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Reading desert sands – Indigenous wildlife tracking skills underpin vast monitoring project

News Feed
Thursday, September 26, 2024

As animals move across the desert, they leave tracks, diggings and droppings. For skilled trackers, reading these signs is like watching a movie. A story of who was there and what they were doing unfolds in front of them. In this way, many Indigenous Australians know where the goannas (jalangardi in Yawuru) are fat and abundant, when bilby (jitartu in Karajarri) burrows are occupied, and whether the bush turkeys (parrkara in Karajarri) have arrived to take advantage of a freshly burnt patch. For many years, scientists have been working with Indigenous people in the desert to record these observations in a systematic way. Taking a standard approach enables comparisons between data from different people, times and places, so trends can be detected. Our new research collates almost 49,000 animal detections during 15,000 surveys at more than 5,300 sites, since 1982. This unique data set reveals new information about desert species. Monitoring animal numbers, locations and responses to environmental change is vital for guiding efforts to support their survival. This video features reflections from people involved in the Arid Zone Monitoring project, including authors Sarah Legge and Braedan Taylor. (Threatened Species Recovery Hub). Monitoring desert wildlife is a skill It’s not always easy to see animals in the desert. Most are nocturnal, secretive, and spend much of their time underground. Numbers can fluctuate widely, dwindling during droughts and booming after rain. This means we need to collect a lot of data — over a long time and over a vast area — to tell what is going on. Fortunately, Indigenous Australians continue to inhabit and look after desert landscapes using deep knowledge of their Country and exceptional observational skills. Our deserts contain one of the largest networks of Indigenous-managed land in the world. The Arid Zone Monitoring Project combines Traditional ecological knowledge and tracking skills with scientific analysis. Indigenous rangers and Traditional Owners from 33 different Indigenous desert groups are involved, along with government agencies, non-government organisations and independent scientists. It’s one of Australia’s largest wildlife monitoring endeavours, spanning nearly half of the country. More than 5,300 unique sites are spread across deserts with various types of Indigenous land tenure and management. The project area boundary follows regional boundaries based on geology and ecology. Sarah Legge Fresh insights The standard approach is to search a 2-hectare area for signs of animals with at least two people for 20 minutes. One of us, Braedan Taylor, has performed many dozens of these sign-based surveys. He says: “Within these areas we look for scats (poo), burrows, tracks and record everything that we find.” The observations are recorded on various apps or paper record sheets. The method has been widely embraced by Indigenous ranger teams. But, until now, the data has generally stayed within those teams. By bringing all of the data together for analysis, our research has revealed fresh insights into desert wildlife. We now know more about where species occur and their preferred habitats. We found some species in places where they were not thought to exist before. For example, it turns out the range of the great desert skink (tjakura in Wiluna Martu Wangka) extends further southwest in Martu Country than previously thought. This chunky, group-living reptile is culturally important to Indigenous people. While local people knew of its presence, sharing that knowledge helps conserve this threatened species. Learn how to track Tjakura (great desert skink) and see how rangers and custodians are monitoring and caring for this threatened, culturally significant species. (Indigenous Desert Alliance) In the northwestern deserts, Yawuru Country managers and Karajarri rangers recorded many observations of spectacled-hare wallabies (manggaban in Yawuru). This species had not been detected in the region for more than a decade. One of us, Pius Gregory, worked with his countrymen, using careful observation of scats (poo) to distinguish this species from two other wallaby species of similar size (northern nailtail wallabies, agile wallabies; garrabulu, barrjaniny). Analysing the data has also improved our knowledge of where pest species occur and how they may be affecting native wildlife. For example, we found bilbies have been lost from 70% of their former range, contracting to the northwest deserts where fox density is lowest. Feral cat numbers are also higher here, perhaps also due to fewer foxes. Some species leave more tell-tale signs Better monitoring can help ranger teams evaluate their programs to control fires and feral animals. The data can also help determine the conservation status of threatened species, and whether it’s improving or declining. Species detection rates, locations and habitat preferences can also inform future monitoring programs. This includes guiding where and how often to survey, to detect population changes for various species. Overall, we found sign-based surveys are great for monitoring 28 species of mammals, reptiles and birds – including threatened, invasive and culturally significant species. This includes game species that are important to desert people such as kangaroo (mirtimarlu in Karajarri), emu (bijarda in Yawuru) and bush turkey (bustard, barrgara in Yawuru). We found a national monitoring program for these 28 species would only require visiting 600 strategically located sites twice every five years. Each team involved in the monitoring would need to survey only 10–20 sites a year. We identified a further 48 species in the records, but found sign-based surveys may not be the best way to monitor them. This is either because detections are too few, or their sign is hard to identify. For some of those species, extra training by expert trackers may make a difference. For example, the tracks of red kangaroo, euro and grey kangaroo are hard to distinguish for inexperienced trackers, as are perentie, yellow-spotted and sand goanna tracks. Emu, dingo, echidna, and sand goanna tracks – and bilby scats. Arid Zone Monitoring project. See images for individual attributions. Potential for the future The Arid Zone Monitoring Project was a proof of concept that showed how much monitoring is already being done by rangers. It also shows the potential for a desert-wide monitoring program, in which Indigenous-led data collection is paired with logistic, analytical and funding support. Such a program could provide information on biodiversity trends over 40% of the country. This would help inform invasive animal control programs, as well as Indigenous-led recovery strategies for threatened species and culturally significant species. Sign-based monitoring gives elders and senior rangers an opportunity to share information and skills. This extends beyond tracking, to language, stories, and all aspects of cultural and ecological knowledge. Pius and Braedan can’t overstate how important this is – sign-based surveys are a great way to get out on Country and learn. The wellbeing of Indigenous Australians is inseparable from the wellbeing of Country: (“healthy Country, healthy people”). Effective monitoring, with strong Indigenous engagement, is a essential for looking after the plants, animals and people of Australia’s desert Country. We sincerely acknowledge the many people who contributed to this research. Bustard tracks across a dune on Anangu Country. Bustards, or bush turkeys, are a culturally significant game species. Jaana Dielenberg / Biodiversity Council Sarah Legge received funding from the National Environmental Program's Threatened Species Recovery Hub for the project described here. In related work, she receives funding from the Australian Research Council, and from the Australian Government's Innovative Biodiversity Monitoring for biodiverisity monitoring with Indigenous organisations. She is a member of the Biodiversity Council.Braedan Taylor worked for the Karajarri Rangers, Karajarri Traditional Lands Association during this project. He's now studying Marine Science at the University of Western Australia.Jaana Dielenberg was a collaborator on the Arid Zone Monitoring project, which was funded by the now-ended Threatened Species Recovery Hub of the Australian Government's National Environmental Science Program. She is a Charles Darwin University Fellow and is employed by the University of Melbourne and the Biodiversity Council.Pius Gregory is a Yawuru Traditional Owner. He worked previously for Nyamba Buru Yawuru as a Country Manager, looking after desert and sea country. He is now employed by WWF as the Biocultural Conservation Specialist based in Broome.Rachel Paltridge was employed by various Indigenous organisations to assist rangers collect track plot data during the period 2000-2020. She now works as an ecologist with the Indigenous Desert Alliance, with support from the Resilient Landscapes Hub of the National Environmental Science Program and also receives funding from the Australian Government's Saving Native Species program. She is an adjunct Senior Research Fellow with the University of Western Australia.

Footprints, droppings, diggings and other signs left behind by animals reveal a lot to a skilled observer. Indigenous knowledge feeds into one of Australia’s largest wildlife monitoring endeavours.

As animals move across the desert, they leave tracks, diggings and droppings. For skilled trackers, reading these signs is like watching a movie. A story of who was there and what they were doing unfolds in front of them.

In this way, many Indigenous Australians know where the goannas (jalangardi in Yawuru) are fat and abundant, when bilby (jitartu in Karajarri) burrows are occupied, and whether the bush turkeys (parrkara in Karajarri) have arrived to take advantage of a freshly burnt patch.

For many years, scientists have been working with Indigenous people in the desert to record these observations in a systematic way. Taking a standard approach enables comparisons between data from different people, times and places, so trends can be detected.

Our new research collates almost 49,000 animal detections during 15,000 surveys at more than 5,300 sites, since 1982. This unique data set reveals new information about desert species. Monitoring animal numbers, locations and responses to environmental change is vital for guiding efforts to support their survival.

This video features reflections from people involved in the Arid Zone Monitoring project, including authors Sarah Legge and Braedan Taylor. (Threatened Species Recovery Hub).

Monitoring desert wildlife is a skill

It’s not always easy to see animals in the desert. Most are nocturnal, secretive, and spend much of their time underground. Numbers can fluctuate widely, dwindling during droughts and booming after rain.

This means we need to collect a lot of data — over a long time and over a vast area — to tell what is going on.

Fortunately, Indigenous Australians continue to inhabit and look after desert landscapes using deep knowledge of their Country and exceptional observational skills. Our deserts contain one of the largest networks of Indigenous-managed land in the world.

The Arid Zone Monitoring Project combines Traditional ecological knowledge and tracking skills with scientific analysis. Indigenous rangers and Traditional Owners from 33 different Indigenous desert groups are involved, along with government agencies, non-government organisations and independent scientists. It’s one of Australia’s largest wildlife monitoring endeavours, spanning nearly half of the country.

Map showwing locations of survey sites across the deserts
More than 5,300 unique sites are spread across deserts with various types of Indigenous land tenure and management. The project area boundary follows regional boundaries based on geology and ecology. Sarah Legge

Fresh insights

The standard approach is to search a 2-hectare area for signs of animals with at least two people for 20 minutes.

One of us, Braedan Taylor, has performed many dozens of these sign-based surveys. He says: “Within these areas we look for scats (poo), burrows, tracks and record everything that we find.”

The observations are recorded on various apps or paper record sheets.

The method has been widely embraced by Indigenous ranger teams. But, until now, the data has generally stayed within those teams.

