Progress 04/15/18 to 04/14/23
Outputs
Target Audience:The primary audience of this project were land managers, decision makers, community members and youth of the Karuk Tribe in northern California. Decision support tools co-created by and for our Karuk tribal partners are designed to improve agroecosystem productivity of cultural foods and fibers for the benefit of Karuk tribal members. Tribal youth and land use managers participated in a series of hands-on experiential learning workshops and mentorship improving long term capacity to measure and monitor for cultural food and fiber resilience in the Klamath. Lessons learned from our research results and decision support tools were regularly shared with other audiences including tribes and land management decision makers at the federal, state, local, tribal government, community and household levels working to restore cultural foodways and enhance human ecosystem health. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Training Year 1: Field-based training activities included one-on-one and small group mentoring on cultural foods, prescribed fire and 360 digital imaging from USFS partnerand experienced Karuk Cultural Practitioners. Year 1: UC IGIS (Informatics and GIS Program) trainers provided 4 technical support consultations to UCB post-docs and KDNR technicians on immersive visualization, remote sensing and geospatial data management and analysis. Year 1: 1 UC Berkeley undergraduate intern received one-on-one training in cultural plant ID, aggregating photos from the online databases, collaborative and cross-cultural work, and voucher specimen collection, mounting, and preservation. Year 2: 1 undergraduate intern gained skills in archival research, literature review, and using historical documents. Year 2: We supervised and trained 1 Karuk intern and 4 undergraduate interns, developing their skills in reconstruction of historical land and water use and long-term change detection methods. Year 2: We mentored and trained 2 undergraduate interns in voucher specimen label making and mounting Years 2-4: KDNR staff and supporting researchers have increased their skills and capacity to carry out agroecosystem condition assessments using Survey 123 to collect digital data and in using Avenza Systems to more accurately map territory. Year 3: We mentored and trained 2 undergraduate student interns in fall 2020. The students worked on coding qualitative data (learning how to code and use NVivo) and completed the literature review of focal plant species (improving their design & synthesis skills and promoting their proficiency in cultural knowledge). Year 3: We provided training to 1 new Karuk Tribal staff member on use of all field survey tools and methods. Year 4: Training KDNR summer 2021 interns on the use of a key field research tool (Citizen Science Tool) that they can continue to use and contribute toward after their internship Years 1-5: The UCANR IGIS program provided recurrent or periodic, depending on need, tutoring and mentoring to KDNR staff (from 1-10 persons) in R language, data server set up, ARC Enterprise, 360 imagery, Survey 123, and the use of drones. Years 1-5: UCB provided Karuk Tribe staff mentorship and support with grant writing to secure continuing funds for ongoing tribal-led research and monitoring in established ACA plots and patches. Years 1-5: Mentorship of two (now-former) UCB post-docs by PI Jennifer Sowerwine has included grant proposal development and drafting, logic model development, guidance on research and writing for peer-review publications, training on drafting policy briefs, guidance on research design and analysis, job search and career development strategies, and reviewing articles and reports. Professional development: Year 1: Workshops organized through the project and attended by all project members included Introduction to Story Maps, Immersive Visualization with 360 Photography, and Introduction to Remote Visualization and Mapping using drones. Year 1: One postdoc attended the four-day Drones for Biologists workshop, a comprehensive drone mapping short course led by UC IGIS trainers. Staff of KDNR's Wildlife Division were introduced to drones as applied to wildlife biology, and have now purchased a drone for their research on elk. Year 1: Project team organized a two-day Advanced Herbarium Skills workshop at UC Berkeley's University and Jepson Herbaria in preparation for augmenting the Karuk tribal herbarium collection of culturally significant and native plants. Workshop participants developed new skills in gathering, mounting, and preserving bulky or oversized plants, fungi, lichens, mosses, and algae or seaweed, and learned how to search for data in the Consortium of California Herbaria. All workshop participants have increased knowledge of voucher specimen collection for each of the plant types discussed, the California Consortium of Herbaria and online portals, and efficient label making for voucher specimens. Years 2-4 Staff of KDNR's Wildlife and GIS divisions were trained by UC IGIS professionals in R, ArcGIS, and other web and data based technologies. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? Local children & youth: Secret Plant Scavenger Hunt/Nature Journaling lesson with Junction Elementary School lower grades. Implemented Secret Plant Scavenger Hunt with 12 youth, grades K-4th and with 6 youth, grades 5th-8th (both Feb 2020) "Investigating Biological Resilience in Mushrooms, Mosses, and Ferns," Orleans Elementary School, 3-6 Grade Classes with 17 children (March 2020) UC ANR trainings offered on story mapping to 15 Junction Elementary School students and the 8th grade class (8 students) of Orleans Elementary School (both in May 2019) Yew Field Trip with Cultural Practitioner, Phil Albers JR. with 8 Orleans Elementary School 6th graders to learn about Karuk cultural plant species, Pacific Yew, at research plot (March 2020) KDNR staff & Karuk Cultural Practitioners (beyond those on the project) Workshop session on processing, hosting, serving and data management of 360 images (Nov 2019) for 10 KDNR staff and project partners. UCIGIS trainings offered on ARC Enterprise to KDNR GIS staff and Data Steward (May & Nov 2019) UCIGIS trainings on Survey 123 offered to KDNR staff (May & November 2019) UCIGIS training on drone technology, regulation, flight planning and image processing workshop for 7 KDNR staff (May 2019) followed by drone flyover testing (November 2019) In Year 3, Karuk Department of Natural Resources staff and cultural practitioners provided input on the second version of the Climate Citizen Science Tool, which not only improved the tool for further use and broader application in the community (planned Year 4 rollout), but also heightened the individuals' awareness, appreciation for and communication about this tool 4-day virtual and on-site workshop series provided opportunity for feedback to improve the ACA Mobile Field tool and identify key indicators of resilience and also ensured shared learning across different specialists (i.e. children's educators, researchers, Cultural Practitioners, leadership, etc.) (May 2021) In Year 4, soliciting and incorporating staff and practitioner input on second version of Citizen Science Tool which helped to not only improve the tool for further use and broader application in the community but also heightened the individuals' awareness and appreciation for this tool In Year 4, demoing the Data Display Portal to KDNR senior/executive staff heightened individuals' awareness and appreciation for this long-term-use resource Local community writ large & invested collaborators and champions In Year 4, Dean Ackerly of UC Berkeley's Rausser College of Natural Resources attended the on-site workshop series in May 2021 which heightened his awareness of this ongoing partnership between UC Berkeley and the Karuk Tribe and strengthened his and his office's support of current and future endeavors under the Karuk-UCB Collaborative Years 1-5, quarterly email newsletters sharing updates on research progress, outcomes, and publications as well as advertising related partner and local community events and opportunities to engage which reach over 380 subscribers. Years 1-5, Karuk-UCB Collaborative website (https://nature.berkeley.edu/karuk-collaborative/) is updated regularly with project updates, newsletter archives and current relevant natural resource events for the Karuk community and supporters Years 4-5 presentations shared results back to tribal communities (WKRP & ITCC) and several academic conferences Year 5, UC ANR Press Release and Blog shared out project results which were picked up in regional media including one radio interview. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?
