Pepperwood hikes and classes offer Indigenous perspective

On a recent cool and cloudy fall afternoon at Pepperwood Preserve in Santa Rosa, a group of about 20 hikers, a mix of ages, gathered under the umbrella of a massive coast live oak. They had come to the preserve for a hike with an uncommon approach, one that would allow them to look at the landscape through the viewpoint of Native Americans.

“You can feel how special Pepperwood is while standing under the great oaks,” Clint McKay told the hikers, as acorn woodpeckers tap-tap-tapped on trees and crows cawed. “I think about the changes that have occurred since my aunties were alive. If we listen, these trees tell us stories,”

McKay is the Indigenous education coordinator at Pepperwood and chair of the preserve’s Native Advisory Council. His heritage includes Dry Creek Pomo, Wappo and Wintun tribes, and he is a gifted basket weaver. On the day of the hike, he had recently returned from delivering his artistic baskets to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

McKay started the Exploring the Autumn Landscape through an Indigenous Perspective hike with a recitation in his native tongue to “set the tone of the walk,” before he led the hikers along the trails and interpreted this traditional homeland of the Wappo people.

In-person hikes, like the one McKay was leading, restarted in September on Pepperwood Preserve’s 3,200 acres. But the nonprofit Pepperwood Foundation that runs the preserve has another aim, in addition to environmental education.

At Pepperwood’s Dwight Center for Conservation Science, research is being done to further the mission of discovering solutions for the health of the lands, water and wildlife in Northern California.

Among those research projects is one to study the lands’ “water balance.”

Pepperwood staff are testing the hypothesis that forest thinning may increase water yield in an area. Scattered around the preserve are a variety of sensors, both in the ground and above, in “flux towers.” The tower sensors are designed to measure evapotranspiration, in which plants use the water collected from their roots and then release it as vapor into the atmosphere.

Anemometers, which measure wind speed and direction, are set on top of the towers, along with infrared gas analyzers, to measure carbon dioxide and other gasses. These multi-tasking towers also contain radiometers that measure solar radiation. Included in the setup are several types of water gauges.

In other places in Pepperwood, you might see wood cover boards, used at forest monitoring stations. Although low-tech, the cover boards, set on the forest floor, do reveal climate insights: They entice reptiles and amphibians such as California newts to inhabit the cool, dark spaces there and allow the creatures to be counted and monitored to measure changes in species diversity.

“Pepperwood is a living laboratory, where we are researching the impacts of climate variability over time and space on our watersheds and ecosystems,” said Lisa Micheli, lead scientist of Pepperwood’s climate and fire resilience initiative. “This includes studying the mechanisms of drought and fire and how wildlife are doing in the region. We also use the preserve to demonstrate and evaluate Indigenous and science-based stewardship practices. We show people how to do climate adaptation — test good ideas based on science, and then adjust our stewardship as needed based on what we learn.”

Although Pepperwood Preserve retains its beauty, some of its lands were impacted by both the 2017 Tubbs fire and the 2019 Kincade fire. The timely climate and fire resilience work being done at Pepperwood generates data and guidance to help meet future challenges of wildfire.

Webinars continue

The list of new classes is growing at Pepperwood, said the preserve’s Education Director Margaret Boeger. That includes online classes, which will continue.

“People just want to get outside, but we are continuing our online classes on a variety of topics as well,” Boeger said.

Holland Gistelli, education program coordinator, said moving Pepperwood’s Discover Nature lecture series to a livestreamed event on YouTube during the pandemic widened the audience for the series, even attracting viewers from “all over the Americas.”

And there is more to come.

“Another webinar we are looking forward to hosting on Dec. 9 will feature a panel of Soundscapes to Landscapes team members, sharing about how they engage teams of citizen scientists using audio recorders to collect sounds in natural and urban areas throughout Sonoma County to measure regional bird diversity,” Gistelli said.

Passed-down tradition

McKay did not grow up on a reservation, but he was raised to honor the traditional ways of his people. He learned from stories and cultural practices passed down from relatives, including his father.

When McKay decided to move his family to the Dry Creek Rancheria in Geyserville, he learned the significance of basket weaving from his great-aunt, Laura Somersal, who taught him the methods of Pomo basket weaving, including how to harvest, process and weave the necessary plants. And his great-aunt Mabel McKay taught him the fine art of the Dry Creek language.

On the recent hike, he shared some of what he learned from his relatives.

“The bay and black oak trees are very important to my people for many reasons,” McKay said. “Bay leaves are an insect repellent, and we put the green bay leaves into our baskets to preserve them. When we hunt, we rub ourselves down with bay to hide the human scent. Bays were hit hard in the fires but are coming back strong. Black oak provides our preferred acorns for our staple food.”

The redbud bushes at Pepperwood were, and still are, an important plant source for basket making. The first hard frost of the season changes the branches to the desired red color.

McKay explained that in order to obtain strong, straight cane from redbud, it is necessary to tend the plant by cutting it down and allowing it to produce the prized straight materials needed for making baskets.

As the hiking group passed spectacular views of Mount Saint Helena in the distance, McKay paid respect to the beautiful sentinel: “Mount Saint Helena is in our creation story, and it is a very powerful place.”