By bringing all of the data together for analysis, our research has revealed fresh insights into desert wildlife. We now know more about where species occur and their preferred habitats. We found some species in places where they were not thought to exist before.

For example, it turns out the range of the great desert skink (tjakura in Wiluna Martu Wangka) extends further southwest in Martu Country than previously thought. This chunky, group-living reptile is culturally important to Indigenous people. While local people knew of its presence, sharing that knowledge helps conserve this threatened species.

Learn how to track Tjakura (great desert skink) and see how rangers and custodians are monitoring and caring for this threatened, culturally significant species. (Indigenous Desert Alliance)

In the northwestern deserts, Yawuru Country managers and Karajarri rangers recorded many observations of spectacled-hare wallabies (manggaban in Yawuru). This species had not been detected in the region for more than a decade. One of us, Pius Gregory, worked with his countrymen, using careful observation of scats (poo) to distinguish this species from two other wallaby species of similar size (northern nailtail wallabies, agile wallabies; garrabulu, barrjaniny).

Analysing the data has also improved our knowledge of where pest species occur and how they may be affecting native wildlife. For example, we found bilbies have been lost from 70% of their former range, contracting to the northwest deserts where fox density is lowest. Feral cat numbers are also higher here, perhaps also due to fewer foxes.

Some species leave more tell-tale signs

Better monitoring can help ranger teams evaluate their programs to control fires and feral animals.

The data can also help determine the conservation status of threatened species, and whether it’s improving or declining.

Species detection rates, locations and habitat preferences can also inform future monitoring programs. This includes guiding where and how often to survey, to detect population changes for various species.

Overall, we found sign-based surveys are great for monitoring 28 species of mammals, reptiles and birds – including threatened, invasive and culturally significant species. This includes game species that are important to desert people such as kangaroo (mirtimarlu in Karajarri), emu (bijarda in Yawuru) and bush turkey (bustard, barrgara in Yawuru).

We found a national monitoring program for these 28 species would only require visiting 600 strategically located sites twice every five years. Each team involved in the monitoring would need to survey only 10–20 sites a year.

We identified a further 48 species in the records, but found sign-based surveys may not be the best way to monitor them. This is either because detections are too few, or their sign is hard to identify.

For some of those species, extra training by expert trackers may make a difference. For example, the tracks of red kangaroo, euro and grey kangaroo are hard to distinguish for inexperienced trackers, as are perentie, yellow-spotted and sand goanna tracks.

A montage of photos showing emu, dingo, echidna, sand goanna and bilby tracks and scats
Emu, dingo, echidna, and sand goanna tracks – and bilby scats. Arid Zone Monitoring project. See images for individual attributions.

Potential for the future

The Arid Zone Monitoring Project was a proof of concept that showed how much monitoring is already being done by rangers. It also shows the potential for a desert-wide monitoring program, in which Indigenous-led data collection is paired with logistic, analytical and funding support.

Such a program could provide information on biodiversity trends over 40% of the country. This would help inform invasive animal control programs, as well as Indigenous-led recovery strategies for threatened species and culturally significant species.

Sign-based monitoring gives elders and senior rangers an opportunity to share information and skills. This extends beyond tracking, to language, stories, and all aspects of cultural and ecological knowledge. Pius and Braedan can’t overstate how important this is – sign-based surveys are a great way to get out on Country and learn.

The wellbeing of Indigenous Australians is inseparable from the wellbeing of Country: (“healthy Country, healthy people”). Effective monitoring, with strong Indigenous engagement, is a essential for looking after the plants, animals and people of Australia’s desert Country.

We sincerely acknowledge the many people who contributed to this research.

An orange sand dune with a line of animal tracks
Bustard tracks across a dune on Anangu Country. Bustards, or bush turkeys, are a culturally significant game species. Jaana Dielenberg / Biodiversity Council
The Conversation

Sarah Legge received funding from the National Environmental Program's Threatened Species Recovery Hub for the project described here. In related work, she receives funding from the Australian Research Council, and from the Australian Government's Innovative Biodiversity Monitoring for biodiverisity monitoring with Indigenous organisations. She is a member of the Biodiversity Council.

Braedan Taylor worked for the Karajarri Rangers, Karajarri Traditional Lands Association during this project. He's now studying Marine Science at the University of Western Australia.

Jaana Dielenberg was a collaborator on the Arid Zone Monitoring project, which was funded by the now-ended Threatened Species Recovery Hub of the Australian Government's National Environmental Science Program. She is a Charles Darwin University Fellow and is employed by the University of Melbourne and the Biodiversity Council.

Pius Gregory is a Yawuru Traditional Owner. He worked previously for Nyamba Buru Yawuru as a Country Manager, looking after desert and sea country. He is now employed by WWF as the Biocultural Conservation Specialist based in Broome.

Rachel Paltridge was employed by various Indigenous organisations to assist rangers collect track plot data during the period 2000-2020. She now works as an ecologist with the Indigenous Desert Alliance, with support from the Resilient Landscapes Hub of the National Environmental Science Program and also receives funding from the Australian Government's Saving Native Species program. She is an adjunct Senior Research Fellow with the University of Western Australia.