Nothing Reported
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Over the course of five years, the Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience and Cultural Foods and Fibers RevitalizationInitiative laid the foundation to promote and enhance the resilience of cultural agroecosystems under variable climatic conditions within the Karuk Aboriginal Territory in the Klamath River Basin. Through integrated research and extension, we a) co-created innovative tools integrating Indigenous and Western science and assessed the condition of cultural agroecosystems and component cultural foods and fibers gaining a deeper understanding of how land use, land management, and climate variables have resulted in agroecosystem resilience or vulnerabilities, b) developed innovative decision making tools through community-based planning processes that have improved land management decision-making at the federal, state, tribal and community levels, and c) built capacity of the Karuk Tribe through workshops and mentorship in research, analysis, mapping and visualization techniques for ongoing assessment, monitoring and management for abundant cultural food and fiber resources and overall agroecosystem resilience beyond the grant.Our approach, tools and systems we co-created, integrating Indigenous and western science methodologies, to understand and take action to enhance resilience of cultural agroecosystems, can serve as a model for other tribes and partners working toward similar goals. Notable impacts have occurred at the individual, community, school, Tribal, general public, policy maker, and ancestral land base itself. Overall we believe this project has strengthened the Karuk Tribe's capacity for long term climate monitoring of their cultural resources as well as improved land use decision making based on the research tools, protocols, databases and server we co-created and secured with this grant. This project has increased awareness of climate impacts on cultural foods and fibers and inspired a new generation of tribal youth to engage in cultural resource monitoring and management. The Karuk Tribe is already a state-wide and national leader in pursuing climate adaption and this project has strengthened their ability to engage both in national conversations as well as place-based decision making processes to enhance resilience of their ancestral territories to climate change. We believe our approach, methods, tools, protocols and outcomes that integrate Indigenous and western science perspectives can serve as a model for other academic-agency-tribal partnerships striving to work together to address some of the most challenging land management and climate change crises of our times by identifying shared values and working together for solutions. Key impacts by objective: Obj.1: Co-created innovative mixed-methods approaches, tools and protocols integrating Indigenous and Western Sciencestrengthening Karuk Tribe's capacity to assess and manage cultural resources under changing climate conditions and set a gold-standard for how agencies and academics can partner with tribes to accomplish shared climate resilience goals. Data sets generated contribute to forest management prescriptions for the regional Western Klamath Restoration Partnership (WKRP) as well as Prescribed Fire Training Exchange (TREX) burning strategies and locations Outcomes fill a knowledge gap for Northern California-specific forests (esp. with regards to USFS practices/knowledge sets/climate impacts on cultural use species) Obj. 2: Increased knowledge of historical cultural plant distribution and baseline data set for ongoing analysis. Increased knowledge and awareness among Karuk Tribal technicians about the value of using historical botanical specimens for long term studies on climate impacts on distribution of cultural use species. Establishment ofa new Plants Program at the Karuk Tribe, building off the successes of this project, with the goal of engaging in ongoing research, monitoring, management and restoration of cultural use species and the habitats in which they grow. Increased capacity of Karuk Tribe's herbarium to advance global knowledge and understanding of climate impacts on cultural use species. Obj.3: Increased knowledge about settler colonialland use and management (eg.fire suppression and logging) and climate change on the distribution, phenology, productivity and resilience of cultural use species. Change in knowledge, action and condition in that KDNR now has baseline data of the condition of cultural use plants and the habitats in which they grow, that can be used for long term monitoring and management, and hasinfrastructure in place with their newsecure Enterprise server, Survey 123 forms, and several key research protocols. Innovative insights into finer-scale vegetative changes informhow climate science can be downscaled to be impactful/meaningful to localized geographies & communities. Elevates Indigenous knowledge and science en par with USFS with a robust knowledge set & practices (see White House directive on Indigenous Knowledge, which cites our work) New evidence-based models for integrating Indigenous and western science knowledges and approaches to assessing, monitoring and managing forested landscapes for cultural agroecological resilience. Obj.4: Increased knowledge and skills among KDNR staff, Cultural Practitioners, youth, and other community members in plant identification, collection and mounting and curation. One of the first Tribal herbaria in the nation, the Karuk Tribe's collections are a national treasure, with opportunities for ongoing education and research on cultural use species and their distribution. Obj. 5: Increased tribal data sovereignty through the co-creation and establishment of tools, protocols, databases and a tribally owned server that will benefit every project at KDNR into the future as well as increase capacity for long term monitoring and management of cultural resources for resilience. The Data Display Portal strengthens Karuk Tribe's internal capacity to aggregate and interpret multiple GIS layers of contemporary and historic fire and climate data together with tribal wildlife, cultural foods and archaeological spatial data to support integrated land use decision making. Changes in knowledge and enhanced capacity among Tribal staff and cultural practitioners for specific tools/techniques, inc. Enterprise geodatabase, ArcGIS, story mapping, plant identification, species distribution analysis, collecting and preparing specimens for herbaria, ecological field techniques (e.g., plant transects), and practical field skills (e.g., using compass). Obj. 6: Increased knowledge, skills and confidence among tribal and community youth excited about cultural management practices and monitoring climate change efforts and capacity to tell their story using StoryMaps. Change in action and condition where local educators are using and leveraging the climate change and cultural resource management curricula developed under this project, with ongoing learning opportunities from Tribal scientists. Increased intergenerational knowledge exchange, skills and action among cultural practitioners and youth to integrate climate change observations and monitoring in their stewardship of cultural foods, fibers and medicines. Obj. 7: Through public and academic presentations, as well as a public press release, and radio interview, there is increased visibility and acknowledgement by the general public and policy makers of Indigenous knowledge and cultural practitioners as critical climate science knowledge bearers and essential advisors for land management. Cultural practitioners, Tribal staff and families have reconnected with and are now actively monitoring and caring for cultural use species in over 30 plots and patches for climate resilience. The Karuk Tribe took action based on the findings of our study to secure additional funding to continue monitoring and implementing management recommendations.
Publications
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2022
Citation:
2022 Mucioki, M., Sowerwine, J., Sarna-Wojcicki, D., McCovey, K., and Bourque, S.D. Understanding the conservation challenges and needs of culturally significant plant species through Indigenous Knowledge and species distribution models. Journal of Nature Conservation, 70. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jnc.2022.126285
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Awaiting Publication
Year Published:
2023
Citation:
Nguyen, C., Wilbur, R., Henderson, A., Sowerwine, J., Mucioki, M., Sarna, D., Ferguson, G., Maudrie, T., Moore-Wilson, H., Wark, K., Jernigan, V.B.B. Framing an Indigenous Food Sovereignty Research Agenda. Health Promotion Practice.
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Awaiting Publication
Year Published:
2023
Citation:
Karuk-Berkeley Collaborative. (accepted) Caring for culturally significant plants in the midst of record setting droughts. Artemisia, California Native Plant Society.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2022
Citation:
Methods and results of Agroecosystem Condition Assessment, Land Use/Land Cover Change Detection, Herbarium Voucher Specimen Collection, Cultural Ecosystem Services publication, 360 camera immersive visualization images and sample tours, Unmanned Aerial Vehicle imagery, Citizen Science Climate Change mobile application and extension activities were presented through the Western Klamath Restoration Partnership coalition of Federal, State Tribal, NGO and community scientists and managers on June 16, 2022.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2022
Citation:
Mucioki, M. Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience Initiative: x�us nu�ethti we are caring for it. National Tribal & Indigenous Climate Conference, St. Paul, Minnesota & virtual, August 2022.
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Awaiting Publication
Year Published:
2023
Citation:
Sowerwine, J., Mucioki, M., Sarna, D., McCovey, K., Morehead-Hillman, L., Hillman, L., Lake, F., Preston, V., and Bourque, S. Enhancing Indigenous Food Sovereignty and Community Health through the Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience Initiative: We are caring for it: x�us nu'�ethti. Health Promotion Practice.
