Our Story
We have always looked at the systems around us and asked: Who does this actually serve?
From an early age, we both noticed the ways the world trains people to disconnect from themselves. To want more. To measure everything by how it looks, how fast it moves, how much it produces. We watched those systems wear people down and we decided to spend our lives building something different.
One Song Collective is that something different. It started with a piece of land in Eastern Ontario and a decision to stop managing it and start listening to it. To rewild it slowly. Intentionally. Without rushing the process.
It became a place where the frogs return every spring, where the mallards use the pond exactly as it was designed, where the owl appeared in the shape of a pond we just asked to hold water, and where the fields we stopped cutting are alive with milkweed and wildflowers that are starting to return, and with community support and the RVCA, will grow richer with native species every season.
We're not a resort. We're not a retreat centre in the conventional sense. We are a gathering place for people who are also asking: What if we tried a different way?
The front wildlife pond, called the OWL, was built with Ducks Unlimited, ALUS, and the RVCA to remove invasive species and support native waterfowl. It was also designed to catch rainwater runoff from the roof, keeping water resources on the land and ensuring the whole ecosystem has access. It dries in the summer by design. That's when it's resting. In the spring, when the babies come, the water is there.
The OWL Pond (Front Property)
Although we'd heard many suggestions that the fields should be cut, we chose to leave them. Milkweed and wildflowers are starting to return. The seed heads feed winter birds. The tall grass shelters mice and snakes. The sky above has more birds of prey than we've ever counted. The regeneration of the fields with native species is ongoing and it is something we are inviting the community to be part of. Visit our 'Living Plan' page to learn how to get involved.
Fields + Wildflowers
Before: an overgrown drainage ditch dug by a previous owner to take water off the land for crops. After: a thriving habitat for native species, migratory birds, and wildflowers that grow a little further each year. Rewilded with help from the RVCA.
The Back Pond
The Land—Regeneration
Regeneration is slow and messy looking. Every year, something new appears: a wildflower we didn't plant, a bird we've never seen, a bee working a native species that wasn't here five years ago. We stopped trying to make the land pretty and started trying to make it whole.
What We Believe
On Connection
All living beings share this space. The snakes under the rocks, the ducks in the pond, the bees in the native flower gardens, the people who gather here. No one is more important. We belong to each other.
On The Land
We are intentionally building at a pace the land can support. Slow is not lazy. Unhurried is not unproductive. We are choosing a different rhythm on purpose and we believe that rhythm is healing.
On Community
We create with people, not just for them. Community is not a product. It is a practice. We have chosen to prioritize face-to-face, grassroots connection because we understand the cost of systems that trade human contact for convenience.
On Slowness
We are not using this land to capitalize on it. We are in relationship with it. Every decision we make — where to place a path, whether to cut a field, how to shape a pond — starts with the same question: what does the land need? What do the beings who share it need?
Our Partners—With Gratitude
The regeneration work at One Song Collective has been supported by Ducks Unlimited Canada, the Rideau Valley Conservation Authority (RVCA), and ALUS Canada. We are grateful to work alongside organizations who share our commitment to restoring land for the beings who depend on it.