Childhood foraging as regional culture: some implications for conservation policy

Abstract

Natural resource planning theory now accepts that laypersons may acquire scientifically correct knowledge of nature by informal means and that sense of place, or ecological identity, motivates citizens to assume personal responsibility for their own bioregion. Previous research has identified childhood foraging, that is, searching for and using wild plants and animals of distinguishable kinds, as one informal means by which citizens learn about local ecosystems, but ethnographic evidence suggests foraging may also contribute substantially to the development of ecological identity. Does foraging reflect the ecological characteristics of local bioregions closely enough to structure ecological identity in industrial populations too? By way of addressing this question, studies were conducted to test predictions about the foraging repertoires of people growing up in two separate, but related, bioregions of Canada, centred on Niagara and Ottawa respectively. The most important of these predictions were, first, that regional patterns of foraging experience would correspond to regional ecological patterns, and second, that foraging repertoires would evince within-region similarities and between-region differences. Results confirm that the childhood foraging experience of ordinary Canadian citizens responds to important ecological parameters at the regional scale and in so doing constitutes an aspect of place-specific culture. These findings have a bearing on conservation policy, particularly for multicultural societies.

Cultural transmission of ethnobotanical knowledge and skills: an empirical analysis from an Amerindian society

“…Research also suggests that 152 7 children must practice tasks to learn folk biological knowledge (Chipeniuk, 1998;153 Ohmagari & Berkes, 1997). For example, Ruddle and Chesterfield (1977) (Manski, 1993), so individual ethnobotanical competence could also 367 vary with the distribution of background characteristics of the group (contextual 368 effects), or just be associated to group ethnobotanical competence because both -the 369 individual and the group-face a similar environment (correlated effects).…”

Natural spaces – how do they influence stewardship attitudes and actions of university students?

“…This is in contrast to research that indicates that childhood and recreational experiences are the main activities where regular interaction has the potential to change views and values of the environment [e.g. 8,13,15,[36][37][38][39][40][41][42]. The development of an environmental ethic may not require visits to what the child perceives as 'natural spaces' since experience, even within natural spaces of a schoolyard, help in the development of environmental concern [38,43,44].…”

New Zealand school children’s perceptions of local forests and the Montréal Process Criteria and Indicators: comparing local and international value systems

“…rainforest), those in which animals and plants may be present (Rydberg and Falck 2000;Snaddon et al 2008;Strommen 1995), where the value of forests to the environment (Barraza and Pineda 2003;Greaves and Stanisstreet 1993;Lovell and O'Brien 2009) and the economy (Barraza and Pineda 2003), all focus on perceptions about generic forests, rather than knowledge of and experiences gained from interactions with local forests. Understanding children's perceptions about forests is important because childhood interaction with nature through play activity has a profound impact on physical and mental wellbeing (Fjørtoft 2001;Fjørtoft and Sageie 2000;King and Church 2013;Rydberg and Falck 2000) and leads to latent awareness of the importance of environmental stewardship (Chipeniuk 1998). Hence it is valuable to know how forests in a country are contributing to this.…”

“…The responses were also considered in regard to place attachment and landscape preference; these may be influenced by familiarity, or else developed by learning to belong to the land through foraging and other childhood experiences (Chipeniuk 1998). Māori have a strong affiliation to their land or whenua, grounded in whakapapa as the creation stories relate to landscapes that link with their genealogy.…”

“…While a place attachment value relates to MP Indicator 6.5.a, it is not clear if this is spiritually based or culturally learned, and a limitation of the study is the lack of any distinction between local Māori school children and other ethnicities in terms of local forest values. People care more for environments considered to be "uniquely theirs" (Chipeniuk 1998); this attachment is usually with indigenous landscapes, rather than to flora and fauna of the region (Chipeniuk 1998). In our study, Nelson and Rotorua children drew attention to features associated with exotic forests in their vicinity (e.g.…”