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2021
Citation:
Mucioki, M., Sowerwine, J., Sarna-Wojcicki, D., Lake, F.K., and Bourque, S. Conceptualizing Indigenous Cultural Ecosystem Services (ICES) and benefits under changing climate conditions in the Klamath River Basin and their implications for land management and governance. Journal of Ethnobiology, 41(3): 313-330. 10.2993/0278-0771-41.3.313
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2023
Citation:
Karuk Tribe UC Berkeley Collaborative. Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience and Cultural Foods and Fibers Revitalization Initiative: x�us nu�ethti we are caring for it. Karuk Aboriginal Territory. Karuk Tribe UC Berkeley Collaborative. Berkeley, CA: University of California at Berkeley, and Orleans, CA: Karuk Department of Natural Resources. https://nature.berkeley.edu/karuk-collaborative/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Karuk-Resilience-Report_Smallest-file-size.pdf
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2023
Citation:
Mucioki, M. Exploring the conservation challenges and needs of culturally significant plant species through climate change and multiple ways of knowing. UC Berkeley Herbaria. Botany Lunch Talk (March 10).
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2022
Citation:
Findings from the Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience and Cultural Foods and Fibers Revitalization Initiative: X�us Nu'�ethti We Are Caring For It. National Tribal & Indigenous Climate Conference (Aug. 29-Sept. 1). Virtual.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2022
Citation:
Findings from the Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience and Cultural Foods and Fibers Revitalization Initiative: X�us Nu'�ethti We Are Caring For It. The Western Klamath Restoration Partnership Speaker Series (June 29-30). Virtual.
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2022
Citation:
Executive Office of the President of the United States. Guidance for Federal Departments and Agencies on Indigenous Knowledge. https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/OSTP-CEQ-IK-Guidance.pdf
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2022
Citation:
Hoorn, R. Indigenous Knowledge guides the conservation of culturally important plants. Mongabay. https://news.mongabay.com/2022/12/indigenous-knowledge-guides-the-conservation-of-culturally-important-plants/
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2021
Citation:
USFS. Gathering Value from Tribal Forest-Tending Practices. US Forest Service Research and Development News. https://www.fs.usda.gov/inside-fs/mail-call/rd-november-newsletter
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2023
Citation:
Sowerwine, Jennifer and Bourque, Shay. 2023. Indigenous Science Key to Adapting to Climate Change, UC ANR Food Blog.
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2023
Citation:
Interview with Lauren Schmidt to discuss Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience Report.
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Submitted
Year Published:
2023
Citation:
Eitzel, M., Sarna-Wojcicki, D., Hogan, S., Sowerwine, J., Mucioki, M., McCovey, K., Bourque, S., Morehead-Hillman, L., Hillman, L., Lake, F., Preston, V., Hillman, C., Lyons, A., Tripp, B. Using mixed-method analytical historical ecology to map land use/land cover change for ecocultural restoration in the Klamath River Basin (Northern California). Journal of Ecological Informatics. Manuscript submitted for publication.
|
Progress 04/15/21 to 04/14/22
Outputs
Target Audience:The primary audience of this project are land managers, decision makers, community members and youth of the Karuk Tribe in northern California. Decision support tools co-created by and for our Karuk tribal partners are designed to improve agroecosystem productivity of cultural foods and fibers for the benefit of Karuk tribal members. Tribal youth and land use managers have participated in a series of hands-on experiential learning workshops and mentorship improving long term capacity to measure and monitor for cultural food and fiber resilience in the Klamath. Lessons learned from our research results and decision support tools are regularly shared with other audiences including tribes and land management decision makers at the federal, state, local, tribal government, community and household levels working to restore cultural foodways and enhance human ecosystem health. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? KDNR teammates trained 4 KDNR interns, 3 KDNR employees, and 5 traditional basketweavers to use the Citizen Science tool, increasing their ability to participate in collaboratively-sourced data collection for their community and region. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?KDNR staff & Karuk Cultural Practitioners (beyond those on the project) 4-day virtual and on-site workshop series in May 2021 provided opportunity for feedback to improve the ACA Mobile Field tool and identify key indicators of resilience and also ensured shared learning across different specialists (i.e. children's educators, researchers, Cultural Practitioners, leadership, etc.) Soliciting and incorporating staff and practitioner input on second version of Citizen Science Tool which helped to not only improve the tool for further use and broader application in the community but also heightened the individuals' awareness and appreciation for this tool Training KDNR summer 2021 interns on the use of a key field research tool (Citizen Science Tool) that they can continue to use and contribute toward after their internship Demoing the Data Display Portal to KDNR senior/executive staff heightened individuals' awareness and appreciation for this long-term-use resource Local community writ large & invested collaborators and champions Dean Ackerly of UC Berkeley's Rausser College of Natural Resources attended the on-site workshop series in May 2021 which heightened his awareness of this ongoing partnership between UC Berkeley and the Karuk Tribe and strengthened his and his office's support of current and future endeavors under the Karuk-UCB Collaborative Quarterly email newsletters sharing updates on research progress, outcomes, and publications as well as advertising related partner and local community events and opportunities to engage which reach over 380 subscribers. Karuk-UCB Collaborative website (https://nature.berkeley.edu/karuk-collaborative/) is updated regularly with project updates, newsletter archives and current relevant natural resource events for the Karuk community and supporters What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?During the final reporting period, we plan to finish all Objectives and report on their individual and collective impact. All of our field work is completed, including social science research, and so we will focus on finishing the analysis and writing up the results and learnings. During the write-up, we will continue to have KDNR staff and Cultural Practitioner input. After write-up's are complete, our plan is to focus on communications and disseminations of all major project deliverables, from the Resilience Report to the various data display and collection tools. Communications and disseminations for completed deliverables, as well as the completion of the Data Display Portal, was delayed last year due to the ongoing pandemic
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Over the past year, we focused on (a) refining the innovative tools our team lead designed to enhance resilience of Karuk cultural food and fiber species to changing climate and unprecedented natural disasters and on collating and (b) interpreting the data and learnings of the past three years into an internal Resilience Report for the Karuk Department of Natural Resources (KDNR) and a public-facing Resilience Report for the broader community and stakeholders. Both versions of the Resilience Report contribute to a lasting legacy of rich data and recommendations for the Karuk Tribe, regional community members, and invested supporting stakeholders (e.g., US Forest Service) and to inspiration and guidance for like-minded colleagues from University of California Agriculture & Natural Resources staff to those in Indigenous-and-non-Indigenous research partnerships. To the latter end, we have published and continue to publish peer-reviewed publications and popular articles in accessible mediums like Civil Eats. Specifically, in this reporting period, we finished the internal Resilience Report for KDNR, finalized two key research and monitoring tools held by KDNR, transferred all the project's herbaria resources (curriculum, Cultural Plant Guide, and voucher specimens) to the Tribe, and used various means to ensure consistent and respectful outreach with KDNR staff, Cultural Practitioners, and invested community members. We continue to publish the results of our work and currently have an additional article under review and two more in preparation. Objective 1: Being connected to specific places in the landscape through this project has changed the action of those people involved in the project through increased visitation, thought, and discussion of those places and in some cases, family visits to those places. By being present and starting to harvest, access, and observe those places the condition of the cultural resources