Singing to the Land

Wuikinuxv Nation members gather to share stories, songs, and traditional practices while reconnecting with the land and waters that sustain them.

On a summer evening in 2025, at a remote camp on Owikeno Lake about 60 kilometres south of Bella Coola, members of the Wuikinuxv Nation gathered around a fire as songs carried out across the water and into the surrounding mountains.

“We sat around the fire, and the Knowledge Keeper would go over one of our stories, then the song that went with it, and then we’d practice the dance together,” says Raven Walkus, Salmon Restoration Coordinator at the Wuikinuxv Stewardship Department. “It was just a really great way to wind down every evening and it felt like we were singing to the land.”

“It’s about getting people back out there and spending time on the land more frequently.”

Raven Walkus

Salmon Restoration Coordinator, Wuikinuxv Stewardship Department

The gatherings are part of Cisalagilakv Quskas: Restoring Ancestral Rights & Responsibilities, a 2025 Wuikinuxv Nation project funded by REFBC.

For the past two and a half years, the Wuikinuxv Nation has been hosting Culture Camps on Owikeno Lake to bring together youth and community members for land-based knowledge sharing activities. The participants spend several days making traditional medicines, harvesting, fishing, berry picking and visiting old villages and cultural sites, where they learn about the families who historically stewarded those places.

“A big part of my job is just reconnecting community members with the land and the culture,” Walkus says. “It’s about getting
people back out there and spending time on the land more frequently.”

That work has taken many forms, from creek walking during salmon spawning season to a community hunting camp and a pilot trout
fishing program that encourages people to get out on the water while contributing to monitoring efforts.

“People now have the freedom to take part in those harvesting opportunities when they want, without having to rely on us, and that’s
really special,” says Walkus, adding that the goal is to continue creating opportunities for people to reconnect in ways that feel familiar
and accessible.

“We want boots on the ground and eyes on the land again,” she says.