Getting back to fire sum\xe9\u015d: exploring a multi-disciplinary approach to incorporating traditional knowledge into fuels treatments

Monique D Wynecoop,Eva K Strand,Penelope Morgan,Fernando Sanchez Trigueros

doi:10.1186/s42408-019-0030-3

Monique D Wynecoop, Eva K Strand + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1186/s42408-019-0030-3

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Abstract

BackgroundEvaluating fuel treatment effectiveness is challenging when managing a landscape for diverse ecological, social, and economic values. We used a Participatory Geographic Information System (PGIS) to understand Confederated Colville Tribal (CCT) member views regarding the location and effectiveness of fuel treatments within their ancestral territory within the Colville National Forest (CNF) boundary. The 2015 North Star Fire burned 88 221 ha (218 000 acres) of the CCT ancestral territory.ResultsWe sampled thirty plot pairs that were treated or untreated prior to being burned by the North Star Fire and again one growing season post fire. Species diversity was significantly increased by wildfire in both treated and untreated plots. Species richness was significantly increased in the plots that were treated, and there was no significant change in species richness from wildfire within the untreated plots. The percent canopy cover of two of the six culturally important plants (Fragaria spp. L. and Arnica cordifolia Hook.) significantly increased one growing season post wildfire within treated plots and one (Arctostaphylos uva-ursi [L.] Spreng.) significantly decreased in the treated plots post wildfire. These post-fire monitoring results were consistent with CCT member management recommendations and desired outcomes of understory thinning, prescribed fire, and natural ignition found using PGIS.ConclusionsTogether, the results suggest that prior thinning and prescribed burning can foster vegetation response to subsequent wildfires, including culturally important plants. Further, integrating Traditional Knowledge (TK) into fuels treatments can improve ongoing adaptive management of national forests that include tribal ancestral lands.

Highlights

The Confederated Colville Tribes (CCT), Spokane Tribe, and Kalispel Tribe all have ancestral lands surrounding and within the Colville National Forest (CNF) boundary
Our objectives were to: 1) investigate how prior fuel treatments influenced understory vegetation response to the North Star Fire—we focused both on overall species diversity and the abundance of six individual culturally important plants; 2) determine how tribal participants perceived the effects of fuel treatments on cultural practices such as hunting, fishing, and gathering; and 3) evaluate where tribal participants felt that CNF fuel treatments should be done or be avoided based upon their expected influence on tribal cultural values
Roem), there was no significant difference in abundance between T and treated and burned (TB)

Summary

Introduction

The Confederated Colville Tribes (CCT), Spokane Tribe, and Kalispel Tribe all have ancestral lands surrounding and within the Colville National Forest (CNF) boundary. These tribes have used TK to manage their traditional hunting, gathering, and prayer sites with locally adapted fuels reduction and fire ecology techniques Such techniques have perpetuated the use of those locations and increased the resilience and resistance of those areas to large fire events. We used a Participatory Geographic Information System (PGIS) to understand Confederated Colville Tribal (CCT) member views regarding the location and effectiveness of fuel treatments within their ancestral territory within the Colville National Forest (CNF) boundary. The 2015 North Star Fire burned 88 221 ha (218 000 acres) of the CCT ancestral territory

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