Indigenous co-management essential for protecting, restoring Bears Ears region

Indigenous people have lived in the Bears Ears region of southeastern Utah for millennia. Ancestral Pueblos built elaborate houses, check dams, agricultural terraces and other modifications of the landscape, leaving ecological legacies that persist to this day. Identifying how humans interacted with past environments is critical for informing how best to protect archaeological sites and ecological diversity in the present. This "archaeo-ecosystem" approach would facilitate co-management of public lands in ways that promote Indigenous health, cultural reclamation and sovereignty.