The wildfire diaries — pt.1
As the climate warms, the deep scars of wildfires endure
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The lost cabin
A native elder returns to a remote hunting and fishing cabin to see if it has survived the devastating Elephant Hill fire of 2017. Along the way, he wonders aloud whether the cabin still stands and whether the traditional Skeetchestn way of life will survive climate change’s latest blows.
Terry Deneault, known as a ‘cultural knowledge-keeper’ for the Skeetchestn Indian Band was heavily affected by wildfires in British Columbia in 2017.
As we pull out of the parking lot, the man at the wheel of the 4×4, Terry Deneault, explains we’ll have to take a long detour to get to our destination. The country road we were planning to take had been washed out the night before. “There’s mud all over the place,” Deneault tells me. “So for safety, we’re going the long way.”
After the fires in 2017 in this central region of British Columbia, Canada, Deneault says, mudslides began rolling down the mountains all over the territory. As the charred hillsides can no longer absorb rainfall and the soil is not held in place by living root systems, water and earth often come tumbling down, taking out roads, bridges, fences and sometimes even cars. The slides, he adds, can hit at any time.
“These washouts come down really fast now,” he says. “You never used to see this. The rain right now is what we are afraid of.”
Deneault is known as a ‘cultural knowledge-keeper’ for the Skeetchestn Indian Band and as we wind our way upwards, it becomes clear why. He tells stories of growing up in a remote mountain camp with his grandfather where he learned how to hunt, fish and gather plants in the traditional way. Some are funny, some are sad. He talks about being taken away to a residential school as a boy, then returning as young man and spending all of his time working to keep the traditional way of life alive. With the pressures of the modern world, development and now these fires and mudslides, it’s not an easy job.
‘The fire has changed everything’
“The place I’m taking you to, is one of the lower-elevation places that is plentiful with everything that we need,” says Deneault. “But because of the mudslides, we have to go way around to get to our mountain,” he says, adding that getting to hunting and gathering grounds normally takes one hour. Now it can take three times that. “This fire has literally changed everything. It’s had a deep impact on our culture.
“The Elephant Hill fire burned 75 per cent of the territory that I’m taking you to,” he continues. “And this year, the Alley Fire literally wiped us out up there. So now what do we do? How do we feed ourselves traditionally? Where do we go to find the berries, the plants, the roots to put the medicines in our body that keep us going?”
The wildlife is also suffering as there are no saplings or clover for the moose, deer and other large animals to eat. “We’re having reports of starving moose because they survive on the twigs [of young saplings] and clover. Now, it’s all gone.”
Until the fires, almost everyone in this community of 250 people relied on the land for a significant portion of their sustenance. After the fires, many subsist on imported food.
“Unfortunately, we have to rely on the system now,” says Deneault, who as knowledge-keeper runs numerous activities to keep traditional ceremonies, language, music and food gathering alive. “I was bringing back the hunting camps, I was bringing back the fishing camps. I was bringing back the teachings for our children so they could go hunt and gather whatever they needed for the winter. So all this has really changed us.”
‘We are not poor’
Still, Deneault says the Skeetchestn have what it takes to survive. “People look at us and think, ‘Oh, you poor Indians’,” he says, his soft-spoken tone rising in volume. “We are not poor. We are a thriving culture. We know everything about this land. We live off it. We’ll never be poor. During the hard 1930s, the great depression, our elders tell us they didn’t even know it was happening.”
In the wake of the fire, the band mobilized to support their members. They ran their own food drive with traditional foods and the Canadian Red Cross Society came in soon after with regular deliveries of food and firewood. “The Red Cross has given us various things — truckloads of fruit, chickens, turkeys, meat — and we are totally thankful. I want to let them know how grateful we are for that. It’s hard for a hunter and gatherer to accept this but we have to. We have no choice. “I also have to thank the grocery stores for being there when we needed them because of the fire and the evacuation. I have three gardens in which I grow what I need for the winter. But after the fire, I couldn’t eat any of it.”As we drive further into the burn zone, we are surrounded by the blackened skeletons of trees.
“Right now, looking at this, I could cry in front of you. It hurts me that much,” says Deneault. “This is Loon Lake. This was a traditional fishing spot. But that’s all gone now. This is another lake affected by the fire. The people here were devastated. Many homes were burnt.”
Terry teaches children in his town about cultural practices and traditions, so that his Band’s heritage doesn’t get lost.
The last straw?
The problem, says Deneault, is that the fires came on top of other pressures on the traditional way of life. “In the old days, in my era, you could go up in the old reserve, you had gunny sacks full of dried things. We had hanging and drying racks for berries, medicine, meat — we had plenty of food to pull us through the winter; no problem. But you don’t see as much of that today now. Now we have all the big stores that a lot of our people go to and get that processed food.”
Meanwhile, the construction of new roads, housing developments and changes in seasonal fish runs due to a warming climate were already putting pressure on their ability to live off the land. “The effects of climate change have been hurting the river systems,” Deneault says. “The rivers are lower, slower and warmer, and salmon are coming up in bad shape because all the run-off causes diseases.”
Other changes affected the forest. As the summers got warmer, new infestations of insects killed off thousands of trees. “That’s why the Elephant Hill fire spread so fast — the forest was red from where bugs had killed everything. Everything left was bone dry; there was lots of fuel for the fire to go through non-stop.” This is one reason many here fear that the worst is yet to come. “If another fire sparks up, it’ll be even more devastating; trunks are all dried out now.”
‘What does is mean?’
Finally, after about two hours of driving, Deneault pulls the pick-up on to a grassy area. We get out and walk to the cabin. “This is one of the most important areas for us as hunters and gatherers,” he says as we march through the grass.
A few yards on, he stops. “Oh, my god. My cabin’s gone.
“We had a hunting and fishing cabin right here,” he says, standing by the only remaining remnants, a twisted metal structure. “These are drying racks for fish, moose and deer. This is where we did a lot of work. It was a beautiful cabin. There’s nothing left of it.”
He takes me to a small creek where fisherfolk used to pull out fish. “It’s sad to see this.” But then he spots a sign of hope: a moose track in the grassy bank. “Good to see that moose track. Looks like they came in and ate stuff growing out of the water.
“Culturally, traditionally, spiritually, I’m still trying to put two and two together,” he says. “What does climate change really mean? I know what it’s done to us already but how can we look 20, 30, 40 years ahead? Are we even going to be around? With our language, with what we know about our land? Will there be land around to continue this lifestyle? That’s what I need to know.”
This article was written by Katherine Mueller, communication humanitarian specialist and reporter.
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