Across the sprawling landscapes of Turtle Island, from the western mountains through central prairies, over eastern woodlands, to the northern boreal and tundra, the land carries memory. It speaks through ancient fires, through the whispers of returning smoke, through the cycles of regeneration and loss. Fire is not merely a destructive force but a living relative with agency, voice, and purpose embedded in the land’s sacred balance.
Fire as a Living Relative and Teacher
In Indigenous worldviews across Canada, whether among the Coast Salish, Anishinaabe, Cree, Dene, Mi’kmaq, Inuit, or Métis, fire is understood as more than heat and flame. Fire is a relative: a powerful presence that teaches and transforms. Fire holds knowledge about when and where to flow, how to clear away the old and invite new life, and when to retreat to allow healing. It is a force that must be listened to, respected, and lived with, not tamed or feared.
The land itself contains this fire knowledge, its patterns and rhythms, held not only in the soil and trees but also in the pulse of the more-than-human relations that weave together plants, animals, insects, and waters. These relationships have been cultivated through generations of ceremony, stewardship, and attentive listening.
The Memory of Fires Past: Lessons Written in the Land
For millennia, Indigenous peoples have carried the memories of fire’s many faces: the gentle burns that nurtured wild berries and medicines, the larger fires that shaped forests and grasslands, and the fires that carried warnings and renewal. These memories are more than history; they are living teachings embedded in stories, songs, and place. They remind us how fire once danced in balance with water, wind, and seasons, fostering abundance and diversity.
The land’s hold on this memory reveals how fire traditionally cleared away invasive undergrowth, opened habitats, cycled nutrients, and created mosaic landscapes vital for wildlife. Indigenous fire stewardship was respectful and purposeful, marked by precision, ceremony, and an understanding of fire’s role as a caretaker.
The Changing Land: Fire’s Agency Amidst Drought and Climate Change
Today, this sacred balance is strained as climate change stirs new challenges. Prolonged drought and rising temperatures dry the land beyond its natural resilience. Fire’s agency, once harmonized with the earth’s rhythms, now pulses with growing intensity and unpredictability. Wildfires rage more frequently, far beyond the historical rhythms of many regions, threatening the very life-systems they once helped sustain.
In western forests, ancient conifer refugia for caribou and lynx face pervasive mortality. In central prairies, grasses and wildflowers fail to recover, leaving soil exposed. Eastern woodlands lose their understory of medicinal plants and berries, which are relied upon by birds and smaller mammals. Northern boreal and tundra zones are suffering from the collapse of delicate lichen beds and shrinking habitats for migratory birds.
All the while, fire continues to assert its agency, challenging all beings to remember and adapt.
Honouring Fire Knowledge: Stewarding Indigenous Wisdom for the Land and All Life
To walk respectfully with fire in this changing world demands more than technology or control; it demands honouring Indigenous fire knowledge systems, which see fire as a living relation, as part of the land’s voice.
Non-Indigenous peoples and institutions must listen deeply to this wisdom. Stewardship means recognizing the fire’s spiritual, ecological, and cultural roles as encoded in Indigenous laws, ceremonies, and practices, which are calibrated to the land’s signals and cycles. It means supporting Indigenous leadership with sovereignty over how landscapes are cared for and how fire is welcomed, guided, or restrained.
This stewardship involves:
Recognizing the land’s agency, learning from the land where fire is needed and where it is invited to restore life, not simply extinguished as a threat.
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- Integrating Indigenous fire timing and techniques, such as controlled or “cool” burns guided by ecological indicators and spiritual guidance, which have been practiced for thousands of years.
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- Respecting the relational web that includes plants, animals, fungi, and waters as kin with roles in fire’s unfolding.
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- Bridging knowledge systems where Indigenous knowledge co-creates with scientific understanding, enhancing fire forecasting, monitoring, and response rooted in ecological respect.
Fire as a Call to Renew Kinship and Balance
As drought and dry conditions intensify, the urgency of honouring fire’s role becomes increasingly apparent. Fire teaches humility the lesson that we are part of the land’s family, not masters of it. The fate of biodiversity, including berries, pollinators, game, medicinal plants, soil microbes, and waters, echoes the health of the balance of fire.
In listening to fire’s voice, remembering its cycles, and walking with Indigenous stewardship, humans reclaim responsibility. Fire need not be a force of devastation alone but can become a renewing presence that heals scars, encourages diversity, and sustains future generations of life.
This is not only a strategy for wildfire management, but a sacred path forward, one where agency, memory, and respect guide us toward living in a reciprocal relationship with the land, honouring fire’s place as a vital and sacred relative.
