The Ozette Prairies of Olympic National Park - Natural Resources ...

urned one way and others a different way. Knowledge of the specifics of burning is not lacking entirely,
however. There are good bases for making some general conclusions and well-founded speculations.
During what season did the Ozette people burn the wetlands? The possibilities narrow down to
summer and fall, because these seasons offer times when drier and warmer weather leaves the vegetation
dry enough to burn. Although some sources (Emil Person, for example) mention summertime burning
(June and July), the bulk of the evidence points to fall as the season for bringing fire to the wetlands.
According to fire ecologist James Agee (pers. comm. 2009):
July and August are the highest months for lightning ignitions. This is not suggestive
that native burning necessarily followed the same pattern. The lightning ignitions
are forest-related and focus on moisture content of fine dead fuels, while the prairie
fires would have depended on partially cured herbaceous fuels, which likely occurred
later than July and August, and the cultural advantage of burning after berry harvest.
Clearly, east winds, which occur at higher frequency in summer and fall, and carry
lower humidity (and sometimes higher velocity) would have been favored times to
burn, and even after September rains an east wind can dry fine fuels in a day or less.
They normally occurred over 3-day periods, which gave natives the opportunity for
short-term planning.
The Makah name for the fall season is qw!aya’tex, a word that means “hard” or “tough,” but
which can be translated to mean “dried-up time” when used in a seasonal context (Waterman 1920:46
vol I.). This conception of the autumn suggests that the Makah thought of it as the time when the vegetation
was at its driest and thus best able to carry a fire. Bud Klock stated that he believed September and
October were the months that the Indians burned the wetlands, and according to several sources this was
also the time of year that Pete Roose did his burning of the wetland (James Wesseler and Bud Klock pers.
comm. 2003). It is reasonable to assume that Roose was following what he knew the Indians had done.
In the historical literature, Albert Reagan (1908:148–149) mentions that the Olympic tribes burned
the bracken fern in the fall to enhance its growth in the spring. In reference to Ts’oo-yuhs Prairie, two
Makah informants mentioned the fall (September and October) as the time when the wetland was set
fire, and another informant, John H. Ides, says the burning occurred when the cranberries were picked—
which corresponds to early fall as well.
Sources vary considerably as to the frequency of burning on the Ozette Prairies. Four sources
(two newspaper accounts, and the testimony of Emil Person, and Bob Bowlby) say that burning in the
Ozette Prairies took place every year. Bud Klock stated every one to three years. With regard to Ts’ooyuhs
Prairie, Kate McCarty said that burning did not take place every year. Greg Colfax said that burning
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