley Evans Ogden

Conservationist Anne Poelina has a deep connection to the fresh water that runs through the dry red-rock landscape of the Kimberley region in Western Australia. Poelina identifies as a Nyikina Warrwa woman, and her people are the Traditional Custodians of the Martuwarra Fitzroy River. The river meanders through the region’s arid land, cutting a path of about 735 kilometres long through steep gorges, savannahs and flood plains before terminating at King Sound, a delta fringed by tidal mangroves by the Indian Ocean.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Nature 652, 259-261 (2026)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-026-00973-3

Subjects

Latest on:

Nature Careers

Jobs

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing

Search

Advanced search

Quick links