U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials and leaders of the Mi’kmaq Nation gathered at the Aroostook National Wildlife Refuge in Limestone Wednesday to sign a co-stewardship agreement to preserve and connect land surrounding the former Loring Air Force Base.
The federal government controls several thousand acres of land to the east and west of the Cold War military installation. The Mi’kmaq own about 600 acres to the south of the base that abuts both sections of the refuge.
Signed on Earth Day by Mi’kmaq Tribal Chief Sheila McCormack and Fish and Wildlife Acting Northeast Regional Director Sharon Marino, the agreement is the first of its kind in Maine, and unique among other co-stewardship agreements between the federal agency and tribes on the East Coast.
“The best way to steward the lands is to combine the knowledge that the tribal communities have with the scientific research that we do,” John Megera, refuge manager of the Northern Maine National Wildlife Refuge Complex said. “There’s a lot that can be lost if you don’t understand the history of thousands of years of people living on these lands.”
The agreement grants each government access to the other’s land, whether that be for scientific research, to grow medicinal plants or participate in other cultural traditions.
A publicly accessible hiking trail will be constructed to connect the sections of the wildlife refuge through tribal land, and signs on trailheads and displays inside the refuge visitors center have been updated to include translations in the Mi’kmaq language.
“We’re a small tribe, but we’re a mighty tribe, and we are the original land stewards to this land,” Mi’kmaq Environmental Health Director Shannon Hill said. “The water is our life, the soil is our soul. So we just want people to appreciate and respect what the land means to us, and partner with us so that we steward this land moving forward.”
The Mi’kmaq and the Fish and Wildlife Service have partnered on projects before. Tribal children take a field trip to the refuge each year as part of a summer camp, and the service has allowed the tribe to cut down several brown ash trees for basket making. The trees have become more difficult to find on Mi’kmaq land.
Wednesday’s agreement formalizes their association and sets the stage for future cooperation, something the federal government has more strongly emphasized in recent years.
“The government called upon us to explore new partnerships with tribal nations to think above and beyond the things that we have to do with and for tribes and look at the broader landscape of possibilities of things that we could do or should do,” Regional Tribal Liaison Tim Binzen said. “Co-stewardship of the ancestral lands that we happen to administer today became a very big priority.”
The effort was spearheaded by Wayne Selfridge, a refuge volunteer, and Lachlin Robertson, a wildlife refuge specialist with the Fish and Wildlife Service, who worked in the Aroostook refuge in summer 2024.
“Out of the blue he asked, ‘Wayne, what could we do with the local tribes here at the refuge?’ Selfridge said of Robertson. “Well, he wasn’t used to me yet, and I said, ‘I’ve already got a plan.’”
The agreement came together over the next two years in what both sides called a “very natural and organic process.”
“Let this be an example of co-stewardship of land and the positive outcomes of our two governments working hand in hand with each other,” McCormack told a crowd gathered for the signing.
As part of the event, Robertson and Mi’kmaq historic preservation officer Jenny Gaenzle affixed two new signs to trailheads for the refuge’s Lynx Trail, which now include the Mi’kmaq word for the animal — apugsign — and its pronunciation.
Officials also unveiled a new display in the visitors center that features Mi’kmaq-made baskets and other tribal items, along with a copy of the co-stewardship agreement for the public to read about the partnership.
“That’s really what this is about, just getting out there and showing the local community, the non-native community, that ‘Hey, we’re here. Let’s be good neighbors and we can learn from each other,” Hill said.