ABSTRACT
This is the story of how an undergraduate’s small landscape plan grew into a complex reclamation project in the form of a riparian/wetland-based garden in Yolo County, California. From the beginning, the work was a collaborative process. The use of participatory research opened communication and created common ground between competing interests. The project grew organically out of a student’s desire to be inclusive of local community stakeholders. The Native American Tending and Gathering Garden (the Garden) is in the Cache Creek Nature Preserve (CCNP) located in Woodland, California, which is managed by the Cache Creek Conservancy (the Conservancy) (see Figure 5.1). The Garden is the result of collaboration between industry, the Native American community, academics, farmers and others. The journey that led to the establishment of the Garden was laden with lessons. This chapter provides a critique of the impact and contribution of participatory action research (PAR) in a local community-based natural resource management effort.
