This paper presents weather magic practices from the islands of Tanna and Aneityum, in southern Vanuatu, and highlights how this phenomenon is a critical domain of Indigenous environmental knowledge, particularly knowledge involving plants. Recent literature suggests that diverse cultural systems, such as music, can be viewed as domains of environmental knowledge, and we propose that magical systems should be afforded the same recognition. Although anthropological work in Melanesia has historically featured various magical practices, relatively little has been said about how these have been used to influence or understand the weather, and even less has been presented directly by Indigenous weather magic practitioners, who are co-authors on this paper. In this contribution, we intersperse anthropological and ethnobotanical commentary with verbatim narratives provided by three local experts in weather magic from southern Vanuatu, including oral histories, contemporary narratives, and the results of ethnobotanical surveys. The detailed knowledge that weather magic practitioners on these islands hold regarding their local environment represents an important means of transmitting not only cultural heritage, but also botanical knowledge, the maintenance of which may be critical for current and future conservation efforts. This research documents rich cultural traditions of local and global significance which are worthy of the attention and preservation afforded to other forms of Indigenous environmental knowledge. The goals of magic and those of science are not necessarily inherently opposed, and we show that magical practice can indeed involve and even preserve a detailed and powerful mode of knowing the environment.

Landscape management by First Nations Peoples often involves sustainably enhancing environments to increase availability of resources. Granite outcrops, globally, can exhibit such modifications. Propped-up rock slabs constructed by First Nations Peoples for catching reptiles (lizard traps) are a widespread, overlooked, and threatened cultural component of granites of the Southwest Australian Floristic Region. Our team, which includes three Merningar/Menang Elders (co-authors LK, HC, and AE), has undertaken a systematic and culturally informed review of the current scientific literature and Traditional Ecological Knowledge with the subsequent aim of using that data to raise awareness and advocate for lizard trap protection. We collated information and identified knowledge gaps regarding lizard traps: their definition, function, distribution, related Traditional Ecological Knowledge, threats, and conservation. Elders explained that lizard traps do not restrain or contain animals. They provide reptiles with shelter from aerial predators, and opportunities for basking, shade, and foraging. They work as a trap because startled reptiles run beneath a lizard trap, are surrounded by people, and extracted. All 317 published lizard trap records are in southwest Western Australia, across Noongar, Yamaji, and Ngadju lands. Ten papers expressed concern over threats to lizard traps. Overall, lizard traps highlight how sustainable ecosystem enhancement requires deep knowledge of the land and culture that is embedded in the ecological system. Further cross-cultural ecological studies are required to document, understand, and protect these culturally significant structures, and the Traditional Ecological Knowledge and biodiversity that they sustain.

Besides their namesake island and several immediately neighboring small islands, Komodo monitors (Varanus komodoensis)—better known as Komodo dragons—also occur on the larger island of Flores to the east. Apart from the extreme western part of Flores, the giant lizards occur along the island's northern coast; but how far eastward they extend remains a question. Early in the twentieth century, reports by local people described dragons as present in the northeast, while in 1985, officials of the Indonesian department of Forest Protection and Nature Conservation reported catching specimens of V. komodoensis in the vicinity of Cape Kotabaru in northeastern Flores. Camera trapping conducted between 2014 and 2019 by field zoologists failed to produce evidence of dragons in this region. Yet, during recent ethnographic research, the present author recorded reports of local people encountering specimens in Kotabaru. In view of locally recognized differences between Komodo dragons and the related, though much smaller, water monitor (Varanus salvator), the present study discusses local knowledge of Komodo dragons among the Lio people of northeastern Flores as a prelude to reviewing local sighting reports, some from as recently as 2016 and 2017. With regard to mostly anthropogenic factors that would account for recent decline in dragon numbers throughout Flores Island, as well as features of the species that render it resilient to these, the paper concludes that a small number of dragons remain in the Kotabaru region, so that recent sighting reports are likely valid.

Holy Hills, sacred groves protected by ethnic minority Dai people, have garnered great interest for conservation in Xishuangbanna—a region containing some of the world's northernmost tropical rain forests and China's richest biodiversity, though much of it has been threatened by deforestation from rubber cultivation. As some of the only remaining forest fragments outside nature reserves, Holy Hills have been documented to contain rare species and ecosystems underrepresented in protected areas. Although previous studies provided some insight into fragmentation impacts, they lacked data to examine population structures. Accordingly, this study uses continuous metrics of tree regeneration for the first time in sacred groves, while also drawing on ethnographic understandings of socioecological contexts of human disturbance, to examine biodiversity and regeneration in three Holy Hills and two nature reserves. Contrary to expectations that smaller area and fragmentation effects would decrease biodiversity in Holy Hills, we found no significant difference in diversity between Holy Hills and nature reserves, though we detected marginally significantly less diversity in seedlings, and certain Holy Hills displayed a shift towards light-demanding species. Common and dominant species varied by site, speaking to the importance of inter-patch beta diversity captured among Holy Hills that can support the maintenance of a regional species pool. Our results also indicated considerable regeneration opportunity in Holy Hills, though individual site conditions and histories had a strong influence. We recommend collaborating with communities and local institutions not only to safeguard existing forest, but also to regenerate and restore fragments whose protection is bolstered with cultural meaning.

Knowledge and use of plants among the Sakha (orYakut) people are reflected in their naming practices for the plants according to habitat. The Sakha are a Turkic people with a total population of approximately 500,000, living primarily in the vast territory of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) in the Russian Federation, a region comprising Arctic and Subarctic zones. The Sakha plant lexicon encodes knowledge and cultural information about how the Sakha engage with their environment, as plants occupy an important place in their life. The present article represents an ethnolinguistic analysis of 43 plant names; these plants were chosen as their names indicate their habitats. We used a mixed-methods approach of linguistic analysis, ethnolinguistic fieldwork, questionnaires, and verification with published resources to understand the linguistic structure of the plant names, what they mean for users, and how the plants are used in traditional Sakha medicine, more broadly. We found that the names provide key information as to how to locate plants that have practical uses (as medicine and as food). Information from several unstudied dialects is also provided.

Maize diversity in southern Mexico is threatened as climate change and sociopolitical factors limit the ability of small-scale farmers to continue agricultural production. Between 2017 and 2019, I conducted ten months of ethnographic research on maize agriculture in San Miguel del Valle (San Miguel), a Zapotec community in the Central Valleys of Oaxaca. In San Miguel, agricultural production is declining due to seasonal droughts that have increased in frequency and intensity in recent generations. Farmers who continue to plant maize use exclusively their own or locally acquired seeds of native landraces. Worsening seasonal droughts play a significant role in determining what seeds farmers plant and whether farmers choose to continue planting. Farmers plant locally sourced seeds partly because they believe these to be the only available seeds that will produce a harvest in their fields. This points to important interactions between environmental conditions, seed choice, and farmers' livelihoods. I contribute to existing literature on maize diversity and in situ conservation by using an ethnographic approach to describe seed saving practices and networks in San Miguel.