Read the full story here.
Photos courtesy of

Oregon Indigenous farm navigating uncertainty over federal grants

One federal grant awarded to the farm was recently restored but two others are still on hold.

A few miles south of Salem, the Elderberry Wisdom Farm uses generations of traditional knowledge to grow native plants, restore habitats and train Indigenous adults and other underrepresented students for careers in agriculture. The six-year-old farm has received much of its funding through state and federal grants — but a farm founded on principles of equity and sustainability is a target for cuts under the Trump administration. As she led U.S. Rep. Andrea Salinas, D-Oregon, on a tour of the farm Wednesday, founder Rose High Bear half-jokingly asked if she could still use the words “equity” and “climate,” both terms Trump and his team have disparaged and used as keywords to find disfavored programs and policies. One $750,000 grant, awarded to the farm and community partners to expand tree canopies, was temporarily frozen but restored as of last week, following a letter from Salinas. Two other federal grants meant for workforce development are still on hold. “We need to restore the planet, and this is one way to do it,” Salinas said. “I keep saying, let’s bring all solutions to the table. This is just one, but if I can write a letter and unfreeze funds, I’m going to do it.” High Bear, an Alaska Native of Deg Hitʼan and Inupiat descent, founded the farm in 2019 after retiring as executive director of Wisdom of the Elders, a Portland-based nonprofit dedicated to preserving and sharing Indigenous history. She said the work is spiritual, and that she trusts ancestors will help guide the farm’s workers to accomplish their task of restoring the earth and raising awareness of traditional ecological knowledge. “We have no doubt in our mind that what we’re doing is right,” High Bear said. “If a government doesn’t necessarily believe in it, that doesn’t mean they’re going to stop us from doing our work — no matter what, we’re going to accomplish it.”Right now, much of the work consists of developing a native tree nursery, with Willamette Valley ponderosa pines, as well as firs and other pines native to the region. About 1,000 of those trees, as well as companion shrubs and pollinator ground cover plants, will be planted in areas of Salem that lack tree canopies. The farm will work with local high school students, as well as its adult interns, on the project. Natural shade from tree canopies helps cool the air and reduce air pollution. Nearby trees also increase home values and help prevent stormwater runoff. The farm will also feature a garden planted with the “three sisters” — maize, beans and squash — growing together. Hopi corn will provide a natural trellis for the Cherokee Trail of Tears beans, which convert nitrogen in the air to soil nitrates. Leaves of the summer and winter squash that make up the lower level provide shade, suppress weeds and retain soil moisture. The farm doesn’t use pesticides. Instead, workers manually remove most pests — and are resigned to some others, including deer who wander through nibbling on plants. “This is our oldest grandmother here, Mother Earth, and we’re not going to put poison on her just to get rid of our new neighbors,” High Bear said. Dawn Lowe, an Indigenous traditional ecological knowledge instructor of Hawaiian, Apache, Cherokee, and Mohawk descent, told Salinas the farm could always use more grant money to expand its work. “There’s a lot that we want to be able to achieve in the crisis we’re living through,” Lowe said. Each day at the farm includes some classtime, with videos or reading, and a discussion about a different topic. On Wednesday, that topic was seeds — saving, germinating and choosing them. Then interns spend time working with plants, including transplanting native pines and planting an elderberry forest heading up the hill.For Joaquin Ocaña, interning at the Elderberry Wisdom Farm is part of connecting with his heritage. On his father’s side, Ocaña is descended from the Kaqchikel people, an Indigenous Maya group from the highlands of Guatemala. Trying to connect to that side of his identity over the past few years led Ocaña to farming and spirituality, but feeling that connection is still a work in progress, Ocaña said. “I’ve never actually been to the place where my people are from, so I think that part is kind of lacking for now,” he said. “I’m still very young and figuring it out, but there are some things that as an individual that you can pay attention to and feel. Those can be my family guiding me and helping me along the way.”Intern Amanda Puitiza, an Oregon State University graduate student completing her Ph.D. in animal sciences, said she learned more about ecology and traditional practices at the farm than she did through her classes or prior work. She grew up in New York, and on the East Coast she said there wasn’t as much discussion about traditional practices outside of specific communities. “I’m really happy to get another perspective on how we’re protecting the environment or the ecosystem, trying to make it healthier,” Puitiza said. “I think it makes me a better learner and teacher in general, just to have more perspectives.” C.J. Senn, an enrolled member of the Umatilla Tribe, pivoted from 13 years working as a pastry chef to finishing her double major in environmental studies and science at Portland State University. After graduation, she’ll join her tribe working on huckleberry genealogy. The most valuable thing Senn has learned through interning at the Elderberry Wisdom Farm, and that she hopes to continue working on, is how to relate to plants and animals. “It’s really just about being a part of it, rather than trying to manipulate it,” Senn said. -- Julia Shumway, Oregon Capital ChronicleThe Oregon Capital Chronicle, founded in 2021, is a nonprofit news organization that focuses on Oregon state government, politics and policy.

