In Átl'ḵa7tsem, a new generation of stewards are welcoming herring home

The Grand Coulee, a 500-foot-tall dam on the Columbia River, nearly eradicated the salmon population that the Colville Tribes relied on, but the Indigenous community initiated a restoration effort to save the fish. They released by hand 100 adult Chinook salmon and scientists were able to confirm that the species was spawning on the upper part of the dam for the first time in 80 years.

The Upper Columbia United Tribes are working to reintroduce salmon along the Upper Columbia River after the Chief Joseph and Grand Coulee Dams altered the environment, preventing the salmon from returning. Their research on the impact of the dam on the river, salmon, and their culture has pressured the U.S. government to uphold its obligations to them. So far, it’s committed $200 million for the reintroduction efforts as a result.

While beavers might seem like a nuisance to many, the Tulalip Tribes in Washington state — after a long legal battle — are relocating the creatures to their lands as a way to create healthy ecosystems. The tribe has spent two years successfully capturing beavers from private lands and moving them with help from the Cascade Forest Conservancy. Their work could become a model for other tribes as a way to reclaim their land management methods.

In Benin, indigenous beliefs, knowledge, and traditional governance systems are helping communities protect biodiversity and adapt to climate change. Vodun, a spiritual practice that protects fragile and vital ecosystems, has enabled the preservation of more than 1,200 acres of mangroves over the last decade.

Through a co-management system, which has successfully rehabilitated degraded watersheds, the 2015 Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes-Montana Water Rights Compact has restored tribal sovereignty over their waters. This has brought bull trout back to their native streams and reconnected tribal members to traditional lifeways while maintaining water access for existing agricultural users.

After decades of collaboration between the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe in Washington state, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and other organizations, the Elwha River dams were taken down to restore fish populations and return the ecosystem to its natural state. Grant funding has helped tribal biologists partner with organizations and universities to implement their fish restoration plan. While the work is expected to take years and funding isn’t always guaranteed, the restoration work so far has seen native plants and fish return.

The Indigenous Foods Knowledges Network (IFKN) connects Indigenous scholars, community members, and leaders from tribes in the Arctic and the U.S. Southwest to work together on achieving food sovereignty. By visiting each other’s lands, they share their traditional knowledge on farming practices and river restoration. Because of the network, they received a grant to study the effects of COVID-19 on food access for Indigenous communities. “We can learn from one another, teach each other, and also work together on finding different solutions,” said a member of the IFKN steering committee.

Under an innovative scheme in the Democratic Republic of Congo, indigenous communities are obtaining the legal right to own and manage the forests where they reside. This ownership has shown success in slowing deforestation of the Congo rainforest and creating new economic opportunities for residents in these villages. “Rather than just being an add-on, community forestry is now being considered as a mainstream model for forest management,” says a coordinator for the Rainforest Foundation UK.

The Swinomish tribe in Washington state is combining traditional knowledge and science to combat the effects of climate change and improve the health of its land, water, and people. In recent years, their salmon harvest has diminished due to warming waters, but they’ve instituted salmon recovery efforts by restoring tidelands and channels and planting trees along stream beds to cool the waters. Their focus on ecosystem and community health could be a model for other Indigenous tribes looking to create their own climate plans.

After the legacy of acid mine drainage from abandoned coal mines in Appalachian Ohio, there are several initiatives working to clean up the rivers and streams. Change-agents from universities, local organizations, and the government joined together in the 1990s to use both active and passive methods of neutralizing the pH level of the streams. Since then, they've brought the pH acidity down from 4.5 to 7 and grown the number of fish species from 4 to 37, and efforts are still ongoing and optimistic.