Blog by Rye Karonhiowanen Barberstock
(Image Credit: Jan Kopřiva, Unsplash)
The post When the Land Speaks Through Fire: Indigenous Wisdom, Memory, and Stewardship of the Living Landscape appeared first on Indigenous Climate Hub.
Climate Change
DeBriefed 19 June 2026: Bonn talks end in ‘gridlock’ | Energy’s ‘new era’ | Oceans in climate negotiations
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Bonn talks close
‘SIDE-STEPPING AND STALLING’: UN climate talks in Bonn have ended in “gridlock”, according to Climate Home News. The outlet reported on the failure to balance developing countries’ need for climate-adaptation finance with “richer nations’ desire to move forward” on emissions cuts. It added that both topics were subject to “rule 16”, meaning no agreement could be reached and work will be pushed to the COP31 summit in Turkey. Inside Climate News quoted UN climate executive secretary Simon Stiell, who said the talks had seen “side-stepping and stalling”.
JUST TRANSITION: One “glimmer of hope” came from negotiations on achieving a “just transition”, reported Euronews. The news outlet said negotiators “made headway on operationalising the Belém-Antalya mechanism”, intended to support people in the shift to a low-carbon economy. However, Politico concluded that much of the focus in Bonn had “shift[ed] to efforts outside diplomatic talks – raising questions about the future of global climate negotiations”.
‘ATTACKING SCIENCE’: Agence France-Presse reported on the EU, Switzerland and “dozens of developing nations” warning of “attacks on science” by a “small group of fossil-fuels interests” in Bonn. Table Briefings explained that “the 1.5C target is increasingly being challenged” and the role of the UN climate-science panel – the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – in an upcoming assessment of global climate progress “remains controversial”. See Carbon Brief’s full write-up of the talks for more detail.
US-Iran deal
PRICE DROP: The US and Iran announced that they have reached an interim agreement to halt the war and reopen the strait of Hormuz, reported Bloomberg. Oil prices have fallen, as the “long-awaited deal” began the process of “eas[ing]” the global energy crisis triggered by the conflict, according to the New York Times. The Associated Press noted that high fuel prices will “likely outlast the Iran war”.
‘OIL GLUT’: The Financial Times reported that the International Energy Agency (IEA) has forecast a “glut of oil” emerging next year, if the peace deal holds. The IEA said this would allow countries to build new strategic reserves, as they “review their energy strategies and policies in response to the crisis”, according to Reuters.
‘NEW ERA’: Agence France-Presse reported that oil and gas companies have “few illusions about a return to normal for the Gulf energy industry after more than three months of blockage”. One analyst told the newswire that the war “showed the oil and gas industry that Hormuz risk is no longer just a geopolitical headline”.
Around the world
- OCEAN MONITOR: The Trump administration is “abandoning its plan” to dismantle a $368m ocean monitoring system key for tracking climate change after a “bipartisan backlash on Capitol Hill”, reported the New York Times.
- CORAL HAVEN: The New York Times covered preliminary research, presented at the Our Ocean Conference in Kenya, suggesting there could be three times as many “coral refugia” – where corals are relatively safe from climate change – than previously thought.
- BAD CREDIT: Down to Earth reported that the first carbon credits issued under the Paris Agreement’s new Article 6.4 mechanism are “facing scrutiny over alleged links to institutions controlled by Myanmar’s military junta”.
- OIL BACKTRACK: Reuters reported that oil-and-gas company Equinor has dropped a renewable-energy target and scaled back clean investments, while another Reuters story noted that Shell is selling off its offshore wind assets.
1.1 billion
The number of children facing “at least three overlapping climate hazards”, according to a new Unicef report covered by Agence France-Presse.
Latest climate research
- Including the “permafrost carbon-climate feedback” in climate models increases the chance of exceeding “tipping elements” – such as the Greenland ice sheets, Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation or Amazon rainforest – by up to 50% | Environmental Research Letters
- The intensity of influenza outbreaks could decline in temperate regions, but increase in tropical areas over the next century, as the climate warms | PNAS Nexus
- European snow cover has declined by 20% for December and January since the start of the industrial era, revealing an “unprecedented ongoing shrinkage of European winters” | Communications Earth & Environment
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
The more than 2m battery electric vehicles (BEVs), 1m “plug-in” hybrids (PHEVs) and 100,000 electric vans on UK roads are already saving drivers a total of around £3bn a year, according to new Carbon Brief analysis. This amounts to savings of more than £1,100 a year in fuel costs for each BEV driver in the UK. The analysis comes amid reports in UK media this week that the government is considering “watering down” its EV sales targets.
Spotlight
Oceans rising at UN climate talks
The state of the world’s oceans is inextricably linked to the changing climate – and many delegates at UN climate talks want to see more focus on this issue, reports Carbon Brief.
