NDNLand’s work is rooted in protecting our peoples’ right to clean air, clean water, healthy lands, and community self-determination.

Indigenous Land, Culture, and Health — Rewoven.

Indigenous Land, Culture, and Health — Rewoven.

Our Core Projects

Kihkǫspé:hla
Yesàh Community, Language, Culture & Health

Kihkǫspé:hla — “They Remember It” — is a land-based education and cultural memory site stewarded by NDNLand. Originally developed through a partnership between NDPonics, the Landberry Foundation, and Washington & Lee University, it now serves as a central cultural campus for NDNLand’s research, teaching, and mapping programs.

Located on 6 acres in the ancestral Yesàh territory, the site includes a teaching lodge, internet-connected classroom space, meadow, stream, and trails. It provides a grounding space for intergenerational knowledge exchange — where Indigenous students, scholars, and community members can engage in hands-on learning that weaves together ecology, language, governance, and cultural history.

As Kihkǫspé:hla evolves, it is becoming a hub for restorative education and Indigenous-led research. Future plans include expanding curriculum offerings in partnership with tribal schools and universities, hosting seasonal knowledge-gathering events, and creating a digital archive that protects and uplifts Yésah (Eastern Siouan) cultural memory.

Onkyayun Oheki
Indigenous Food Forest Protection & Replanting

Onkyayun Oheki — "Mountain to Valley" — is a long-term effort to protect and reconnect sacred lands across a culturally and ecologically vital corridor in the Appalachian foothills. Since 2020, NDPonics has secured over 700 acres of forest, grassland, and trout-bearing creek, forming the core of a 983-acre conservation area that anchors traditional foodways, ceremony, and ecological stewardship.

This project has already helped reconnect fragmented habitat between Coates' Mountain and the Adam’s Peak Roadless Area — together, these landscapes represent over 13,500 acres of spiritually and ecologically significant territory.

Looking ahead, our goal is to close the final gap between our protected homelands and the George Washington and Jefferson National Forests. By securing additional tracts and establishing tribal conservation easements, we seek to ensure unbroken habitat corridors for wildlife, access to ceremonial sites for our people, and long-term Indigenous governance of these mountain-to-valley ecosystems.

Indigenous East
An Intertribal Ecological & Cultural Corridor

Indigenous East (“Kihú:wa”) is a Native women-led initiative to advance land rematriation by creating a connected corridor of Indigenous-owned, -managed, and -stewarded lands east of the Mississippi River. Originally launched under the Landberry Foundation, Indigenous East now operates as a core program of NDNLand, anchoring our regional strategy for Indigenous conservation leadership and cultural resurgence.

Through Indigenous East, we are identifying and mapping culturally significant lands, supporting tribal governance systems, and building coalitions across eastern Tribal Nations and Indigenous communities — from the Great Lakes to the Chesapeake to the southern Appalachians. Our work centers Traditional Ecological Knowledge, ancestral memory, and community self-determination to return land and power to Native hands.

  • Tapuničkaika

    This program ensures energy resilience for critical land work, ceremony, and safety, including emergency preparedness for community gatherings.

  • He Kawiyani Mani

    This project addresses threats to our ancestral streams and forests by restoring riparian habitat and replanting native species. It reintroduces traditional crops and foodways, improves ecological resilience, and centers Indigenous food sovereignty and water stewardship practices.

  • Amani Akateka

    This is our program of immersive cultural learning that centers language reacquisition and, through the lens of language, teaches traditional food practices, indigenous agroforestry, and traditional Yesàh foodways.

  • Mani Ame

    This project revolved around the completion of purchasing a small wetland in the valley that contains the confluence of two springs and the primary creek of the valley in a flat section of important wetland. This project was completed in 2022.

Our Story

NDNLand is a living network for Indigenous land rematriation, ecological restoration, and environmental restoration in the Eastern Woodlands. It emerged from the grounded work of two sister organizations: NDPonics, an Indigenous conservation and cultural sovereignty nonprofit stewarding land and lifeways in the Blue Ridge mountains, and the Landberry Foundation, a private foundation devoted to returning land and power to Indigenous & Afro-Descendant communities through community-led ecological healing.

Rooted in the forested ridges, river valleys, and wetlands of Yesàh (Eastern Siouan) homelands, NDNLand began with the act of returning to place — protecting springs, replanting forests, speaking ancestral languages, and building off-grid food and energy systems from the soil up. Over time, the work became more than the sum of its parts. As land was reacquired and waters restored, the need for a broader, intertribal framework emerged — one capable of weaving together tribal communities, cultural practitioners, legal advocates, and conservation partners across the region.