Indigenous communities look to ‘rekindle’ traditional practice of controlled burns – Northern Ontario Business

February 10, 2026

Traditional approaches to forest stewardship, food sovereignty among methods discussed at Indigenous Lands Symposium

Elder Edward Perley recalled, as a boy, watching the people of his community conducting controlled burns to keep their forested land healthy.

It was a traditional approach to forest stewardship that has been lost today.

“If they noticed that there was a piece of the forest somewhere that was diseased, they would go and they would burn that area,” said Perley, a Wolastoqey knowledge keeper and fire keeper from Nekotkuk in New Brunswick. “And, actually, everything would come back to life.”