Indigenous river campaigner from Peru wins prestigious Goldman prize

Mari Luz Canaquiri Murayari led a successful legal battle to protect the Marañon River in the Peruvian AmazonPrize recognises seven activists fighting corporate powerAn Indigenous campaigner and women’s leader from the Peruvian Amazon has been awarded the prestigious Goldman prize for environmental activists, after leading a successful legal campaign that led to the river where her people, the Kukama, live being granted legal personhood.Mari Luz Canaquiri Murayari, 57, from the village of Shapajila on the Marañon River, led the Huaynakana Kamatahuara Kana (HKK) women’s association, supported by lawyers from Peru’s Legal Defence Institute, in a campaign to protect the river. After three years, judges in Loreto, Peru’s largest Amazon region, ruled in March 2024 that the Marañon had the right to be free-flowing and free of contamination, respecting an Indigenous worldview that regards a river as a living entity. Continue reading...

An Indigenous campaigner and women’s leader from the Peruvian Amazon has been awarded the prestigious Goldman prize for environmental activists, after leading a successful legal campaign that led to the river where her people, the Kukama, live being granted legal personhood.Mari Luz Canaquiri Murayari, 57, from the village of Shapajila on the Marañon River, led the Huaynakana Kamatahuara Kana (HKK) women’s association, supported by lawyers from Peru’s Legal Defence Institute, in a campaign to protect the river. After three years, judges in Loreto, Peru’s largest Amazon region, ruled in March 2024 that the Marañon had the right to be free-flowing and free of contamination, respecting an Indigenous worldview that regards a river as a living entity.It was a landmark ruling in Peru. The court in Iquitos, Loreto’s capital city, found the Peruvian government had violated the river’s inherent rights, and ordered it to take immediate action to prevent future oil spills into the waterway. The court also ruled that the government must mandate the creation of a protection plan for the entire river basin and recognise the Kukama community as its stewards. The government appealed against the decision, but the court upheld the ruling in October 2024.“She is the ‘mother of rivers’, the Marañon is born in the Andes and flows downstream to become the Amazon River,” Canaquiri said. The Kukama believe the river is sacred and that their ancestors’ spirits reside in its bed. for four decades, however, the Kukama have endured scores of oil spills which destroy fish stocks, damage the ecosystem and contaminate the water with heavy metals.The village of Shapajila on the Marañon River. Photograph: Goldman Environmental PrizeThe Peruvian state oil company Petroperú began building the the Northern Peruvian pipeline in 1970s, and the region around the Marañon River has accounted for 40% of the county’s oil production since 2014 – with devastating effects. There have been more than 60 oil spills along the river since 1997, some of them catastrophic.“My grandparents taught me that there is a giant boa that lives in the river, Puragua, the ‘mother of the river’,”said Canaquiri. The spirit represents the health of the river and its personhood, according to the Kukama’s cosmovision.In practical terms, the Kukama depend on the river for transport, agriculture, water and fish, which is their main protein source. As a result of the the oil drilling, however, they have become highly vulnerable to water contamination.Local people have suffered from fevers, diarrhoea, skin rashes and miscarriages after oil spills, and elevated levels of lead, mercury, arsenic and cadmium were found in the blood of river community members in a 2021 study.Canaquiri, a mother of four with six grandchildren, remembers a blissful childhood with abundant fish and animals before the oil drilling began. “There was plenty of food. We shared everything, worked on each other’s farms and celebrated the festivals together,” she said.Mari Luz Canaquiri Murayari out on the river with members of her community. Photograph: Goldman Environmental PrizeDespite the ruling, the river is not out of danger and Canaquiri and the HKK are asking the Peruvian government to implement the court’s ruling. The fight continues.skip past newsletter promotionThe planet's most important stories. Get all the week's environment news - the good, the bad and the essentialPrivacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.after newsletter promotionPeru’s congress passed an anti-NGO law last month, which the country’s president, Dina Boluarte, approved last week. The law prevents civil society organisations from taking legal action or even giving legal counsel in cases against the state over human rights abuses.Canaquiri says the law could cripple their legal battle. “It is worrying because it means lawyers cannot take our cases to enforce our fundamental rights,” she said.“It is not just for us, it is also for the country and the world. Who can live without breathing? If it wasn’t for the Amazon, the forest, the rivers, we wouldn’t have clean air to breathe. How would we get food to eat every day, our fruits, our vegetables, our animals, our fish?”She says she and the HKK are motivated by the future of their children and grandchildren,: “The government needs to understand that it should not kill nature but protect it. Otherwise, what hope will our children, the next generation, have?

Brazil's Indigenous Leader Raoni Says He Is Against Drilling for Oil in Amazon Region

By Lais MoraisBRASILIA (Reuters) -Brazil should not explore oil reserves in the Amazon region, because of the dangerous impact on local communities...