Oceans are often described as the world’s “greatest ally” against climate change – absorbing 30% of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and most of the heat generated by those emissions.
They are also the site of important climate solutions, such as huge offshore windfarms and the shipping industry’s transition to cleaner fuels.
At the same time, the oceans themselves present a growing danger to coastal communities and sea life due to sea level rise, marine heatwaves and ocean acidification.
These diverse issues have led to growing calls within the UN climate process for more focus on oceans. During climate negotiations this week in Bonn – known as SB64 – nations and civil society had a chance to air these views during an “ocean and climate change dialogue”.
‘Elevate action’
Oceans first entered UN climate outcomes in 2019, when the final COP25 negotiated text requested a new “dialogue” on “the ocean and climate change to consider how to strengthen mitigation and adaptation action”.
The following years saw this dialogue established as an annual event. However, the political weight of these discussions has been limited.
COP31 is being co-led by Turkey and Australia, but with Pacific islands playing a supporting role. These small islands sometimes self-identify as “large ocean states”, stressing the ocean’s centrality in their societies.
In Bonn, figures from across the presidency threw their weight behind this issue. Chris Bowen, an Australian minister and incoming COP31 “president of negotiations”, told attendees:
“Australia, Turkey and the Pacific see an important opportunity to elevate ocean-based climate action.”
Strategies and finance
The two-day dialogue in Bonn involved a series of panels, statements and breakout groups.
One of the main topics was how oceans are integrated into national climate plans under the Paris Agreement, known as “nationally determined contributions” (NDCs).
Three-quarters of the latest round of NDCs mention oceans, with conservation of “blue carbon” ecosystems the most frequently described action. (Landscapes such as mangroves can both absorb CO2 and protect coastal areas.)
Delegates also discussed alignment with the UN biodiversity process, as well as ocean finance, which currently makes up less than 1% of all climate finance.
(As discussions were taking place in Bonn, country officials also gathered in Mombasa, Kenya for the 11th Our Ocean Conference. Carbon Brief’s associate editor Giuliana Viglione attended the conference and will publish a full summary shortly.)
Developing countries were clear that many of the ocean-related actions in their NDCs would depend on receiving more financial support.
‘Political momentum’
With the backing of the COP31 presidency, delegates were hopeful about where this year’s dialogue could lead.
Charles Hamilton, an advisor for the Bahamas who spoke for the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) in the dialogue, told Carbon Brief that island representatives “are not traveling thousands of miles to just talk and pat ourselves on the back”. He added:
“A dialogue that just remains a dialogue is just more talk – no action.”
Given that, he said “discussions in the dialogue must move into COP decisions and the decisions must be actioned”, noting the importance of finance.
Marina Corrêa, oceans lead at WWF-Brazil, pointed to an upcoming UN climate change Standing Committee on Finance forum as a space to ramp up pressure on ocean finance.
More broadly, she wanted to see the presidencies translate their support into a “leader-level ocean initiative” that could “mainstream” oceans across negotiations.
“We have a really interesting opportunity, in terms of political momentum,” Corrêa told Carbon Brief.
Watch, read, listen
‘HOTTER THAN HELL’: An episode of the BBC’s Rare Earth podcast titled “hotter than hell” considered the issue of extreme heat, with input from experts and “people facing up to the hottest temperatures on the planet”.
NOT BROKEN?: John Drake, a professor of ecology at the University of Georgia, wrote an essay for Aeon – also re-published as a Guardian “long read” – questioning the framing of ecosystems and climate systems “breaking down”.
ON COURSE: On his Volts podcast, US climate journalist David Roberts interviewed UK climate minister Katie White, quizzing her about whether the UK will “stay the course with its climate plans”.
Coming up
- 20-28 June: London climate action week
- 21 June: Colombia presidential runoff
- 24 June: UK Climate Change Committee progress in reducing emissions 2026 report to parliament
Pick of the jobs
- Mongabay, managing editor – Africa | Salary: Unknown. Location: Global
- Contexte, environment reporter – Brussels | Salary: €45,000-€60,000. Location: Brussels
- Climate 200, communications director | Salary: Unknown. Location: Australia
- Energy Tracker Asia, energy transition correspondent | Salary: $3,000-$4,000 per month. Location: South-east Asia (remote)
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s weekly DeBriefed email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.
The post DeBriefed 19 June 2026: Bonn talks end in ‘gridlock’ | Energy’s ‘new era’ | Oceans in climate negotiations appeared first on Carbon Brief.
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DeBriefed 19 June 2026: Bonn talks end in ‘gridlock’ | Energy’s ‘new era’ | Oceans in climate negotiations
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