Daily Junction.mobi portal<p>Our data can’t tell us exactly what this looked like, but it does give us clues. Charcoal probably came from a mixture of daily life and land management, with fires clearing spaces for crops to be planted. There’s no sign that this led to forest loss, though – it may even have been an agroforestry system, with maize and beans growing under the canopy of culturally useful trees, including <em>Araucaria</em>. At one site, this influence created a landscape unlike any seen in previous studies, which developed and changed over centuries with the rhythms of the nearby village. The southern Jê may not have spread trees widely across the landscape, but they certainly shaped the forests around the places they lived. </p>
<p>Although our findings focus on the past, they are invaluable for this ecosystem’s future. Seeing how climate changes pushed forest-grassland dynamics over tipping points in unpredictable ways is a worry: as conditions in southern Brazil continue to get warmer and wetter, this will make it harder to conserve both <em>Araucaria</em> forest and <em>campos</em> grasslands. </p>
<p>And the revelations about the region’s human history matter, too. Southern Brazil still has southern Jê communities – the Kaingang and Laklãnõ Xokleng. Our results highlight that there’s no inherent conflict between people and <em>Araucaria</em> forest. As these Indigenous communities continue to fight for their rights to their ancestral land, conservation would do well to learn from them and to establish better ways of linking people with the forests – before it’s too late.<!-- Below is The Conversation's page counter tag. Please DO NOT REMOVE. --><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/285286/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important" referrerpolicy="no-referrer-when-downgrade" /><!-- End of code. If you don't see any code above, please get new code from the Advanced tab after you click the republish button. The page counter does not collect any personal data. More info: https://theconversation.com/republishing-guidelines --></p>
<p><span><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/oliver-wilson-797957">Oliver Wilson</a>, Lecturer, School of Natural Sciences, <em><a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-lincoln-885">University of Lincoln</a></em></span></p>
<p>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/brazils-highland-forest-has-been-shaped-by-climate-change-and-indigenous-people-for-6-000-years-285286">original article</a>.</p> </div>