BRASILIA (Reuters) -Brazil should not explore oil reserves in the Amazon region, because of the dangerous impact on local communities, Indigenous leader Raoni Metuktire, of the Kayapo people, told Reuters during the country's largest Indigenous gathering last week.Raoni's comments at the gathering, called Acampamento Terra Livre, come as debate heats up around Brazil's state-run oil firm Petrobras' bid to drill for oil off the coast of the Amazonian state of Amapa, in the sensitive Foz do Amazonas basin."I'm against this oil project," said Raoni, days after he met with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. "I personally told President Lula that I am against it, I do not accept this oil in the Amazon."Though Lula has sought to be recognized as a champion of the world's tropical forests and Brazil's Indigenous peoples, he has also said that the country should be able to drill in the environmentally sensitive Foz do Amazonas basin. He has criticized the country's environmental agency Ibama for its delay in giving Petrobras a license to do so.Raoni, who has been an internationally recognized environmental campaigner for decades, was one of the few people invited by Lula to stand by him when he was sworn in for his third term as president in January 2023. In May 2023, Ibama denied Petrobras' request for an offshore drilling license for Foz do Amazonas, citing environmental concerns. It later also highlighted concerns over the effects the drilling could have on Amapa's Indigenous communities. The oil company appealed, but a final Ibama decision is pending.The Foz do Amazonas basin is in Brazil's Equatorial Margin, considered the country's most promising oil frontier, sharing geology with nearby Guyana, where Exxon Mobil is developing huge oil fields. (Reporting by Lais Morais in Brasilia, writing by Fabio Teixeira, editing by Manuela Andreoni and Aurora Ellis)Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

This Land Is Our Land: New Books About Public Lands, the Threats They Face, and Their Ecological Importance

These new books cover challenges to our shared land, ranging from Indigenous appropriation to current corporate grabs. The post This Land Is <i>Our&lt;/i> Land: New Books About Public Lands, the Threats They Face, and Their Ecological Importance appeared first on The Revelator.

