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Abstract Traditional harvest entails humans extracting and managing resources from intact, semi‐natural ecosystems. As such, it is inherently comprised of close interactions between humans and ecosystems and may provide unique insight into socio‐ecological systems. Traditional harvest is generally accompanied by traditional resource management and directly influences ecological community dynamics, species reproduction and distribution, and competitive interactions. Meanwhile, ecological processes, seasonality, and natural disturbances influence human behaviors, decision making, activities, and well‐being. As a result of this tight coupling, traditional harvest systems have the potential to serve as important laboratories for the study of ecological community dynamics. Resilience science, in particular, may benefit from greater appreciation of traditional harvest, wherein thresholds and bidirectional feedbacks may be more easily detected and modeled than in more diffuse socio‐ecological systems. Additionally, because traditional harvest links to cultural heritage and traditional ecological knowledge, a greater understanding of these systems may facilitate efforts to support marginalized communities and social equity. We here discuss the value of traditional harvest research for science and society, highlighting as a case study the traditional harvest of Emory oak acorns by Western Apache Tribal Nations. We argue that traditional harvest systems carry important heuristic value but are often assumed to be rare or declining and are therefore relatively neglected by researchers, yet their persistence in modern agriculture‐dominated systems exemplifies resilience. As environmental change persists and natural systems near critical tipping points, understanding the role of humans in ecosystem resilience will be necessary to develop effective and sustainable management. 

Dataset AbstractFarmers are surveyed to understand their perception of and response to climate change. This data forms part of the basis for Stuart, D., R. L. Schewe, and M. McDermott. 2012. Responding to climate change: barriers to reflexive modernization in US agriculture. Organization & Environment 25:308-327original data source http://lter.kbs.msu.edu/datasets/123 

Scholars are increasingly calling for the environmental issues of the industrial agricultural system to be addressed via eventual agroecological system-level transformation. It is critical to identify the barriers to this transition. Drawing from Henke’s (Cultivating science, harvesting power: science and industrial agriculture in California, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 2008) theory of “repair,” we explore how farmers participate in the reproduction of the industrial system through “discursive repair,” or arguing for the continuation of the industrial agriculture system. Our empirical case relates to water pollution from nitrogen fertilizer and draws data from a sample of over 150 interviews with row-crop farmers in the midwestern United States. We find that farmers defend this system by denying agriculture’s causal role and proposing the potential for within-system solutions. They perform these defenses by drawing on ideological positions (agrarianism, market-fundamentalism and techno-optimism) and may be ultimately led to seek system maintenance because they are unable to envision an alternative to the industrial agriculture system.