Ron Waukau, forest manager, accepted the 2024 Connor Award for distinguished service by an organization from the Wisconsin Forest History Association of Wisconsin at its fall conference held Oct. 11-12 in Keshena.
The Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin is known nationally for the character and condition of its forest. Visitors are reminded that in 1856, Chief Oshkosh offered a vision of sustainable forest practice to the tribe.
“Start with the rising sun and work toward the setting sun, but take only the mature trees, the sick trees and the trees that have fallen,” he is reported to have said. “When you reach the end of the reservation, turn and cut from the setting sun to the rising sun, and the trees will last forever.”
The forest landscape he was citing still retains some of that “ancient” character he saw at the time. That makes it different from the surrounding forest.
Sustainable management of the forest was an old concept to the Menominee in 1856 but an uncommon understanding to the general Wisconsin population that supplied logs and lumber for a rapidly growing United States. The Menominee have been applying modern forest management practices within an evolving natural science ever since they took in Chief Oshkosh’s advice.
In 2005, the Menominee Tribal Legislature put forth an ordinance that codified the process of operational coordination between the Tribal Historic Preservation and Forest Management programs.
In traditional forest practice management data, the age, timber type, growth and volume are used to schedule forest treatments to include timber harvesting. Now, once forest treatment targets are mapped out to steer annual forest operations planning, the maps are shared with the Historic Preservation Office to add data layers that delineate current cultural preservation set asides within the forest.
Such sites include identification of ancient gardens, seasonal campsites, burial sites, mounds, sacred sites and the like. Forestry staff will then use the updated maps to mark preservation zones within the timber sale or other treatment being planned. All the planned activity is offered to tribal members via a blog at the tribal website.
In addition, the same tribal ordinance sets a design for basic and annual refresher training in identification of archaeological activity in the forest. This training is offered to all new forestry employees, interns, loggers and cooperators.
Waukau said new archaeological discoveries are made every year by forestry program workers.
“Staff always keep an eye out, especially for sites near water,” he said. “Sites that look good for a campsite now looked good hundreds of years ago.”
All discoveries of new sites are then fed back to the Historic Preservation Office to update its database to guide new archaeological research and set down data for future forest management practices.
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