Tara Chandra (Putney) Davis, 45, of Albany, Oregon, was born February 8th, 1978, when the sun was in Aquarius, and passed away on August 23, 2023, as the sun moved into Virgo. Tara was born to Durene and Bert Putney in Medford, Oregon. She spent her childhood on the banks of the Rogue and Deschutes Rivers and hiking the forests of Southern Oregon. On a challenge from a high school teacher, Tara spent several winter nights in a small cabin on the upper Rogue, which she often referred to as her “Thoreau” experience. As an adult, she often returned to a solitary lifestyle, where she journaled in silence and busied her mind by solving the world’s issues. She attended St. Mary’s High School, Medford, Oregon, where she studied multiple religions and spiritual belief systems, which made her a formidable opponent in any philosophical conversation. Her developing “world view” only reinforced her Aquarian appreciation and compassion for other viewpoints. She attended Santa Clara University, California, earning the degree of Environmental Science, Individual Studies, a degree she largely developed to suit her particular interests, and was one of the first to earn that specific degree. While attending Santa Clara, her love for travel and culture blossomed. Tara participated in an exchange to Durham University in the UK. While in the UK, on a whim during a school break, she and a close friend traveled around Spain, Italy and Morocco with little money and fewer plans. Despite the culture shock, exhaustion, inability to communicate, and generally uncomfortable conditions, Tara truly fell in love with travel. After a few summers as a seasonal employee, Tara enrolled in a Masters of Science (MS) in Water Resources Management emphasizing watershed health at the University of New Mexico. While earning her Masters, she spent a significant portion of her time in San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato, Mexico, researching community participation in watershed management as a key element to sustainable development. In San Miguel and nearby Guanajuato, she developed many deep friendships and connections. Some of her most recent endeavors were to return to those connections, developing an extensive transboundary youth education program between elementary schools in the Willamette Valley and the Laja Watersheds, utilizing the flyways of migratory birds. Tara’s passion for the water, rivers, plants and animals of the natural world, and her commitment to understand and restore landscapes, became central to her identity. As a young environmentalist, she battled life-threatening poison oak to complete a fish count in the small tributaries of the Rogue River. Later, she fought to restore damaged and degraded waterways for the species that occupied them. During her career, water and watersheds became the pivot point of habitat restoration to addressing the urgency of water availability and climate change, especially in the challenging environments of central Mexico. Her recent efforts focused on community development of demonstration rainwater catchment systems and school “greening” projects as a conduit for climate change education and knowledge transfer to overcome the threats of increasing water scarcity. Thoreau, an inspiration since her teenage years, wrote “The boundaries of the actual are no more fixed and rigid than the elasticity of our imaginations.” Tara took to heart the philosophy that she could “build castles in the air,” and with her community “put foundations under them.” Though she was often heard saying “yeah, nah” to others (thanks, Tasmania), she never took no for an answer. Freshly minted with her graduate degree, she was hired as Coordinator of the Calapooia Watershed Council in Oregon and soon became their Executive Director to lead the organization for over a decade. With her at the helm, the team went on to remove 4 dams, restoring the salmon run to the headwaters of the Calapooia River. After there was “nothing left to do” she moved on to develop a “Twinning Partnership” between the Willamette River and the Laja River Basins with the International River Foundation based in Brisbane, Australia. She had big ideas and strived to accomplish much in her career, often “grading” her progress along the way. She dreamed of doing international river work. Early on, during a job interview, a committee member asked Tara “where do you see yourself in 10 years?” Without hesitation, Tara replied “I’ll be doing international river restoration on a global scale, similar to this job, but much bigger.” The committee member chuckled and replied “that’s what we all want to do, good luck with that.” Well, Tara did do that. Tara’s career spanned decades, pushing boundaries across borders. From her start in the Calapooia watershed, to the Willamette-Laja Twinning Project connecting Oregon and Mexico, to new networks spanning the globe, she often gave herself a “95%,” but we’d give her an “A+.” Her web was vast, but her heart was close to home. She had her eyes on her husband, Kent, as a life partner from the moment they met in 2007, although he didn’t know much about that for a while. As a couple, they worked hard and loved harder. Tara and Kent married in 2009 on the banks of the Metolius River (of course) and honeymooned in Portugal. Side-by-side they remodeled several homes, supported each other’s professional development, traveled the world, raised kids, gardened, camped, learned, explored and dreamed big and small for nearly 14 years. She wanted a family and children with all of her being. She was intentional about everything. She wanted to have Carmen and Nico at home, and she did. She wanted to spend as much of her time with them as possible when they were young, and she did. She valued emotional closeness and physical attachment with her children. She taught them everything she knew about the earth, the (many) animals around them and in their home, and about rivers all over the world. She created adventures, crafted rituals, and made new traditions, often adopting from others, for the whole family. They traveled together and they created a home together, sometimes in Oregon, sometimes elsewhere. She convinced Kent to move the family to Tasmania, Australia, so that the kids “could live outside the bubble of America.” The beaches and forests of Tasmania provided a living lab where the family thrived. Her friends and community were never far from her mind, and only a phone call away. If you needed perspective on life, or a vision for your future, she was down to philosophize with you. (She had a minor in Philosophy, by the way.) Dance around the fire, drink some wine, have a hot bath or dip in the hot springs. Spontaneity with a purpose was the name of the game when you hung around Tara. You may not understand the plan she had, but there was always a vision and a destination. Tara spent a lot of time in her head, imagining ways to make her own path too, and following her intuition — an intuition that often led her in directions that few could follow. There was nothing pedestrian about her. She had a style all her own. She communicated through music and lyrics. She loved to put on costumes and perform for her audience. She believed everyone’s voice had value in the stakeholder processes that she developed over the course of her career. She worked to empower the marginalized and underrepresented to step into their own natural resources leadership roles — to find and manifest solutions in and for their own communities. Before her sudden death, Tara struggled. Some knew the depths of her pain and her challenges with the disease of alcoholism, and felt the wake of it all. She did not survive a tragic fall on her property, but her courage lives on in all of us. In Carmen and Nico. In her family and friends. In her truly amazing body of work. Tara’s family and friends invite you to, as the Aussie’s say, “stay chatty.” Reach out when you are struggling; don’t shy away from that hard conversation with a loved one who is struggling. And as Tara would have wanted, keep dreaming big dreams, work hard, and always adventure. Tara was predeceased by her sister Mia Campbell. She is survived by her mother Durene Putney, her father Bert Putney, stepmother Toni Putney, brother Derek Putney, husband Kent Davis and children Carmen June Vivyana Davis and Niccolo Victor Jason Davis, stepson Asa Dixon Lester Davis, along with several aunts, uncles, cousins, and adopted family. Tara’s generosity and desire to make an impact was exemplified in the end by her gift of life through organ donation. She donated two kidneys; one to a man in his forties, and one to a father in his fifties. A Celebration of Life will be held at Bryant Park in Albany, Oregon on September 29, 2023, at 4pm. A GoFundMe has been set up to help support Kent and the children during this difficult transition.