A cross-cultural collaborative project is helping protect the unique biodiversity and cultural assets of the Great Southern region of Western Australia.
The Walking Together Project at UWA’s Albany Campus combines Noongar knowledge with Western science to assist conservation.
In 2020-21, the project supported PhD candidate Ursula Rodrigues — recipient of the RSWA John Glover Research Grant — to research cross-cultural bushfire mitigation strategies along with fellow researchers Professor Steve Hopper and Dr Alison Lullfitz and Noongar Elders Aden Eades, Averil Dean, Carol Pettersen, Ezzard Flowers, Lester Coyne, Lynnette Knapp and Treasy Woods.
As well as Noongar Elders, the team interviewed fire practitioners, volunteer brigade members and local landcare organisations to understand differing views of bushfire risk mitigation and how the knowledge and aspirations shared by the Noongar Elders could be applied.
In 2022, as a result of the project, the first Elder-led Noongar burn on Shire of Denmark reserves in generations took place.
“We used a collaborative, cross-disciplinary approach, focusing on working together to achieve outcomes for people and Country,” Ms Rodrigues says.
“Semi-structured interviews and ‘yarning’ demonstrated that a highly nuanced knowledge of Country, including vegetation and fuel conditions, was necessary for achieving the desired outcomes of Noongar fire management.
“In all of the groups interviewed, fuel species, vegetation type, patchwork burning, specific fire placement and fire effects on vegetation were characteristic elements of conversation.
“Non-Noongar participants were concerned by authority to burn and the regulation of burning by governments. Local landcare groups shared a focus on land stewardship with Noongar Elders. Elders and fire practitioners shared practical concerns of fuel consumption, site preparation and fuel load.”
Ms Rodrigues said the research process created space for participating Noongar Elders to reconnect with the reserves and the knowledge of fire passed down to them through generations, and to participate in discussions around a Noongar-led approach for the rejuvenation of cultural fire.
“The Elders’ requirements and recommendations were forwarded to the Shire of Denmark and a pamphlet co-developed to explain the process and findings of the research to interested community members and volunteer fire fighters,” she says.
The research led to a Noongar-led burn in the study reserve where, in a symbolic gesture, the Shire’s Deputy Bushfire Control Officer handed a box of matches to Menang Nadju Elder Carol Pettersen, who lit the fire.
Ms Pettersen’s grandson, Matt Palfrey, and Shawn Colbung, both of Binalup Noongar Rangers, finished the job, demonstrating their methodology to the volunteer fire fighters and fire practitioners present.
“I see this as an opportunity for a two-way learning,” Ms Pettersen says. “Listening to the old cultural ways of doing things which were in practice for thousands of years and looking at how Western science is used today.”
This year, as part of Ms Rodrigues’ PhD project, Caring for People, Country and Communities with Noongar Cultural Fire, burns will take place in the Fitz-Stirling region, between the Fitzgerald River and Stirling Ranges National Park about 100km east of Albany. The burns will take place on private land or land that is part of the Aboriginal Lands Trust.
“We are working very closely on this project with the Nowanup and the Gnowangerup Aboriginal Corporations,” Ms Rodrigues explains.
“We will be monitoring ecological and social outcomes of the burns.”
The project will eventually create opportunities to show the local community what they have been doing and to connect with fire brigades in the region.
This project acknowledges funding contribution of the Commonwealth Government and support from the WA State Emergency Management Committee.
The Walking Together Project, supported by Lotterywest and funded by South Coast Natural Resource Management, is a collaboration with Noongar groups and families and the UWA Albany Campus.
Read the full issue of the Winter 2023 edition of Uniview [PDF 2.7Mb]. The Uniview accessible [PDF 2.9Mb] version is also available.