Traditional Ecological Knowledge Explained: Stewardship, Science and Sovereignty
Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) is living, place-based knowledge developed and maintained through Indigenous peoples’ relationships with their homelands. It includes observations, practices and responsibilities that can guide fishing, farming, forestry, water management, fire stewardship and responses to environmental change.
Understanding TEK also means understanding who holds that knowledge, how it is passed on and who has authority to share it. A useful environmental observation may be inseparable from language, family relationships, governance or obligations to other living beings.
This guide focuses on Indigenous TEK in the United States, with examples from Tribal and intertribal stewardship programs. Their approaches reflect particular peoples and places; they do not represent a single “Native view of nature.”
In this guide: Meaning and terminology · Stewardship examples · TEK and science · Permission to share · CARE Principles · Research agreements · Sovereignty
What does Traditional Ecological Knowledge mean?
The National Park Service’s overview of TEK and Indigenous Knowledge describes knowledge that accumulates through experience with an ecosystem and passes between generations. It encompasses practices and beliefs as well as observations of relationships among people, other living beings and their surroundings.
“Traditional” does not mean unchanging. Communities continue to observe new conditions, evaluate practices and respond to altered landscapes. Inherited knowledge and new learning can work together.
Indigenous Knowledge is often used as a broader term encompassing ecological understanding alongside social, cultural, physical and spiritual systems. Usage varies: TEK, Indigenous Knowledge, Native science and community-specific terms can overlap without being exact equivalents. Follow the terminology used by the Nation and knowledge holders involved.
Knowledge grows through place and responsibility
TEK may include close attention to animal behavior, plant development, water levels, soil, weather and seasonal timing. Its meaning comes from the relationships around those observations.
For example, knowledge of a food plant might involve when it becomes available, who may gather it, how much should remain and what responsibilities follow the harvest. This is an illustration, not a harvesting rule shared by all Nations. The relevant community determines its own practices and protocols.
A list of species or dates therefore captures only part of a knowledge system. Removing observations from their language, place and responsibilities can change what those observations mean.
Examples of TEK in environmental stewardship
Ojibwe communities: seasonal change and climate adaptation
The Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission (GLIFWC) works with Traditional Ecological Knowledge and scientific ecological knowledge in Ojibwe ceded territories. Its climate-change program describes an approach in which TEK helps guide the work, including attention to culturally important plants and animals.
One example is phenology—the study of seasonal timing. The program combines plant monitoring with observations and stories from elders and harvesters. Changes in flowering, ripening and other seasonal events can affect when foods and medicines are available. These relationships help shape questions about climate impacts and adaptation.
Columbia River Tribes: salmon and river restoration
The Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission’s Spirit of the Salmon plan explains how TEK and science inform restoration. It treats knowledge as evolving and connects ecological understanding with responsibilities to the land and water.
The plan highlights the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation’s First Foods approach to river management. That approach links culturally important foods with the ecological conditions needed to sustain them. It demonstrates how community priorities can help define restoration goals, rather than being added after technical decisions are made.
Karuk Tribe: fire, forests and cultural stewardship
The Karuk Tribe’s Eco-Cultural Revitalization Branch describes work connecting cultural responsibilities with forest and fire management. Its programs include support for cultural fire practitioners, prescribed fire, fuel reduction and forest restoration.
The Tribe explains that fire suppression disrupted Indigenous burning practices used to care for important resources and habitats. Its present work combines cultural knowledge and contemporary management tools. Cultural burning should be understood through the relevant people’s purposes and authority; it is not a generic technique that can be copied without that context.
How TEK and scientific research can work together
Indigenous knowledge and scientific research can examine the same environmental changes through different methods, time scales and relationships. Their boundaries are not absolute: Indigenous people are also scientists, and Tribal natural-resource departments conduct technical research.
Consider a hypothetical river project. A sensor records hourly water temperatures, while experienced fishers describe changes in fish condition, migration timing and harvesting conditions over decades. Together, these observations might identify a pattern that either source alone would miss. A partnership would decide how to interpret the findings, protect sensitive information and act on the results.
Collaboration should not require treating outside scientific approval as the source of Indigenous knowledge’s legitimacy. CRITFC’s discussion of TEK and science identifies shared attention to inquiry and changing information while recognizing differences in context and values.
Respect also leaves room for uncertainty. Knowledge holders may disagree, records can be incomplete and environmental conditions can move beyond previous experience. Responsible work examines evidence and limitations without romanticizing either knowledge system as infallible.
Who can give permission to share TEK?