slowly starts to change for the better ACA survey protocols have been used by Karuk DNR to establish new focal plots and patches in Karuk Territory The long-term technological infrastructure, in the form of digital forms and protocols, established by this project will support sustained use and application of these methods and ultimately provide evidence-based monitoring and management recommendations and actions that will change the condition of the landscape and cultural resources. Publishing both research-based and experiential-based learnings about ACA in the popular online magazine Civil Eats provided our team and the Tribe an opportunity to share a story about the project and team members. This article introduced readers to the perils that Karuk agroecosystems and foods and fibers are experiencing under climate stress and what we are doing to support resilience under stress Objective 2: This Objective was completed during the prior reporting period. Objective 3: The stakeholder-guided indicators of cultural use quality and resilience were developed for 20 cultural use focal species. These indicators were tailored to place-based management/monitoring recommendations for enhancing the resilience of these focal species and supporting habitats to climate-related stressors across all ACA plots and patches in Karuk aboriginal territory. These management and monitoring recommendations will be used by Karuk DNR managers and cultural practitioners to guide site-based management, prescribed fire, fuels treatments, riparian restoration and wildlife habitat enhancement activities at these plots/patches. At least three of these plots have already seen prescribed fire, fuels treatments, invasive species removal and cultural plant stewardship prescriptions implemented. Objective 4: The Karuk Tribe's herbarium is used for education, research, and long-term monitoring. The assemblage of the curriculum, Cultural Plant Guide, and voucher specimens increases the capacity of youth and adults to learn about the plants in the collection. Over the long-term, these resources tell about the distribution, condition, and phenology of cultural important plants in Karuk Ancestral Territory. Objective 5: Team members led on outreach in both revising and communicating out about the ACA Mobile Field tool. This increase in knowledge about culturally appropriate techniques, approaches, methods and supporting technological infrastructure, will allow project team members, KDNR staff, and Cultural Practitioners to apply this same method in future projects or surveys. We revised our Citizen Science Tool, a collaborative, publicly-available monitoring and recording tool, with practitioner input and field testing. The Karuk Resource Advisory Board formally approved the use of the tool in spring 2021. The various training and outreach efforts made by teammates helped insure wider use of the tool of all ages (e.g., KDNR summer interns) and experience levels. The now-vetted Data Display Portal is designed to provide the KDNR Pikyav team and relevant collaborators with access and insights into project-related data. The importance of the data display portal rests on increasing transparency and enabling managers to utilize up to date project related information for planning and monitoring. Objective 6: No specific further accomplishments under this Objective. Objective 7: The internal Resilience Report presents methods, background literature and preliminary results of research and monitoring objectives, climate impacts, monitoring and management recommendations for Karuk food and fiber species to Karuk DNR managers and staff. This report pulled together all background research and literature, field research, interview and focus group data, historical and archival research and aerial image analysis in one place for KDNR managers and staff to inform ongoing Tribal management and research activities. This report will be used by Karuk cultural practitioners and Karuk DNR managers to plan management prescriptions and implement treatments for enhancing the resilience of cultural use food and fiber species to climate change stressors across Karuk Aboriginal Territory. This data will also serve as a baseline for assessing the impacts of management actions and climate change on culturally significant species. In May 2021, the multi-day Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience Workshop provided researchers with an opportunity to get feedback on research results and monitoring/management recommendations and to facilitate connections between Federal and University researchers, Karuk DNR staff and Tribal leadership, cultural practitioners and community members through in situ conversations about how to best steward forest ecosystems to support the long term resilience of Karuk cultural food and fiber species to climate change-related stressors.
Publications
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2021
Citation:
Mucioki, M., Sowerwine, J., Sarna-Wojcicki, D., Lake, F. K., and Bourque, S. 2021 Conceptualizing Indigenous Cultural Ecosystem Services (ICES) and Benefits under Changing Climate Conditions in the Klamath River Basin and Their Implications for Land Management and Governance. Journal of Ethnobiology, 41(3) : 313-330. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2993/0278-0771-41.3.313
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Under Review
Year Published:
2022
Citation:
Submitted paper Understanding the conservation challenges and needs of culturally significant plant species by integrating Indigenous Knowledge and species distribution models (Authors: Megan Mucioki, Jennifer Sowerwine, Daniel Sarna-Wojcicki, Kathy McCovey, Shawn D. Bourque) to The Journal for Nature Conservation
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2021
Citation:
Mucioki, M. 2021. Keeping a Detailed Record of the Changing Climate Could Save This Tribes Foodways. Civil Eats article, October 8, 2021. URL: https://civileats.com/2021/10/08/keeping-a-detailed-record-of-the-changing-climate-could-save-this-tribes-foodways/
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2021
Citation:
Seasonal food security research and outreach newsletter centered on the Klamath Basin, curated by project team
|
Progress 04/15/20 to 04/14/21
Outputs
Target Audience:The primary audience of this project are land managers, decision makers, community members and youth of the Karuk Tribe in northern California. Decision support tools co-created by and for our Karuk tribal partners are designed to improve agroecosystem productivity of cultural foods and fibers for the benefit of Karuk tribal members. Tribal youth and land use managers have participated and will continue to participate in a series of hands-on experiential learning workshops and mentorship improving long term capacity to measure and monitor for cultural food and fiber resilience in the Klamath. Lessons learned from our research results and decision support tools are regularly shared with other audiences including tribes and land management decision makers at the federal, state, local, tribal government, community and household levels working to restore cultural foodways and enhance human ecosystem health. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? Training We mentored and trained 2 undergraduate student interns in fall 2020. The students worked on coding qualitative data (learning how to code and use NVivo) and completed the literature review of focal plant species (improving their design & synthesis skills and promoting their proficiency in cultural knowledge). We provided training to 1 new Karuk Tribal DNRstaff member on use of all fieldsurvey tools and methods Professional development: UC IGIS staff continued their mentoring of KDNR staff, this year focusing on 360 photo Tours and drone 360 photos, building up the transferable and long-term skills of staff to use the tools they chose as most appropriate for KDNR purposes. Post-doctoral researchers strengthened their knowledge and skills in land use-land cover change analysis as well as species distribution models. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? KDNR staff & Karuk Cultural Practitioners (beyond those on the project) Karuk Department of Natural Resources staff and cultural practitioners provided input on the second version of the Climate Citizen Science Tool, which not only improved the tool for further use and broader application in the community (planned Year 4 rollout), but also heightened the individuals' awareness, appreciation for and communication about this tool Broader community and general public Quarterly email newsletters sharing updates on research progress, outcomes, and publications as well as sharing related partner and local community events and opportunities to engage, reach over 380 subscribers. Karuk-UCB Collaborative website (https://nature.berkeley.edu/karuk-collaborative/) is updated regularly with project updates, newsletter archives and current relevant natural resource events for the Karuk community What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?During this upcoming final reporting period, we plan to finish all objectives and report on their individual and collective impact. Our field work is complete as of this reporting period. We will finish analyzing and publishing the results and presenting the findings back to the Karuk community through the Pikyav Field Institute lecture series. We plan to disseminate our methods and findings more broadly through Cooperative Extension to increase CE capacity to engage with Tribal communities around agroecosystem research, stewardship, and education. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, finalizingseveral objectives was delayed including disseminating the roll out of the Climate Citizen Science Tool and completion of the Data Display Portal. Through this no-cost extension year we will finalize all objectives and publications, implement and evaluate the Citizen Science Tool, and engage in communications and disseminations to amplify the value not only of this project, but the possibilities of generating more rigorous science through the integration of Traditional Ecological Knowledge with Western Science.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Over the past year, despite significant challenges in the local community posed by COVID-19 and catastrophic wildfires, our team continued to assess the condition of Karuk agroecosystems, generate data, and develop innovative tools to help the Karuk Tribe enhance the resilience of Karuk cultural food and fiber species under changing climate conditions.Our methods and mobile field tools for conducting agroecosystem resilience assessments have been refined through field testing and have become even more accessible and user friendly. We have generated a robust three-year data set on the health of cultural agroecosystems and component foods and fibers, as well as cutting edge assessment tools that will support long term monitoring for resilience. Our approach and report lays the foundation for other Tribal communities to assess the impact of climate change on their culturally significant foods and fibers and develop management strategies to mitigate the impacts. Our research on past and contemporary distribution of culturally significant food plants improves societal understanding of the threats climate change poses to culturally significant food plants, which are vital to Tribal food security. Aggregated data on historical voucher specimens collected in the Karuk Ancestral territory for each focal species was developed into species distribution models, showing the probability of occurrence based on bioclimatic, cover, disturbance, and cultural use geospatial data. We also completed the long-term land use-land cover change detection objective using archival materials, aerial photos and key informant interviews with cultural practitioners and land owners. These data sets brought together all known historic, contemporary, and future conditions of culturally significant sites that are being managed by the Tribe. We have communicated our methods and preliminary findings with Tribal, State and Federal land management agencies and will continue to build a close relationship between agroecosystem monitoring and management entities and processes. The methods and results of the Agroecosystem Condition Assessment and Land Use/Land Cover Change Assessment will be shared with the Western Klamath Restoration Partnership, a coalition of agencies responsible for conducting fuels treatments and prescribed burns in research sites. Research Objective 1: Researchers and Karuk Tribal members have increased knowledge about the current condition of culturally significant focal species and habitats in three new plots and 10 new patches. The on-going collection of seasonal and harvest data and monitoring of plots and patches continues to provide more information about how climate conditions are influencing Karuk landscapes and cultural resources. With increased visitation to these culturally important places to harvest, access, and observe the plants, the condition of the cultural resources is slowly improving with some evidence of increased yield. UC Berkeley undergraduate interns, one of whom is a Karukdescendant,increased knowledge and skills in cultural plant biology and climate stressors, qualitative analysis, and coding using NVivo. The long-term technological infrastructure, in the form of digital assessment tools and protocols, established by this project, will support sustained use and application of these methods, and ultimately provide evidence-based monitoring and management recommendations and actions that will change the condition of the landscape and cultural resources. Awe-inspiring immersive visual tours and 360-imagery of our research plots will providebroader access to information about these culturally significant sites through in-class or remote learning demonstrations. Research Objective 2: Descriptive information about historical plant voucher collections in Karuk Ancestral Territory by species, date, location, etc. affirms the presence and persistence of cultural species on certain areas of the landscape and increases knowledge about the plant diversity of a place. Italso provides information about historical distribution of culturally significant speciesthat may no longer grow in those areas but could possibly be regenerated. Species distribution models of culturally significant plant species increase our knowledge about climate and environmental stressors that predict the distribution of our focal plants in the region. Research Objective 3: In co-designing culturally-appropriate qualitative methods, we have been able to successfully integrate cultural knowledge about research sites' historic and contemporary conditions, cultural use and management and long term ecosystem change into our analysis. We have provided KDNR with a set of methods/ protocols and technology (audio recording devices, NVivo qualitative software products, transcription services) that will help them conduct interviews and organize qualitative information that can inform management. This provides Karuk DNR managers with critical information and a secure and trustworthy process for collecting, coding, analyzing and securely storing cultural information. We have collated and made available to the Tribe numerous data sets on historic rainfall, streamflow, temperature, vegetation cover and land use to help track long term changes and patterns. We have successfully co-designed a process for locating, digitizing, georegistering, classifying and analyzing land cover using historical and contemporary aerial imagery. In addition to building a robust database of all available aerial imagery for our research sites, this provides the Tribe with protocols with which they can analyze land cover change in Tribal management areas. Extension Objective 1: Collecting plant voucher specimens has increased Tribal knowledge about plant diversity and distribution of culturally significant plants that grow in Karuk Ancestral Territory, increasing capacity to manage these sites for long term resilience. Karuk teammates, including DNR staff and Cultural Practitioners,have learned more about the process of voucher specimen collection and thus have begun to collect vouchers on their own, in general, and in greater numbers. Extension Objective 2: KDNR and UCB research team utilized the newly developed ACA Mobile Field tool in all the differing sites this year, providing a robust test of this tool as well as replicable, useful field data. We revised our Climate Citizen Science Tool, a collaborative, publicly-available monitoring and recording tool, with practitioner input and field testing. This tool can be used not only by KDNR staff but also by any member of the Tribal community. The transfer of all original data from UC GIS server to the Karuk server provides long-term data protection and security, honoring cultural data sovereignty. Extension Objective 3: The development and piloting of two lesson plans for Grade 7 ("Dendrochronology & Climate Change" and "Climate Justice and Climate Action") increased capacity of local educators to teach about climate resilience integrating both western science and Traditional Ecological Knowledge. These lesson plans, designed within a cultural sovereignty framework, will be available for long-term use by educators. Through mentorship, UC IGIS staff increased knowledge and capacity of KDNR staff to utilize 360 photo Tours and drone 360 photos for their research, planning, management, and monitoring work. Extension Objective 4: The Karuk Tribe secured a follow up grant to expand the number of research sites and to continue long term monitoring for agroecological resilience. The upcoming (May)Agroecosystem Condition Assessment workshop and field trips to research sites will provide researchers with an opportunity to get feedback on research results and monitoring/management recommendations and to facilitate connections between Federal and University researchers, Karuk DNR staff and Tribal leadership, cultural practitioners and community members.
Publications
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2020
Citation:
Sarna-Wojcicki, D. and S. Bourque. "Impacts of climate change on Tribal agroecosystems and cultural foods and fibers in Karuk Aboriginal Territory." Exploring California Climate Change Connection conference. California Environmental Protection Agency/Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, Sacramento, CA, December 2020.
- Type:
Other
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2020
Citation:
Karuk-UC Berkeley Collaborative. "Klamath Tribal Food Sovereignty News." Quarterly seasonal newsletter sent to over 300 subscribers.