In a perfect world, a book-review column focused on public lands would provide readers with exciting tips and insights about visiting national parks and monuments, wildlife refuges, and other breathtaking sites across the United States. But it’s not a perfect world: Today America’s public lands face their greatest threats as the Trump administration expands the extractive economy, slashes agency workforces, seeks to shrink national monuments, and makes plans to sell off many of our natural assets — even as attendance at our national parks continues to soar to record levels. That’s why several new and forthcoming books about public lands are essential reading: They put this new threat into historical context, reveal the complexities and contradictions in our public-lands policies, offer insight into their current and future protections, and remind us of their beauty and ecological importance. Some of them also teach us how to get maximum enjoyment out of a visit to a national park. Here are a dozen-plus new books about public lands, published in 2024 and 2025, along with their official descriptions. The links go to the publishers’ sites, but you should also be able to request these books through your local booksellers or public libraries. We’ve also provided a list of several must-have, critical, and fundamental books about public lands for your environmental library and book collections — a list especially for new and young environmentalists and those new to environmentalism who seek core information as a foundation for their advocacy and understanding in today’s world. Before we get to the traditionally published books, we thought it was important to mention one of the primary texts being used right now to attack public lands: Project 2025: Mandate for Leadership We include this one on the list to reveal the strategies of those trying to monetize and minimize America’s public lands. There’s a lot to digest and understand in this roadmap for unworking the federal government; for the primary section affecting national parks, monuments, and forests, skip to Chapter 16 on the Department of the Interior by self-styled “Sagebrush Rebel” William Perry Pendley. Making America’s Public Lands: The Contested History of Conservation on Federal Lands by Adam M. Sowards Environmental historian Adam Sowards synthesizes public-lands history from the beginning of the republic to recent controversies. The U.S. federal government owns more than a quarter of the nation’s landscape, managed by four federal agencies. It intersects history with nature, politics, and economics and explores how the concept of “public” has been controversial from the start, from homesteader visions to free-enterprise ranchers to activists. Americans have a stake in these lands: They are, after all, ours. Public Land and Democracy in America: Understanding Conflict over Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument by Julie Brugger Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in southern Utah has figured prominently in the long and ongoing struggle over the meaning and value of America’s public lands. In 1996 President Bill Clinton used the Antiquities Act to create the monument, with the goal of protecting scientific and historical resources. This book focuses on the perspectives of diverse groups affected by conflict over the monument. Brugger considers how conceptions of democracy have shaped and been shaped by the regional landscape and by these disputes. Through this ethnographic evidence, Brugger proposes a concept of democracy that encompasses disparate meanings and experiences, embraces conflict, and suggests a crucial role for public lands in transforming antagonism into agonism. The Other Public Lands: Preservation, Extraction, and Politics on the Fifty States’ Natural Resource Lands by Steven Davis A comprehensive primer on state public lands and the political dynamics that underlie their management. For most Americans state lands are the most accessible type of public land; however, despite their ubiquity, they remain largely terra incognita. Offering a wide-angle overview, Davis focuses on how states prioritize competing claims related to conservation, resource development, tourism, recreation, and finances. Exploring differences and common patterns in state land management, he examines the privatization and commercialization of state parks and the tensions between recreation, revenue, and the preservation of biodiversity and natural landscapes. He also raises issues about equity, access, appropriate development, and ecological health. With current demands to transfer federal lands to the states, Davis concludes with an appraisal of whether states could handle this transfer and suggests ways to ensure adequate access in an era of increased need. The Enduring Wild: A Journey Into California’s Public Lands by Josh Jackson A galvanizing road trip across California’s immense public wilderness from a beloved adventurer. It all began with a camping trip. Outdoor enthusiast Josh Jackson had never heard of “BLM land” before a casual recommendation from a friend led him to a free campsite in the desert — and the revelation that over 15 million acres of land in California are owned collectively by the people. In The Enduring Wild, he takes us on a road trip spanning thousands of miles, crisscrossing the Golden State to seek out every parcel of public wilderness, from the Pacific shores of the King Range down to the Mojave Desert. Over mountains, across prairies, and through sagebrush, Jackson unravels the stories of these lands: The Indigenous peoples who have called them home to the extractives’ threats that imperil them today, and of the grassroots organizers and political champions who have rallied to their common defense to uphold the radical mandate to protect these natural treasures for generations to come. Conserving Nature in Greater Yellowstone: Controversy and Change in an Iconic Ecosystem by Robert B. Keiter For more than 150 years, the 23-million-acre Yellowstone region — now widely known as the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem — has played a prominent role in the United States’ nature conservation agenda. In this book Robert B. Keiter, an award-winning public land law and policy expert, traces the evolution and application of fundamental ecological conservation concepts tied to Yellowstone. Keiter’s book highlights both the conservation successes and controversies connected with this storied region. Extending across three states and twenty counties and embracing more than sixteen million acres of federal land as well as private and tribal lands, Yellowstone is a complex, jurisdictionally fragmented landscape. The quest for common ground among federal land managers, state officials, local communities, conservationists, ranchers, Indigenous tribes, and others is a vital, enduring task. (Available July 2025)  Land Back: Relational Landscapes of Indigenous Resistance across the Americas edited by Heather Dorries and Michelle Daigle Relationships with land are fundamental components of Indigenous worldviews, politics, and identity. The disruption of land relations is a defining feature of colonialism; colonial governments and capitalist industries have violently dispossessed Indigenous lands, undermining Indigenous political authority through the production of racialized and gendered hierarchies of difference. The collection of voices in Land Back highlight the ways Indigenous peoples and anticolonial co-resistors understand land relations for political resurgence and freedom across the Americas, examining the relationships of language, Indigenous ontologies, and land reclamation; Indigenous ecology and restoration; the interconnectivity of environmental exploitation and racial, class, and gender exploitation; Indigenous diasporic movement; community urban planning; transnational organizing and relational anti-racist place-making; and the role of storytelling and children in movements for liberation. Marketing the Wilderness: Outdoor Recreation, Indigenous Activism, and the Battle over Public Lands by Joseph Whitson While outdoor industry marketing promotes an image of “the wilderness” as an unpeopled haven, this book is an analysis of the relationship between the outdoor recreation industry, U.S. public lands, and Indigenous sovereignty and representation in recreational spaces. Combining social media analysis, digital ethnography, and historical research, Whitson offers nuanced insights into more than a century of the outdoor recreation industry’s