Knowledge is not automatically available for recording, publication or reuse. Some teachings are shared publicly; others belong within particular families, societies, ceremonial settings or community institutions. An individual’s willingness to speak does not necessarily establish authority to release collectively held knowledge.
The National Park Service’s research considerations advise seeking permission from the appropriate Tribal government and relevant knowledge-keeping bodies, and following community research protocols. Researchers should establish who can authorize the work before collecting information. Individual participants’ informed consent also matters.
A request should explain the project’s purpose, intended audience, recording methods and possible future uses in language participants can evaluate. Allow time for the community’s own decision process, including a decision not to share. A university’s approval process should not be treated as a substitute for the community’s authorization.
Sensitive information can include harvesting locations, ceremonial landscapes or knowledge about vulnerable species. Even a map made for a helpful purpose can expose places to disturbance. Public education can often meet its goals without publishing those details.
The CARE Principles and Indigenous data governance
The CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance, developed through Indigenous-led work and explained in a peer-reviewed paper, focus on people, purposes and self-determination. They complement technical approaches to organizing and sharing data by asking whose interests the data serve.
| CARE principle | Practical question |
|---|---|
| Collective Benefit | How will the work support priorities and benefits defined by the community? |
| Authority to Control | Who determines how data are collected, accessed, used and reused? |
| Responsibility | What relationships, skills and resources will support accountable stewardship? |
| Ethics | How will Indigenous rights, wellbeing and possible harms guide decisions over time? |
These questions are a practical interpretation of the framework. CARE helps guide governance; citing the principles alone does not establish permission, create a binding agreement or resolve ownership questions.
What a TEK research agreement should address
The NPS guidance on written agreements recommends clarifying research purposes, consent, ownership, access, funding and community benefits before work begins. A project-specific agreement should address:
- Authority and consent: Who approves the project, and how will each participant make an informed choice?
- Scope: What may be recorded, mapped, quoted or published, and what must remain unrecorded?
- Custody and control: Who owns or controls recordings and resulting datasets, where are they stored, and who can access them?
- Review and future uses: Who reviews material before release, and what requires new permission?
- Credit and compensation: How will participants be credited, paid or kept anonymous according to their preferences?
- Community benefits: What resources, useful results or training will return to the community?
- Changes and withdrawal: How can participation or future access end, and what limits apply to retrieving information already released?
Make these decisions before interviews or fieldwork, rather than treating consent as a signature collected at the end.
Plan for disclosure risks before collecting information
The NPS discussion of knowledge protection warns that information held in federal files may be subject to Freedom of Information Act requests. Disclosure rules, available protections and institutional obligations need to be assessed for the particular project; a request does not automatically mean every record must be released.
Researchers should explain the limits of any confidentiality promise before sensitive material is shared. Open-data requirements, archives and later reuse also need attention. Do not promise that a community can withdraw information everywhere after it has been published. Agree on realistic controls, and leave knowledge uncollected when adequate protection cannot be established.
Consultation, consent and shared authority are different
Consultation provides a process for governments to discuss decisions affecting Tribal interests. CRITFC’s account of sovereignty and consultation places that dialogue within the relationship between governments and Tribal treaty rights.
For a knowledge partnership, distinguish three questions: Has the Nation been engaged? Has the appropriate authority permitted the proposed use of knowledge? Who can make or change the management decision? Participation in a meeting does not, by itself, answer all three.
Begin engagement while the research question, schedule and proposed actions can still change. Establish decision-making roles explicitly rather than assuming that consultation creates shared management authority. Communities also need time, staff and resources to participate on terms that serve their priorities.
Benefits should be tangible and agreed upon. Depending on community goals, they might include Tribal employment, equipment, habitat restoration, language materials or data held under Tribal control. An acknowledgment in a report cannot stand in for every other responsibility.
Why sovereignty matters to ecological knowledge
Knowledge can inform stewardship only when people have the opportunity to practice it. Access to homelands, governing authority, funding and relationships with other land managers affect what communities can carry out.
The Karuk Tribe’s public description of cultural revitalization makes this connection concrete: restoring fire and forest practices involves caring for resources, supporting practitioners and sustaining responsibilities across generations. Treating that work only as a source of useful techniques would miss the community’s larger purpose.
For anyone seeking a partnership, begin with the Nation’s priorities and the authorities relevant to the place. Ask what relationship would support its stewardship goals, what knowledge it chooses to share and what responsibilities a collaborator must accept. Those decisions shape whether a project strengthens the living knowledge it hopes to learn from.
Sources checked September 24, 2026. Linked Tribal, intertribal, National Park Service and research sources provide further public information.