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Progress 04/15/19 to 04/14/20
Outputs
Target Audience:The primary audience of this project are land managers, decision makers, community members and youth of the Karuk Tribe in northern California. Decision support tools co-created by and for our Karuk tribal partners are designed to improve agroecosystem productivity of cultural foods and fibers for the benefit of Karuk tribal members. Tribal youth and land use managers have participated and will continue to participate in a series of hands-on experiential learning workshops and mentorship improving long term capacity to measure and monitor for cultural food and fiber resilience in the Klamath. Lessons learned from our research results and decision support tools are regularly shared with other audiences including tribes and land management decision makers at the federal, state, local, tribal government, community and household levels working to restore cultural foodways and enhance human ecosystem health Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? Training activities: One undergraduate intern gained skills in archival research, literature review, and using historical documents. We supervised and trained one Karuk intern and four undergraduate interns, developing their skills in reconstruction of historical land and water use and long-term change detection methods. We mentored and trained two undergraduate interns in voucher specimen label making and mounting. Professional development: KDNR staff and supporting researchers have increased their skills and capacity to carry out agroecosystem condition assessments using Survey 123 to collect digital data and in using Avenza Systems to more accurately map territory. UC ANR provided tutoring and mentoring to KDNR staff (from 1-10 persons) in R language, data server set up, and ARC Enterprise. UC ANR offered technical support and consultations to KDNR GIS staff regarding the development of the mobile field tool and installation of Arc Enterprise and Server, an important component of long-term data management and security for KDNR. Also through UC ANR, KDNR staff had multiple technical workshops and trainings on 360 imagery, Survey 123, and drones. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? Resilience workshop planning session with six KDNR staff, UCB and USFS project partners (Nov 2019) to develop activities and exercises for KDNR staff, cultural practitioners and Karuk Tribal community members to co-generate indicators of agroecosystem resilience for ACA plots and patches. Local children and youth: Secret Plant Scavenger Hunt/Nature Journaling lesson with Junction Elementary School lower grades. Implemented Secret Plant Scavenger Hunt with 12 youth, grades K-4th and with 6 youth, grades 5th-8th (both Feb 2020) "Investigating Biological Resilience in Mushrooms, Mosses, and Ferns," Orleans Elementary School, 3-6 Grade Classes with 17 children (March 2020) UC ANR trainings offered on story mapping to 15 Junction Elementary School students and the 8th grade class (8 students) of Orleans Elementary School (both in May 2019) Yew Field Trip with Cultural Practitioner, Phil Albers JR. with 8Orleans Elementary School 6th graders to learn about Karuk cultural plant species, Pacific Yew, at research plot (March 2020) KDNR staff (beyond those on the project): Workshop session on processing, hosting, serving and data management of 360 images (Nov 2019) for 10 KDNR staff and project partners. UCIGIS trainings offered on ARC Enterprise to KDNR GIS staff and Data Steward (May & Nov 2019) UCIGIS trainings on Survey 123 offered to KDNR staff (May & November 2019) UCIGIS training on drone technology, regulation, flight planning and image processing workshop for 7 KDNR staff (May 2019) followed by drone flyover testing (November 2019) Local community writ large & invested collaborators and champions Quarterly email newsletters sharing updates on research progress, outcomes, and publications as well as advertising related partner and local community events and opportunities to engage which reach over 380 subscribers. Karuk-UCB Collaborative website (https://nature.berkeley.edu/karuk-collaborative/) is updated regularly with project updates, newsletter archives and current relevant natural resource events for the Karuk community What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?Due to COVID-19 shelter in place order, several objectives that required field work and youth education were put on hold. We plan to complete those objectives during the next reporting period as restrictions on travel are lifted. Establishment of the Data Display Portal has also been delayed due to challenges setting up an internal server at the Karuk Tribe's Department of Natural Resources. We anticipate resolving this challenge and completing this objective during this next reporting period
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
In the past year, we increased our understanding of and capacity to manage for agroecological diversity and resilience of cultural significant foods and fibers in the Karuk Aboriginal territory. UC Berkeley and Karuk Tribe researchers developed innovative ecological field research protocols combing Western and Indigenous science to assess cultural plant diversity, quality and abundance and to measure and monitor the effects of land restoration and climate change on these important cultural resources over time. To better understand and manage for agroecosystem resilience, we compiled traditional ecological knowledge and historical land use and climate histories into a database to improve Karuk Tribe forest resource management decisions. We increased the capacity of the Karuk Tribe to monitor effects of land management and climate change on 20 culturally significant species through establishment of 33 long-term monitoring sites. Furthermore, through the activities and discussion generated by this project, more Karuk tribal community members and Karuk Department of Natural Resources staff are monitoring cultural plants for the effects of climate change through the creation of a mobile climate app. UC Agriculture and Natural Resources provided the Karuk Tribe technical landscape monitoring and communication skills including 360 photography, drone survey technology, and StoryMapping in ArcGIS Online. They contributed to long-term infrastructure that supports the capacity of the Karuk Tribe to continue monitoring and managing for agroecosystem resilience beyond the duration of this grant. The integration of traditional ecological knowledge and western science in our assessment has produced a unique methodology and data set which has influenced decisions about prescribed burning and management of sites by the Western Klamath Restoration Partnership, ultimately leading to a change in condition of the sites with the proper cultural management targeted for culturally significant food and fiber species. We have engaged with the Karuk Tribe's Tribal Heritage Preservation Officer to share information about the archeology of project sites and contributed to decisions regarding cultural management and protection of areas rich in artifacts. In the past year, our team has engaged with tribal youth in and outside of the classroom and contributed new lesson plans to the Karuk K-12 curriculum, which collectively has contributed to increased knowledge of Tribal youth on local climate change issues particularly in relation to cultural resources and methods to monitor and communicate the influences of climate change in their community. Apart from community-based youth, our Berkeley team has trained six undergraduate interns in botanical and landscape assessment skills using digital technology. Through these improvements in understanding past and contemporary climate patterns, land management and agroecosystem dynamics, increased ability to monitor for climate change impacts to cultural species and habitats, and enhanced workforce and technical capacity of KDNR and the Karuk Tribal community, we have taken important steps towards our overall goal of promoting and enhancing the resilience of cultural agroecosystems within Karuk Aboriginal Territory. Objective 1: We established 5 long-term research plots and 28 external focal cultural plant patches which will all be used by the Karuk Department of Natural Resources (KDNR) and cultural practitioners beyond the lifetime of this project. The ACA survey we developed and conducted generated a tool and data set to inform contemporary patterns of cultural food and fiber species diversity, distribution, abundance and quality as well as associated biotic and abiotic agroecosystem conditions and climate vulnerabilities across Karuk Aboriginal Territory. KDNR staff and supporting researchers have been trained in ACA methods and assessments, in using Survey 123 to collect digital data, and in using Avenza Systems to more accurately map territory. Considerable survey data including visual data and audio recordings have been organized and cleaned for long-term usage by the Karuk Tribe. A series of guides were developed on cultural plants, invasive plants, and plant diseases. Objective 2: Dataset of voucher herbarium specimens and ArcGIS maps for geographic analysis and visualization was created to support our understanding of focal plant distribution over time throughout the Karuk Aboriginal Territory as well as possible future distributions of focal plant populations using species distribution models and models of future climate projections. In this process, one undergraduate intern gained skills in archival research, literature review, and using historical documents. Objective 3: Blending experimental with established methodologies, we scanned, georeferenced and manually classified land cover in historical aerial image sets from 10 aerial image flights that overlapped with our research plots. We also transcribed and compiled historical weather and land/water records to historical land use/land cover database for the KDNR Climate Variability Portal. Through this, we supervised and trained one Karuk intern and four undergraduate interns, developing their skills in reconstruction of historical land and water use and long-term change detection methods. We also developed a protocol for KDNR's long term use on land cover change detection analysis. Objective 4: We collected and mounted botanical voucher specimens from current research plots. The specimens will be stored in the Karuk Herbarium and the University Jepson Herbaria at Berkeley. The specimens contribute to the vast collection of data on global plant biodiversity stored in herbaria which are important for studying changing distributions and reproductive cycles in the context of climate change. Specimens in the Karuk Herbarium are also used for youth education. Through this process, we mentored and trained two undergraduate interns in voucher specimen label making and mounting. Objective 5: We completed the mobile digital survey tool and conducted four field surveys which increase KDNR's long-term capacity to conduct research and monitoring in in Karuk Aboriginal Territory. UCANR offered technical support and consultations to KDNR GIS staff regarding the development of the ACA mobile field tool and installation of Arc Enterprise and Server, an important component of long-term data management and security for KDNR Objective 6: We provided six learning opportunities for over 60 local schoolchildren (grades K-8th) with lessons, activities, and field trips on nature journaling, biological resilience, ArcGIS Storymaps, and cultural plants. This also resulted in the development of an entire lesson plan on biological resilience that can be used again in local schools. We had multiple technical workshops and trainings on 360 imagery, Survey 123, and drones. Additionally, UC ANR provided tutoring and mentoring to KDNR staff (from 1-10 persons) in R language, data server set up, and ARC Enterprise. Through this, KDNR established Survey 123 infrastructure for mobile field data, developed immersive visualization/360 photography workflows and databases for data visualization and monitoring, and developed a hexagonal GIS grid layer to systematize research and monitoring across Karuk Aboriginal Territory. Objective 7: We conducted interviews with seven local experts on Indigenous cultural plant use and management, land/water use, cultural food management traditions, land use planning and agroecosystem resilience. We hosted a resilience workshop planning session with project partners to develop activities and exercises with KDNR staff, cultural practitioners and Karuk Tribal community members to co-generate indicators of agroecosystem resilience for ACA plots and patches. Through this, we strengthened our long-term working collaborations with the US Forest Service.
