Living Lakes Canada is partnering with First Nation communities across British Columbia to simultaneously integrate traditional western science by using the standardized CABIN protocol with the inclusion of Indigenous language, as the first stages of a cultural preservation project.
Living Lakes Canada will continue with the momentum developed in the Cultural Connections Pilot Project in partnership with the Ktunaxa Nation Council to interweave Indigenous Knowledge and western science for joint watershed health evaluation and stewardship to support informed decision-making, working towards on the ground examples of co-development of watershed assessment methods.
The 2018 field season included workshops with the Liard River Guardians (Dene Nan Yadeh) program and 9 different First Nation representatives from the Skeena watershed.
If you or your community are interested in participating in the preliminary stages of the language and cultural preservation project that will contribute to the evolution of the CABIN stream assessment protocol to include traditional stream names, language and Traditional Knowledge, please contact Raegan Mallinson at raegan@livinglakescanada.ca.
Living Lakes Canada is trained by Environment and Climate Change Canada to train community groups, professionals, industry and First Nation communities in the CABIN methodology, the established national protocol in Canada that collects benthic macroinvertebrates and uses their counts as an indicator of a water body’s health.
