"California’s latest historic wildfire serves as a stark reminder of the regenerative promise of Indigenous cultural burning, practitioners say."
"Where others might see only catastrophe, Don Hankins scans fire-singed landscapes for signs of renewal.
Hankins, a renowned Miwkoʔ (Plains Miwok) cultural fire practitioner and scholar, has kept an eye on the Park Fire’s footprint as it sweeps through more than 429,000 acres across four Northern California counties. It started late last month and became one of the largest fires in state history in a matter of days, fueled by dry grasslands. The fire has since risen into the Sierra Nevada foothills, burning through chaparral shrub to reach the mixed conifer belt of the Lassen National Forest. Timber has become its latest energy source.
Yet Hankins says he is seeing some signs of a landscape resilient to fire in areas where he and his team of researchers at California State University, Chico have been able to bring back to the land “good fire” that reduces the potential for destructive wildfires, maintains ecological diversity and holds cultural and spiritual significance for many Indigenous tribes. It is a practice known as cultural burning."
Sarah Hopkins reports for Inside Climate News September 1, 2024.
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