The Chewaucan Basin has been home to bands of the Northern Paiute since time immemorial. The Northern Paiute bands are now a part of at least four federally recognized tribes: the Burns Paiute, the Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs, the Fort Bidwell Indian Community, and the Klamath Tribes. Settlers arrived in the region in the late 1800s, and many of their descendants still operate multi-generational ranches in the basin today. These ranches rely on the Chewaucan Marshes, which are flood-irrigated fields of native grasses on the site of a historic wetland, to provide feed for their cattle. These wetlands are an important habitat for migratory waterfowl in the spring, such as Northern Pintails. From the Chewaucan Marshes, the Chewaucan River flows south towards the community of Valley Falls before it turns north and terminates in Lake Abert. A crucial stop on the Pacific Flyway, the lake provides an incredibly important habitat for shorebirds migrating south in the fall as its unique hypersaline nature provides extensive food sources, including alkali flies and brine shrimp. At the peak of migration, populations around the lake can reach up to hundreds of thousands of birds.
The Partnership for Lake Abert and the Chewaucan Basin (PLACE) is a collaborative group made up of local ranchers, environmentalists, tribal governments, and state and federal agencies interested in addressing the challenges of water management within the Chewaucan basin. Together, this diverse group of stakeholders has been working to form a shared understanding of water resources in the Chewaucan basin with the support of Oregon Consensus and Oregon State University (OSU) through a joint fact finding effort. This joint fact finding process has involved the development of a report that comprehensively addresses the known information regarding five key areas in the Chewaucan basin: water resources, agricultural practices, fish and wildlife, cultural heritage/lived experiences, uplands processes, and drought considerations. This report has been collaboratively compiled by members of the PLAC collaborative, OSU, and Oregon Consensus.
Scientific Literature
Click here to explore peer-reviewed journal articles, federal agency reports, and other scientific literature on the land and water resources of the Chewaucan Basin.
Traditional Ecological Knowledge
Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) is the accumulation of knowledge, practice and belief about relationships between living beings in a specific ecosystem that is acquired by Indigenous people over long periods of time through direct contact with the environment and handed down through generations. The Indigenous peoples of the Chewaucan Basin have a special connection to the land and provide important sources of information about the area's history and natural resource management.
Lived experience
Explore peer-reviewed journal articles, federal agency reports, and other scientific literature on the land and water resources of the Chewaucan Basin.
Learn more about Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) and how the Indigenous peoples of the Chewaucan Basin have a special connection to the land, history, and natural resource management.
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