Sustainability of Natural Populations: Lessons from Indigenous Knowledge

 Attempts to manage natural populations sustainably are often unsuccessful, especially schemes assuming equilibrium as the natural state. MSY approaches are particularly unsuccessful because they assume that if an experienced adult is killed, it is readily replaced. Indigenous concepts assume that populations are regulated by individuals that “control” accessibility. Indigenous Americans were very practical and aware of the changeable nature of environments and populations. Their concepts may be based on experience with exceptionally productive and experienced individual animals, without whom populations might collapse. Data from two long-term studies demonstrate that 80-90% of successful reproduction in natural populations is the result of 3-5% of the individuals in that population. Results from archaeological studies show that Indigenous hunters may have specifically avoided taking older, more experienced members of a population. Similar results are found in all long-term studies of natural animal populations.