marketing strategies, unraveling its complicity in settler colonialism. Complicating the narrative of outdoor recreation as a universal good, Whitson introduces the concept of “wildernessing” to describe the physical, legal, and rhetorical production of pristine, empty lands that undergirds the outdoor recreation industry, a process that further disenfranchises Indigenous people from whom these lands were stolen. Through the lens of environmental justice activism, Marketing the Wilderness reconsiders the ethics of the deeply fraught relationship between the outdoor recreation industry and Indigenous communities. Emphasizing the power of the corporate system and its treatment of land as a commodity under capitalism, he shows how these tensions shape the American idea of “wilderness” and what it means to fight for its preservation. National Parks, Native Sovereignty: Experiments in Collaboration edited by Christina Gish Hill, Matthew J. Hill, and Brooke Neely The history of national parks in the United States mirrors the fraught relations between the Department of the Interior and the nation’s Indigenous peoples. But amidst the challenges are examples of success. This collection of essays proposes a reorientation of relationships between tribal nations and national parks, placing Indigenous peoples as co-stewards through strategic collaboration. More than simple consultation, strategic collaboration, as the authors define it, involves the complex process by which participants come together to find ways to engage with one another across sometimes-conflicting interests. In case studies and interviews, the authors and editors of this volume — scholars as well as National Park Service staff and Tribal historic preservation officers — explore pathways for collaboration, emphasizing emotional commitment, mutual respect, and patience, rather than focusing on “land-back” solutions, in the cocreation of a socially sensible public-lands policy. Land Power: Who Has It, Who Doesn’t, and How That Determines the Fate of Societies by Michael Albertus For millennia land has been a symbol of wealth and privilege. But the true power of land ownership is even greater than we might think. Political scientist Michael Albertus shows that who owns the land determines whether a society will be equal or unequal, whether it will develop or decline, and whether it will safeguard or sacrifice its environment. With an overview of modern global land reallocation history, Albertus shows how the shuffle continues today as governments vie for power and prosperity by choosing who should get land. Drawing on a career’s worth of original research and on-the-ground fieldwork, Albertus shows that choices about who owns the land have locked in poverty, sexism, racism, and climate crisis — and that what we do with the land today can change our collective fate. Global in scope, Land Power argues that saving civilization must begin with the earth under our feet. Bison: Community Builders and Grassland Caretakers by Frances Backhouse Some 170,000 wood bison, North America’s largest land animals, once roamed northern regions, while at least 30 million plains bison trekked across the rest of the continent. Almost driven to extinction in the 1800s by decades of slaughter and hunting, this ecological and cultural keystone species supports biodiversity and strengthens the ecosystems around it. Bison: Community Builders and Grassland Caretakers celebrates the traditions and teachings of Indigenous Peoples and looks at how bison lovers of all backgrounds came together to save these iconic animals. Learn about the places where bison are regaining a hoof-hold and meet some of the young people who are welcoming bison back home. Sea of Grass: The Conquest, Ruin, and Redemption of Nature on the American Prairie by Dave Hage and Josephine Marcotty A vivid portrait of the American prairie, which rivals the rainforest in its biological diversity and, with little notice, is disappearing even faster. The North American prairie is an ecological marvel, a lush carpet of grass that stretches to the horizon, and home to some of the nation’s most iconic creatures — bison, elk, wolves, pronghorn, prairie dogs, and bald eagles. Plants, microbes, and animals together made the grasslands one of the richest ecosystems on Earth and a massive carbon sink, but the constant expansion of agriculture threatens what remains. Exploring humanity’s relationship with this incredible land, this book offers a deep, compassionate analysis of the difficult decisions and opportunities facing agricultural and Indigenous communities. A vivid portrait of the heartland ecosystem that argues why the future of this region is essential far beyond the heartland. 2025 Rand McNally Road Atlas & National Park Guide Showcasing our country’s astonishing beauty, the Rand McNally Road Atlas & National Park Guide is packed with hundreds of photos, essential visitor information, and insightful travel tips for all 63 of America’s national parks. Includes a complete 2025 Rand McNally Road Atlas to make navigating a breeze, plus tourism websites and phone numbers for every U.S. state and Canadian province on map pages. More Must-Read, Fundamental Public Lands Books for Every Environmentalist’s Collection Literally hundreds of books about public land have crossed our desks since The Revelator started publishing eight years ago. Here’s a compendium of several must-have, critical, and fundamental books about public lands for your environmental library and book collections — a list especially relevant for new and young environmentalists who seek essential information to create a foundation for their advocacy and understanding in today’s often “anti-climate-change” world. In Defense of Public Lands: The Case Against Privatization and Transfer by Steven Davis Briefly lays out the history and characteristics of public lands at the local, state, and federal levels while examining the numerous policy prescriptions for their privatization or, in the case of federal lands, transfer. American Zion: Cliven Bundy, God & Public Lands in the West by Betsy Gaines Quammen Quammen, historian and conservationist, documents the ongoing feud between the Bundy ranching family, the federal government, and the American public, examining the roots of the Bundys’ cowboy confrontations, and how history has shaped an often-dangerous mindset which today feeds the militia movement and threatens public lands, wild species, and American heritage. George Meléndez Wright: The Fight for Wildlife and Wilderness in the National Parks by Jerry Emory The first biography of a visionary biologist whose groundbreaking ideas regarding wildlife and science revolutionized national parks. This Contested Land: The Storied Past and Uncertain Future of America’s National Monuments by McKenzie Long One woman’s enlightening trek through the natural histories, cultural stories, and present perils of thirteen national monuments, from Maine to Hawaii. Our Common Ground: A History of America’s Public Lands by John D. Leshy A leading expert in public-lands policy, Leshy discusses the key political decisions that led to this, beginning at the very founding of the nation. He traces the emergence of a bipartisan political consensus in favor of the national government holding these vast land areas primarily for recreation, education, and conservation of biodiversity and cultural resources. History Comics: The National Parks by Falynn Koch Turn back the clock to 1872, when Congress established Yellowstone National Park as an area of unspoiled beauty for the “benefit and enjoyment of the people.” Meet the visionaries, artists, and lovers of the American wilderness who fought against corruption and self-interest to carve out and protect these spaces for future generations. See for yourself how the idea of national parks began, how they’ve changed, and how they continue to define America. Head to your public library or local bookstore for all these great books about public lands. For hundreds of additional environmental books — including several more on these and related issues — visit the Revelator Reads archives. Previously in The Revelator: Saving America’s National Parks and Forests Means Shaking Off the Rust of Inaction Trump’s Approach to Public Lands? Expanding the Extractive Economy and Declaring a War on Nature The post This Land Is <i>Our&lt;/i> Land: New Books About Public Lands, the Threats They Face, and Their Ecological Importance appeared first on The Revelator.

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