The Churro Sheep remains an icon of resilience and adaptability in the Southwest. On this show we welcome Jennifer Douglass, Founder and Executive Director of Rio Milagro Foundation [https://www.riomilagro.org/], to discuss her work with the Churro on her farm in New Mexico. First introduced by Spanish conquerors, the Churro became a sacred part of the pastoral Diné or Navajo way of life and was also essential to various Indigenous tribes and Hispanic communities of New Mexico and Mexico, including the Pueblo and Tarahumara.

The Churro Sheep has come to symbolize aspects of Diné cultural identity, nomadic lifeways and iconic traditions, including their long history of weaving. Both the Diné people and the Churro endured multiple threats and extermination campaigns and federal management policies which were akin to the genocidal attempts to eliminate Buffalo and the Plains Indians.

By 1970, only 450 original Churro Sheep remained, however due to the combined efforts of Indigenous shepherds, researchers and instrumental people like Dr. Lyle McNeal and the Navajo Sheep Project, the Churro are still here. They are an essential part of regenerating dryland regions and fragile desert ecosystems, contribute to the health of biocrusts and bear cultural significance for the Diné and other Indigenous communities of the Southwest. Many are working to ensure the primitive Churro sheep will thrive well into the future. Jennifer Douglass is here to tell us more about this remarkable breed and why its inheritance matters for restoration ecology, cultural legacy and future generations.

For an extended interview and other benefits, become an EcoJustice Radio patron at https://www.patreon.com/ecojusticeradio

LINKS

https://tilth.org/stories/threads-of-tradition/

Jennifer Douglass is a social practice artist, shepherd, and environmental activist that has devoted most of her life to protecting ecology in the West and creative ways of bridging ideologies between loss of biodiversity, and human impact. She is Executive Director for Rio Milagro Foundation [https://www.riomilagro.org/] and runs a women-led farm (Rio Milagro Farm [https://www.riomilagrofarm.com/]), dedicated to conservation in both restorative ecology and the preservation of the landrace primitive genetics of Churro sheep in the southwest. She has spent most of her adult life devoted to understanding the role landraces like the Churro have in carbon sequestering and soil regeneration in arid regions.

Carry Kim, Co-Host of EcoJustice Radio. An advocate for ecosystem restoration, Indigenous lifeways, and a new humanity born of connection and compassion, she is a long-time volunteer for SoCal350, member of Ecosystem Restoration Camps, and a co-founder of the Soil Sponge Collective, a grassroots community organization dedicated to big and small scale regeneration of Mother Earth.

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Executive Producer and Intro: Jack Eidt

Hosted by Carry Kim

Engineer and Original Music: Blake Quake Beats

Episode 230

Photo credit: Jennifer Douglass