In a moment that tribal leaders described as 'good medicine,' the Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California has completed the acquisition of **10,274 acres** of ancestral Sierra Nevada land near Lake Tahoe — the largest tribal land return in the region's history, and the third largest in California's recorded history.
The property, formerly known as Loyalton Ranch, was acquired in February 2026 through a **$5.5 million grant from California's Wildlife Conservation Board**, supplemented by private donations. The Washoe Tribe's newly established Waší·šiw Land Trust — founded in 2025 specifically to facilitate the repatriation of ancestral lands — now holds title to the land.
It has been renamed the **WélmeltiɁ Preserve** — a word in the Washo language that translates, roughly, as 'where the land is good.'
**A People Without Their Land — Until Now**
The Washoe people have been the stewards of the Lake Tahoe Basin for at least ten thousand years. Their name for the lake — *dá'aw* — predates every city, casino, and ski resort along its shores by millennia. They harvested fish, hunted deer and pronghorn across the Sierra Nevada, and developed a deep ecological knowledge of a landscape that outsiders would later call one of the most beautiful on earth.
The disruption of that relationship was rapid and devastating. Gold rush-era settlement pushed the Washoe off their ancestral lands. Federal allotment policies fragmented what little remained. By the twentieth century, the people whose language named the lake had almost no legal title to any of it.
The WélmeltiɁ Preserve is, in the words of Washoe Tribe Chairman Serrell Smokey, a step toward reversing that.
'This land is good medicine for the Washoe people. It's a step toward healing from generations of historical trauma, and it will benefit our children and grandchildren for generations to come.' — Chairman Serrell Smokey, Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California
**What the Land Holds**
The 10,274-acre preserve is located northeast of Lake Tahoe, approximately 20 miles north of Reno. It encompasses diverse Sierra Nevada landscapes: sagebrush scrublands, juniper and pine forests, riparian corridors, and habitat for pronghorn, mule deer, and grey wolves, which have been gradually returning to the region.
The Washoe Tribe plans to manage the land through traditional ecological knowledge combined with modern conservation science:
- **Cultural restoration:** Replanting native species — particularly pinyon pine, whose nuts were a dietary staple — that have declined under non-indigenous land management - **Ecological stewardship:** Restoring stream corridors, managing grazing, and supporting wildlife passage - **Cultural education:** Bringing Washoe youth onto the land to reconnect with ancestral practices, language, and ecological knowledge
**The Largest Tribal Land Return in the Sierra Nevada**
The acquisition was made possible by the California Wildlife Conservation Board, which recognised that indigenous stewardship has historically produced better conservation outcomes than conventional land management — a finding increasingly supported by peer-reviewed research across North America, Australia, and the Amazon.
The Waší·šiw Land Trust was established in 2025 with a broader mandate: to systematically repatriate Washoe ancestral lands across the entire Sierra Nevada territory. The WélmeltiɁ Preserve is its first major acquisition — but far from its last intended one.
Ten thousand acres of high Sierra Nevada, coming home. 🌲
*Sources: The Guardian (February 11, 2026) · Native News Online · KUNR Public Radio*