Learning from Lax Kwil Ts’iit: Gitga’at Resource Use at Clamstown

Indigenous peoples on the northwest coast have modified marine and coastal ecosystems to enhance food resources, shaping both local biodiversity and ecosystem structure since Time Immemorial. Forest Gardens near villages enhance food plant abundance and diversity, while Clam Gardens and managed clam beds improve clam productivity in the intertidal zone. Today these sites remain vital for cultural practice, food security, and conservation but face various human-caused threats, including climate change, development, and resource extraction. Our research in Gitga’at Territory combines archaeology and ecology to study these cultivated ecosystems, documenting their history and informing future policy along a rapidly changing coast.

Faculty Supervisor:

Camilla Speller

Student:

Partner:

World Wildlife Fund Canada (Toronto, ON)

Discipline:

Life Sciences

Sector:

Other services (except public administration)

University:

The University of British Columbia

Program: