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Ioway Environmental

Land and Water Department and Ioway Climate Resilience Program for the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska

05/25/2026

Má^inje potluck 🦋
Hope you can make!

05/21/2026

We had the immense pleasure to learn alongside the beautiful prairies and peoples of the Pacific Northwest. Together, with many other tribal land stewards and land based educators, we gained tools for how we can further welcome our Ioway community back into our prairies and support our foods to thrive.

During a “Cultural Ecosystems: Camas Prairies & Food Forests” training, we were reminded how our traditional stories, foods, medicines, ways of tendering the land with fire and seed have been throughlines for our people since time immemorial.

The following day we participated in an intertribal camas dig on a nearby prairie. Witnessing families digging and laughing inspired us to host similar gatherings on our lands. The teachings continued at an Intertribal Camas Bake, where representatives from over 13 tribes gathered for 4 days to share skills, songs, and ceremony.

We are grateful to the Native Plants and Foods Institute and Coast Salish Youth Coalition for welcoming us into their communities! Visiting the camas prairies and witnessing the thriving community around this traditional food source provided us inspiration and tools for supporting our people returning to our cultural landscapes and foods.

05/18/2026

Má^inje Harvest!
**This is a family friendly event - Youth encouraged!!
Hope to see you there! 🌱

05/14/2026

Many thanks to the Sac and Fox for inviting us to their Earth Day celebration! What an amazing turnout. Many organizations were able to attend and had their own stations for the kids to rotate through! Teaching our younger generations are what we are all about.

Unfortunately, we committed to the messiest table: seed balls! The kids got to get dirty, make their own mixes, and take them home in biodegradable cups! No tools needed!

Hopefully Smokey makes another appearance next year, but we'll have to see about his schedule.

Thank you very much Sac and Fox for all you have done and will continue to do! Thank you Amy, Will, Stephen, Landon, our EPA fellows, and the rest of the tribal members who helped make this day memorable!

05/12/2026

🌱🦋 má^inje 🦋🌱

Common Milkweed (Asclepias syriaca) is growing fast out here on the Ioway reservation. Our people alongside monarchs, red milkweed beetles and many other insects (over 450 known species!) flock to this plant for nourishment. Here we have Elizabeth helping us learn how to say their name!

05/04/2026

Here is the 2nd spring installment of the Ioway Climate Resilience Program Newsletter!

See full PDF version here: https://tinyurl.com/IowayCRP2

04/24/2026

🔥 It was a good day to burn in Ioway Tribal National Park with help from our partners at Indian Cave State Park. 🔥

We began at the big Bur Oak tree and worked our way south through open grassland and woodland edges.

Our main goals were to continue knocking back the woody shrub encroachment and refine the transitionary zones between grass and woodland. By offering fire to the land we hope to increase biodiversity of our Tribal National Park and decrease the prevalence of 'invasive species.'

04/17/2026

🧄🌱 European Garlic Mustard Removal 🌱🧄
Garlic Mustard is another 'invasive' plant that is at the top of our spring removal list here inside our reservation woodlands and here's why!

🌱 Why are we removing Garlic Mustard ~
This plant can easily form thick mats in the early spring that shade out some of our native plants found here in our woodlands such as mayapples, jack in the pulpits, and trout lilies. Garlic mustard’s allelopathic nature releases compounds which inhibit the growth of other plants around them, thus decreasing our biodiversity.

🌱 Garlic Mustard is native to Europe and brought over by settlers around 1868, most likely for food and medicine. This plant thrives in our woodlands due to disrupted fire regime resulting in dense woody vegetation overgrowth. Our fire efforts are a key part in keeping invasive species in check alongside manual removal.

🌱 How to identify Garlic Mustard ~
This plant is up now! They live in a two year long life cycle, first year the leaves form a basal rosette while the second year they send up a stalk with clusters of white, four-petaled flowers emerging at the uppermost tip. The easiest way to ID this plant is the garlic order to produces when crushed alongside their heart shaped leaves.

🌱 The good news ~
You can eat this plant, especially when they’re young. They are a good garlicy edition to pestos and other spring salads. If you see this plant this spring while you're out looking for mushrooms pull them out!

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White Cloud, KS

Website

https://iowatribeofkansasandnebraska.com/

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