Holistic Benefits of Cultural Burning

You may have heard of prescribed burns. How are they different from cultural burns? Both are lower intensity controlled fires and both are important methods of large wildfire prevention [1]. However, there are two important differences. First, while prescribed burns are a relatively new tool in modern fire management, cultural burns have been practiced for millenia. Second, cultural burning exceeds the boundaries of mere fire protection and connects to wider indigenous practices, including the cultivation of materials, food and medicine, and the retention of groundwater [2].

How does setting fires prevent fires? In forests, fire is not only inevitable but also necessary. Small fires set by experts can burn up dead plants in forests. This way, they decrease the amount of fuel that can be used as kindling by a newly burning fire that was not intentionally set and could otherwise burn out of control [3]. While this benefit of cultural burning is crucial, it is not the only one that exists [1]. There are many reasons why cultural burning is crucial to human communities and whole ecosystems in addition to wildfire prevention [1]. 

If you live in California, you have probably experienced a drought first hand. In fact, this is true for more and more people due to climate change [4]. But did you know that controlled burns can help mitigate droughts’ harm to the ecosystem [1]? In particular, lack of rainfall causes problems for pollinators who depend on an abundance of flowers for their survival [1]. This is where controlled burns come in: small fires create debris from dead trees which bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds use to build their nests [1]. These nest habitats, in turn, help pollinator populations rebound after droughts. 

While all species benefit from a healthy ecosystem maintained by cultural burning [1], humans also directly benefit from this practice. Controlled burns help Indigenous Peoples manage and improve the growth of plants such as edible berries and roots [1]. Additionally, certain types of these plants are not just eaten as food but also used as medicine [1], making this benefit even more important. Cultural burning is also known to improve and stimulate groundwater retention and is part of a holistic approach to ecosystem management [5]. 

California Native communities have practiced cultural burning for thousands of years due to its many benefits, including but not limited to large wildfire prevention [1]. In indigenous worldviews, humans are often thought of as interconnected with and inextricably tied to ecosystems and the many varied species that share them. For this reason, the balanced relationship between humans and natural environments can be considered both as reciprocal and as duty-based [6]. Following this line of thought, practicing cultural burning is not only beneficial to humans but is also humans’ duty to the ecosystem [7, 8].

The science behind our Robotic-Assisted Wood Waste Removal Project is inspired by the fire management techniques created by California’s first peoples, including local Miwok and Yokut nations. It is important to recognize that Traditional Ecological Knowledge is behind some of the biggest scientific innovations in land management today, especially when it comes to managing and preventing extreme fires. For this reason, we are particularly grateful to be working with Dina Gilio-Whitaker, who is helping us to connect with California Native communities and continue learning from and working alongside them and also helped us with this post.

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Figure 1

Real photo of a controlled burn by members of Greenville Rancheria, being used to create more growth of a specific plant species (beargrass) [1].  

Sources:

1. Long, J. W., Lake, F. K., & Goode, R. W. (2021). The importance of Indigenous cultural burning in forested regions of the Pacific West, USA. Forest Ecology and Management, 500, 119597. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foreco.2021.119597

2. Avitt, A. “Tribal and Indigenous Fire” (2021). U.S. Department of Agriculture. Forest Service. https://www.fs.usda.gov/about-agency/features/tribal-and-indigenous-fire-tradition#:~:text=Cultural%20burns%20are%20lower%20intensity,essential%20to%20centuries%2Dlong%20traditions

3. Pereira, P., Bogunovic, I., Zhao, W., & Barcelo, D. (2021). Short-term effect of wildfires and prescribed fires on ecosystem services. Current Opinion in Environmental Science & Health, 22, 100266. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coesh.2021.100266 

4.Ponisio, L. C., Wilkin, K., M’Gonigle, L. K., Kulhanek, K., Cook, L., Thorp, R., Griswold, T., & Kremen, C. (2016). Pyrodiversity begets plant–pollinator community diversity. Global Change Biology, 22(5), 1794–1808. https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.13236 

5. California Water Science Center. (2024). “Culturally Prescribed Fire.”  United States Geological Survey. https://www.usgs.gov/centers/california-water-science-center/science/culturally-prescribed-fire

6. Whyte, K. (2018). Critical Investigations of Resilience: A Brief Introduction to Indigenous Environmental Studies & Sciences. Daedalus, 147(2), 136–147. https://doi.org/10.1162/DAED_a_00497 

7. Deur, D., Turner, N., NANCY J. TURNER, & DOUGLAS DEUR. (2005). Keeping It Living: Traditions of Plant Use and Cultivation on the Northwest Coast of North America (1st ed.). University of Washington Press. 

8.  Strass, K. (2010). Huckleberry harvesting of the Salish and Kootenai of the Flathead Reservation. West: Practicum in field biology. University of Notre Dame,UNDERC Dept. of Biology, Land O’Lakes, WI.