Watershed management throughout California commonly leaves out perspectives from tribal communities. The Eel River basin, the third largest in the State of California, is exemplary of this paradigm. The Upper Mainstem of the Eel is host to the Potter Valley Project (PVP), a pair of dams that divert a significant portion of water flow from the Eel River, which has significantly impacted the livelihoods of tribal members belonging to the Round Valley Indian Tribes (RVIT).
This study presents a different way to conduct management that honors both the Indigenous science of the RVIT and Western management strategies currently set in place by state and federal agencies. A total of twenty microfilms housed at the UC Berkeley Bancroft Library Archives were analyzed. The microfilms contained oral histories and stories collected from tribal elders in the Round Valley during the 1930s. Any content within the microfilms related to the Eel River, salmonids, or hydrology was scanned and transcribed for later viewing and qualitative analysis. Interpretations of the knowledge found within stories were then completed by the author and tribal elders. Transcribed stories, their interpretation, and excerpts from Western science stream ecology journal articles, were then analyzed for common themes.
Results/Conclusions
A total of 11 stories and their interpretations were found to have significant overlap (75% of the stories content) with an excerpt from at least one Western science journal article. Instances of knowledge from Indigenous science (IS) and Western science (WS) exceeded one another in terms of concepts such as historical baseline and species life history (IS) or landscape scale ecological modeling and groundwater recharge dynamics. From these results, a conceptual framework highlighting how eco-cultural management could take place in the Eel River watershed was created. The framework outlines how to conduct culturally relevant and respectful eco-cultural research that benefits all parties within a watershed.
The results of this study highlight the depth of ecological knowledge resource managers could gain by integrating all perspectives in a watershed. In addition, the inclusion of the Round Valley Indian Tribes (RVIT) perspectives in Western management increases their autonomy over their traditional territories, thus contributing to the cultural and livelihood revitalization efforts they currently have underway.