Words by Smiley Team
With towering trunks grown over hundreds of years, California redwoods are the tallest living things on Earth. Their size and beauty gave them a sacred status for indigenous Sinkyone people, who occupied these forests generations ago.
Now, for the first time since colonisation in the 16th century, more than 500 acres of redwood forest is being returned to its original guardians.
Two nonprofit organisations, Save the Redwoods League and the InterTribal Sinkyone Wilderness Council, purchased the land and are donating ownership to the Sinkyone people. To mark the handover, the forest, formerly known as Andersonia West, has regained its original name, Tc'ih-Léh-Dûñ, which means "Fish Run Place."
"Renaming the property Tc'ih-Léh-Dûñ lets people know that it's a sacred place; it's a place for our Native people," said Christa Ray of the Sinkyone Council. "It lets them know that there was a language and that there was a people who lived there long before now."
Made up of representatives from ten tribal nations, the Sinkyone Council says indigenous people "were forcibly removed by European American settlers generations ago."
"This place is within the Sinkyone traditional territory, that for thousands of years it has been and still remains an area of importance for the Sinkyone people, and that it holds great cultural significance for the Sinkyone Council and its member tribes," said Council chairwoman Priscilla Hunter.
Pacific Gas & Electric Company helped purchase the land as part of a conservation project following accusations that PG&E equipment was responsible for sparking wildfires in the area.
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By handing the land over to indigenous people, the company and environmentalists hope to restore the land and protect threatened wildlife with a combination of Indigenous practices, science-based approaches and fire safety protections.
"We believe the best way to permanently protect and heal this land is through tribal stewardship. In this process, we have an opportunity to restore balance in the ecosystem and in the communities connected to it, while also accelerating the pace and scale of conserving California’s iconic redwood forests,” said Sam Hodder, president and CEO of Save the Redwoods League.
The donation of 523 acres of forest is the second made by Save the Redwoods League to indigenous people, the first being 164 acres of forest also located on California’s North Coast.
Due to excessive logging throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, only five percent of the original old-growth redwood forest remains in the area.
To protect more of the world’s tallest trees donate to Save the Redwoods League.