Publications
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2019
Citation:
Shay Bourque presented at a Tribal Working Group session at the CalEPA/OEHHA Indicators of Climate Change in California workshop: Exploring California Climate Change Connection, November 2019.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2019
Citation:
Megan Mucioki, Dan Sarna, Jennifer Sowerwine, and Lisa Hillman. Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience and Cultural Foods And Fibers Revitalization Initiative: Xu?us Nu'e?ethti We Are Caring For It. 60th Annual Meeting of the Society For Economic Botany: The Future of Forests. University of Cincinnati. Cincinnati, Ohio, June 2019.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2019
Citation:
Jennifer Sowerwine, Reframing Food Security by and for Native American Communities: A Case Study of Agroecological Resilience Among Tribes in the Klamath River Basin of Oregon and California, Agriculture, Food and Human Values Conference, Anchorage, Alaska, June 2019.
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2019
Citation:
Sowerwine, J., Sarna-Wojcicki, D., Mucioki, M., Hillman, L., Lake, F. K, & Friedman, E. Enhancing food sovereignty: A five-year collaborative tribal-university research and extension project in California and Oregon. Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development , 9, B 167-190, (Nov. 2019). https://doi.org/10.5304/jafscd.2019.09B.013
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2019
Citation:
(Poster) Sowerwine, J., Hillman, L., Sarna-Wojcicki, D., Mucioki, M., Lake, F. Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience and Cultural Foods and Fibers Revitalization Initiative: x�us nu'�ethtiwe are caring for it. Agriculture, Food and Human Values Conference, Anchorage, Alaska, June 2019.
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Progress 04/15/18 to 04/14/19
Outputs
Target Audience:During the Year 1 reporting period, we focused our efforts on collaborative research design and professional development to build up the capacity of our core team, including both Karuk tribal members and land use management employees, and UC Berkeley postdocs and undergraduate assistant. To that end, team partners offered 7 events and workshops reaching 129 participants (many repeat). Of those participants, 56% were Native American and 51% were women. Our first youth-focused workshops will be held in May 2019. Changes/Problems:The most significant challenge to the project thus far has been the delayed start date, originally anticipated on January 1, 2018 but delayed until April 15, 2018. While the RACCCA team was able to start in April, the subcontract with CoDA/Codifi was not executed until June 28, 2018. The six-month delay has meant that the framework for our Mobile Field Tool was not completed in time for early field testing with the component elements developed by the research team, and slowed the subcontractor's ability to communicate, plan resources, or research key components of the Climate Variability Portal in the first half of Year 1. We hope to make up for lost time early in Year 2. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Tribal capacity building through research, education, extension and new resources forms the core of this three-year project. A key priority for Year 1 has been to offer professional development opportunities to the project's Karuk Tribe staff and UC Berkeley postdoctoral scholars. Training Activities: Activities related to the Agroecological Condition Assessments resulted in postdocs Megan Mucioki and Daniel Sarna-Wojcicki and Karuk cultural and natural resource technicians Vikki Preston and Heather Rickard's increased knowledge in field, geospatial and analytical methods of ecological assessments used in forestry, ecology, wildlife conservation, and watershed sciences as well as indigenous knowledge related to the cultural resources included in our survey. Field-based training activities included one-on-one and small group mentoring on cultural foods, prescribed fire and 360 digital imaging from our USFS partner, research ecologist Dr. Frank Lake, and experienced Karuk cultural practitioners. UC IGIS (Informatics and GIS Program) trainers provided four technical support consultations on immersive visualization, remote sensing and geospatial data management and analysis. Post-docs are now able to apply this new knowledge to conduct the ACAs. Karuk technicians are developing skills to do this independently. Ongoing mentorship of UC Berkeley Postdoctoral fellows by PI Jennifer Sowerwine has included grant proposal development and drafting, logic model development, guidance on research and writing for peer-review publications, training on drafting policy briefs, guidance on research design and analysis, job search and career development strategies, and reviewing articles and reports. Professional Development: Workshops attended by all project staff from UC Berkeley and the Karuk Tribe included Introduction to Story Maps, Immersive Visualization with 360 Photography, and Introduction to Remote Visualization and Mapping using drones. In addition, one postdoc attended the four-day Drones for Biologists workshop, a comprehensive drone mapping short course led by UC IGIS trainers. Staff of KDNR's Wildlife Division were introduced to drones as applied to wildlife biology, and have now purchased a drone for their research on elk. Karuk Tribe project staff and UC Berkeley staff including UC Berkeley postdocs Mucioki and Sarna-Wojcicki, PI Jennifer Sowerwine, Karuk Tribe project coordinator Shawn Bourque, natural resources technicians Vikki Preston, Heather Rickard, and Ben Saxon, plus UC Berkeley undergraduate intern Bryce Hutchins also attended a two-day Advanced Herbarium Skills workshop at UC Berkeley's University and Jepson Herbaria in preparation for augmenting the Karuk tribal herbarium collection of culturally significant and native plants. Workshop participants developed new skills in gathering, mounting, and preserving bulky or oversized plants, fungi, lichens, mosses, and algae or seaweed, and learned how to search for data in the Consortium of California Herbaria. All workshop participants have increased knowledge of voucher specimen collection for each of the plant types discussed, the California Consortium of Herbaria and online portals, and efficient label making for voucher specimens. Attendees will use these new skills in the field to contribute specimen collections of fungi, lichens, mosses, etc. to the Karuk Herbarium. The specimens collected during this time will contribute to our goal of adding 100 new specimens to the Karuk Herbarium. We also plan to hold workshops to train tribal youth and adults in voucher specimen collection of fungi, lichens, mosses, and algae or seaweed in spring or summer 2019. UC Berkeley undergraduate intern Hutchins has received one-on-one training cultural plant ID, aggregating photos from the online databases, collaborative and cross-cultural work, and voucher specimen collection, mounting, and preservation. The UCANR IGIS program has been providing individualized training on the statistical programming language R for several members of the Karuk Department of Natural Resources' Wildlife Division since January 2019 via a weekly online session. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?While results from the project research activities are not expected before Year 3, the project team introduced project goals and objectives to the full Karuk Department of Natural Resources via email and our October workshops, and to Karuk community members through an initial focus group held in January 2019 (a second focus group is planned for fall 2019). The project was also highlighted in the Summer 2018 Tribal newsletter. Skills and knowledge gleaned from the Advanced Herbaria Skills workshop will be shared with tribal youth and adults through workshops held at the Karuk Department of Natural Resources in late spring or summer 2019. Additionally, these skills and knowledge will be integrated into tribal K-12 curricula led by KDNR employees in local schools on a weekly basis. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?
