Deanna Archuleta, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Water and Science, tours the Bonneville Dam to view the fish ladder and in particular the native Pacific Lampreys used as first foods by Tribes along the Columbia River. (Photo Credit: USGS)
The USGS-PSU Partnership (UPP) offers awards biannually for water science research projects through the UPP Seed Grant program. This program funds new and innovative research, planting a seed for larger proposals, collaboration with more partners, and support from extramural funding organizations.
The UPP is excited to announce that the 2025 UPP Seed Grant is awarded to Shelby Anderson, professor of Anthropology at PSU’s School of Earth, Environment, and Society, and Mackenzie Keith, a hydrologist with the USGS Oregon Water Science Center, for their joint project, "Linkages Among Pre-Colonial People, Skakhwǝl (Lamprey), and Landscapes in the Willamette Valley: Pilot Study to Identify Key Questions, Develop Methodology, and Initiate Data Collection."
Restoration of the Lamprey Population
The Pacific Lamprey is a parasitic fish native to the Pacific Ocean and the rivers and tributaries on the West Coast. They have existed in this region for many millennia, and hold ecological and cultural significance–many Native tribes rely on the lamprey for food, medicine, and other community practices. Unfortunately, climate conditions, habitat loss, and other threats have impacted the lamprey’s population and distribution in the Northwest, making them a species of concern.
The new seed grant will support the creation of a new approach for integrating long-term data about people and lamprey in the Willamette Valley to guide future conservation and restoration efforts. To date, cultural and historical knowledge has rarely been included in environmental planning for lamprey. As project Co-PI Shelby explains, “We need deeper time depth and richness of Indigenous knowledge about lamprey, together with Western science, to make a positive impact.”
This pilot study aims to investigate where pre-colonial peoples gathered lamprey in the Willamette Valley and how patterns of harvest were linked to hydrogeomorphic conditions such as water flow, sediment types across different river basins, and the ecological processes that support healthy lamprey populations.
Another goal is to build new scientific and tribal partnerships that bring together diverse expertise and refine methods for integrating multiple disciplines and data sources across different scales.
Finally, the study will collect, synthesize, and analyze data on lamprey, their environments, and associated historical and cultural knowledge to create a greater understanding of these ecologically and culturally important fish.
The UPP sat down with Shelby and Mackenzie to discuss their project.
UPP: How did this project, and your partnership on it, come to be?
Mackenzie: A lot of this really comes from Shelby’s vision, but I think it also grew out of being in the field together, meeting each other, and realizing we had overlapping interests and partnerships. We were both at a UPP symposium when we heard about the seed grant, and it just seemed like a great opportunity to work together and try something new. From a scientific standpoint, many of the questions stem from Shelby’s research and her long-term interests, while I’m always excited about expanding hydrogeomorphic understanding of the Willamette, Oregon, and the Pacific Northwest, and connecting that knowledge to other disciplines.
UPP: What outcomes and collaborations do you hope this project will lead to?
Shelby: I’m excited to have the chance to work directly with Mackenzie and the staff at USGS. The work that they do in the [Willamette] Valley is important in terms of understanding the archaeological context. Getting to work with new tribal partners and people who have different skillsets from me is also exciting. Archaeology is inherently interdisciplinary, so collaboration isn’t new. But getting to formally work with a geomorphologist like Mackenzie, biologists, and people in the ITECK program on a specific project - that’s something I’m really excited about.
Mackenzie: It’s also important to be clear of what we are not doing. We’re not aiming to make policy recommendations or develop policy. And given the sensitivity around cultural resources, we also want to be clear that we’re not seeking to share information that might be sensitive, whether that’s cultural practices or important cultural places.
Shelby: Yes, I’m not bringing indigenous knowledge to the table; our partners are, and they’re going to share what they want to share. We’re also not trying to privilege the knowledge of a particular group over another - this project is an open invitation to collaborate with people who care about lamprey and who have connections to the Valley. Maybe someday this kind of work could help create policy or restoration practices, but we’re just getting started.
UPP: Why is the integration of Indigenous ecological and cultural knowledge a critical piece of this research?
Shelby: I’m not Indigenous, so I’m not an expert in this knowledge area, but Indigenous knowledge comes from deep, highly local relationships between people and place. It’s holistic and integrated, often very different from Western science. It includes quantitative and qualitative elements, but also spiritual and experiential aspects, built and passed down through generations in ways Western science can’t replicate. That makes it essential for environmental work moving forward. Indigenous knowledge brings access to different kinds of information, much of which has been left out of restoration planning. By bringing knowledge systems together, we can do better for lamprey and for the Native communities who have relied on them for countless generations.
UPP: What are your thoughts on the collaborative aspect of the UPP Seed Grant program?
Mackenzie: For me, this project created an opportunity for us to work together that we probably wouldn’t have pursued otherwise. It’s exciting to have funding that allows us to take on these research questions. The program really feels like it’s fulfilling the purpose of a Seed Grant - bringing our agencies together to develop new questions and innovative approaches. I also really appreciate how it supports graduate students by integrating their time and research into the work.
Shelby: Even though we’d talked about collaborating, this opportunity pushed us to prioritize and put together a proposal. Seed funding is crucial because, as a new team with more questions than answers, it gives us the time and support to build momentum and pursue larger opportunities - something that’s rare, especially for this kind of work.