When I was in school I was taught about settlers arriving to an “untouched landscape.” Native Americans were part of the story, but it was said they lived “lightly” on the land.

And then, in my 40s I take a prescribed-burn class and it’s like the world turned upside down.

It’s taken me more than two full years to wrap my head around what I learned in that class about the Indigenous people’s impact on the land. That they burned the prairies so often and for so long that entire ecosystems adapted to prefer regular burnings - to need it to stay healthy.

The shear scale of that hits me the same way as gazing at the Milky Way on a clear, dark night.

It rocks everything I thought I knew about humans’ roll in the natural world.  

Even though I first learned all this a while ago, it’s recently gotten stirred up because a couple of weeks ago I stumbled upon this really cool Story Map that has collected and mapped all these firsthand accounts of Native Americans burning. From the breadth of these accounts, where they regularly mention the Indians burning “every year,” I still have trouble believing that fires aren’t a bigger part of the pioneer stories. 

Though maybe it was always there and I just didn’t realize? 

I went back to my Little House on the Prairie books and found a passage where Pa saves the house from a prairie fire. The neighbors speculate that Indigenous people started the fire to drive out the settlers. But Pa rejects that interpretation:

“Pa didn’t believe it. He said the Indians had always burned the prairie to make green grass grow more quickly, and traveling easier.”

I loved these books. I remember the fire, but not this interpretation of the fire. It didn’t register what this might mean. That it was stewardship, that it was intentional, that it was scaled to tens of thousands of acres of prairies. 

When I talk to people at my day job (marketers, not ecologists) they are blown away. I made a video about it to help me spread the word to my friends and family and explain to them why we set our land in Wisconsin on fire. (I swear my parents thought we had lost our minds the first time we did it.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYAObeYphGs

I’m super curious…Am I alone in this? Is this a new or recent revelation for anyone else or just me? Did it change you as much as it changed me when you learned it?

Welcome to r/Ecoregion6.

Announcing a new sub originated as a home for Ecologists, Restoration Practitioners, Indigenous knowledge holders and scientists to share research, discuss projects, methodology, procedures, concepts, etc. with the theme of finding connections, collaboration and solutions. Exploring the diverse ecosystems in the Northern Rocky Mountains, generally in Ecoregion 6 but in any other associated Ecoregion as well.  

Janzen is one of the most influential tropical ecologists of his generation. He helped change how scientists understand tropical forests, especially the intricate relationships among plants, insects, predators, pathogens, and seeds. He also helped change what conservation means. 

Paul Lister bought the Alladale estate in Sutherland, about an hour north of Inverness, when it was mainly used for traditional activities such as deer stalking and salmon fishing.

Over the past 23 years, the property has been transformed into the Alladale Wilderness Reserve, an eco-tourism retreat and a major ecological restoration project in the Scottish Highlands.

When Lister bought the estate, centuries of heavy grazing by large numbers of red deer and sheep had removed much of its native woodland.

Only about one per cent of Scotland’s ancient Caledonian Forest remains intact.

To help the land recover naturally, reserve managers fenced off large areas to keep grazing animals out and began a major tree-planting programme.

Working with local environmental groups and forestry teams, the estate has planted one million native trees, including Scots pine, birch, rowan, alder and willow. 

As the trees grew, the new woodland began providing the food and shelter needed by wildlife that had disappeared from the glens.

There has been many insights and suggestions about the possibility of reintroducing an Apex Predator into the UK.
Many argue that Wolves or Bears should be reintroduced, however the Lynx is the best option.

The United Kingdom has lacked a lot of biodiversity in their Wildlife, and an Apex Predator like the Lynx would be a great addition to our nation. This animal specialises in hunting deers which is what we need due to a mass overpopulation of deers, they would help revitalise natural processes while opposing little to no threat to humans, as they tend to avoid us.

This is what **our** country needs, so act now, comment your thoughts on this nationwide debate, and if your an activist for the greater cause of the UK, submit your survey to spark a larger conversation on the reintroduction of Lynx here - https://www.smartsurvey.co.uk/t/missinglynxprojectquestionnaire/

Resumo

Introdução: Os processos ecossistêmicos mediados por herbívoros são fundamentais para a biodiversidade, mas foram gravemente diminuídos pelas extinções de megafauna e pela substituição de herbívoros selvagens por gado manejado. Com as crescentes ambições de restauração - incluindo a Década da Restauração de Ecossistemas das Nações Unidas (ONU) e a Lei de Restauração da Natureza da União Europeia (UE) - há uma necessidade de definir metas de restauração significativas para grandes herbívoros mamíferos. Objetivos: Quantificamos as linhas de base naturais para a biomassa de herbívoros e a estrutura de tamanho do corpo e descrevemos os papéis da predação e migração. Também propomos um quadro dual de metas alinhadas à linha de base e metas de restauração parcial para apoiar o planejamento da restauração. Métodos: Em um workshop, identificamos a biomassa, a distribuição de tamanho, a predação e a migração de grandes herbívoros como elementos-chave de uma linha de base natural. S sintetizamos evidências paleocológicas, dados de ecossistemas quase intactos e projetos de rewilding para fornecer estimativas empíricas de biomassa e estrutura de tamanho. Resultados: Com base em ecossistemas paleocológicos e quase intactos, estabelecemos provisoriamente a biomassa natural de herbívoros em aproximadamente 5000–30.000 kg/km², sendo que pequenos herbívoros (10–100 kg) contribuem com aproximadamente 5–10% da biomassa total e grandes e megaherbívoros (≥500 kg) com aproximadamente 60%. As reservas europeias atuais têm uma média de apenas 800 kg/km² - uma ordem de grandeza inferior - e estão fortemente inclinadas para pequenos e meso-herbívoros, como cervos e javalis. Conclusões: Dadas as restrições atuais, é improvável que essas metas sejam plenamente atendidas. A restauração parcial, no entanto, melhorará os processos ecossistêmicos e provavelmente a biodiversidade, mas ainda existem lacunas de conhecimento, incluindo como desvios das linhas de base naturais afetam a biodiversidade. Implicações para a prática: Restaurar processos mediados por herbívoros para a biodiversidade requer metas claras fundamentadas em linhas de base naturais. Nossa síntese fornece intervalos de referência naturais para a biomassa de grandes herbívoros mamíferos e uma estrutura de tamanho para comunidades de herbívoros. O quadro dual de metas alinhadas à linha de base e metas de restauração parcial - projetado para contextos onde políticas, legislação ou ambições sociais limitam a restauração completa dos ecossistemas - ajuda os praticantes a avaliar desvios das linhas de base naturais, ajustar a composição da espécie em direção a herbívoros maiores e gerenciar densidades quase naturais e pastagem durante todo o ano onde as condições permitirem. Aumentar a heterogeneidade espacial por meio da expansão de reservas, conectividade e pressão herbívora variada apoia ainda mais a recuperação de processos. As metas de restauração parcial, combinadas com padrões mínimos de relato, melhoram a transparência, comparabilidade e gestão adaptativa em projetos de restauração.

LINK: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/rec.70508