Nothing Reported
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
The overall goal of the Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience Initiative, titled xúus nu'éethti - we are caring for it, is to improve the resilience of culturally important foods and fibers within Karuk Aboriginal Territory in the context of changing climate conditions. In Year 1, we completed our collaborative research design with the Karuk Tribe, which included co-designing and developing our research methodology and mobile assessment tools, multiple stakeholder input sessions, assessing, selecting and gaining Tribal Council approval of 11 representative one-acre field research sites, obtaining all necessary research permits, and building research capacity of team members. Professional development opportunities strengthened tribal members' and postdoctoral scholars' knowledge and research skills in using 360 degree photography and visual tours, creating ArcGIS Story Maps, developing indicators for assessing cultural plant resilience, and learning advanced herbarium collection and field research techniques. The Karuk Tribe's Píkyav Field Institute, which partners with academic institutions for research and prepares tribal youth for college and career readiness, has increased capacity to provide ongoing training in the above-stated topic areas and development of related K-12 curriculum. Eight workshops and stakeholder input sessions reached 129 participants (56% Native American; many repeat) with information about the new project and opportunities to contribute to research design and build related skills. Community interest was heightened through media coverage of the project in at least nine venues including online, radio and print stories. Specific accomplishments and preliminary outcomes include: Research Obj. 1: Agroecosystem Condition Assessments (ACAs): In Year 1, UC Berkeley and Karuk teams collaboratively developed the ACA methods, tool and protocol guide to collect baseline agroecological data in 11 chosen project sites. We also compiled and reviewed "food grove" survey data the tribe collected over the past two years in some of the same areas. Our UC Berkeley and Karuk teams held weekly phone meetings, conducted 2 week-long field trips, and obtained Karuk Resources Advisory Board approval of 11 selected sites. We held a focus group with Karuk cultural practitioners to co-create a cultural seasonal calendar (phenology of culturally relevant plants) to inform timing of data collection. The focus group served as a forum for feedback on project goals and future practitioner involvement, and generated new community-driven ideas such as a desire for a citizen-science climate assessment mobile app now planned for lay community member monitoring use (separate from the Mobile Field Tool). The app will enable tribal community members to report on phenology of culturally important plants, climate stressors, and any unusual climate or plant related phenomena. Research Obj. 2: Historical plant voucher specimen analysis: Our postdoc compiled voucher specimen data from the California Consortium of Herbaria (CCH) for Trinity, Humboldt, Siskiyou, and Del Norte Counties, and narrowed down data to specimens near our new project sites. This data increases our knowledge of cultural plants historically present in Karuk Aboriginal Territory near selected project sites. In Year 2, we will revisit the locations of historical voucher specimens in our project sites to survey the contemporary presence or absence of these plant species. We anticipate our planned comparison of historical and contemporary cultural plant diversity will help to inform land management decisions by the Karuk Tribe. Research Obj. 3: Assess historical and contemporary ecological impacts to define agroecosystem resilience indicators: Our postdoc identified 12 relevant sets of historical aerial images of our region that overlap with our ACA sites, spanning 1944 - 2016. We conducted a pilot run of digitizing, stitching, orthorectifying and georeferencing images for two research sites to develop a new protocol. Postdoc conducted a literature review on measuring and assessing agroecosystem resilience in indigenous and non-indigenous communities, and developed a question guide and interview list for Karuk cultural practitioners. The Karuk Tribe Project Coordinator began a literature review of Mid-Holocene and oral history assessment of recent warm periods in the mid-Klamath River region. The new image protocol will guide use of historical images to study long-term land use and ecological change in research plots. Together with cultural practitioner input, the literature reviews and oral histories will help define agroecosystem resilience indicators for further monitoring by the Karuk Tribe, to inform future landscape management decisions in various climatic conditions. Data generated through Research Objectives 1-3 will be will be analyzed and stored in the tribally-managed Climate Variability Portal (see Obj. 5). Extension Obj. 1: Expand Karuk Tribe's herbarium and capability to monitor changes in cultural food and fiber plant species. The Karuk Herbarium continues to grow and new specimens are being added. Both Karuk Department of Natural Resources and UC Berkeley project employees attended a two-day customized Advanced Herbarium Skills workshop at UC Berkeley's University and Jepson Herbaria, learning how to collect and preserve bulky specimens, fungi, lichens, mosses, and algae. New skills learned and custom training materials will be used by KDNR and UCB employees to expand the Karuk Herbarium collections beyond vascular plants and teach others in the tribal community. Extension Obj #2: Design and build Mobile Field Collection Tool and Climate Variability Portal: We are in the early stages of developing two mobile and one web application to support data collection, management and security. The Mobile Field Collection Tool (MFT) is approaching completion with digital platform designed and finalized ACA survey content now being added. An additional citizen science Climate Change app is also in design. All project teams held regular monthly or more frequent phone meetings, and met in person with CoDA/Codifi Paperless Solutions in October 2018 and March 2019 to contribute to design for the Mobile Field Tool (MFT). CoDA/Codifi conducted interviews, reviewed documents and data models, provided engineering expertise and delivered a version of the MFT in early April, 2019. Initial field testing is now underway and a community workshop will offer both tribal staff and community members hands-on training in the next grant period. Planning and development of the Climate Variability Portal is calendared for Year 2, with substantial completion in April 2020. Extension Obj #3: Build STEM skills and capacity of Karuk technicians and tribal youth. The UCANR IGIS program delivered two half-day workshops for the Karuk Tribe in October 2018. Approximately 20 people participated in a workshop on Immersive Visualization with 360 Photography, Drone technology, and approximately 15 people participated in a workshop on developing Story Maps. Two draft STEM lesson plans (" Plant Biology: Willow" for Grade 5 and "Native Edible Berries" for Grade 8) have been created and approved for piloting in local schools by Karuk Tribe Council. Piloting is underway (Spring 2019). Extension Obj. #4:Develop Adaptive Management Plan/Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience Report for community-based decision-making. During Year 1, our team developed a method for assessing agroecosystem conditions in one-acre plots (see Research Obj. 1 above) and learned how other indigenous communities define and monitor agroecosystem resilience (see Research Obj. 3). Development of the new Plan and Report will take place in Year 3, based on analysis of research data collected in the next grant period.
Publications
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2019
Citation:
Sarna-Wojcicki, D., Sowerwine, J., Hillman, L., Hillman, L., & Tripp, B. (2019). Decentering Watersheds and Decolonising Watershed Governance: Towards an Ecocultural Politics of Scale in the Klamath Basin. Water Alternatives, 12(1), 241-266.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Accepted
Year Published:
2018
Citation:
Hillman, L. Funding Tools and Strategies for advancing Regional Climate Action. Climate Science Symposium for the North Coast Region. December 2018.
Hillman, L. Karuk Tribes Karuk Agro-Ecosystem Resilience and Cultural Foods and Fibers Revitalization Initiative Project Overview. USDA-NIFA AFRI Principal Investigator Annual Meeting. December 2018.
Sowerwine, J. Karuk Agroecosystem Resilience and Cultural Foods and Fibers Revitalization Initiative: x�us nu'�ethti we are caring for it. Poster, USDA-NIFA AFRI Principal Investigator Annual Meeting. December 2018.
- Type:
Other
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2018
Citation:
Hogan, S. Web Mapping with ArcGIS Online. Story Mapping Workshop. October 2018.
Lake, F. Integration of American Indian Tribal and Rural Community Values into Landscape Restoration & Fire Research and Management: Cultural Use Quality and Food Security in the Western Klamath Mountains. Advisory Group Orientation and Planning Meeting. October 2018.
Lyons, A. 360 Photography Technology Overview. Advisory Group Orientation and Planning Meeting. October 2018.
Lyons, A. Taking 360 Photos for Immersive Visualization. Advisory Group Orientation and Planning Meeting. October 2018.
Sowerwine, J. Enhancing Tribal Health, Food Sovereignty and Climate Resilience in the Klamath River Basin . Presentation in UC Berkeley undergraduate course: "Fire: Past, Present and Future Interactions with the People and Ecosystems of California. September 2018.
Sowerwine, J. Enhancing Tribal Health and Food Sovereignty in the Klamath River Basin . Presentation to UC Berkeley undergraduate course: Conservation and Environmental Problem Solving. October 2018.
- Type:
Other
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2019
Citation:
Sowerwine, J. Building Climate Resilience for Food Security with Native American Communities in the Klamath River Basin . Presentation at UCANR Climate Change Program Team Meeting. January, 2019.
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