The Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation have lived upon the land since time immemorial.  Consisting of fourteen autonomous bands and tribes, the Yakama Nation has a traditional use area of over 11 million acres where tribal members have hunted, fished, gathered, and practiced religious ceremonies for millennia.  These traditional use areas are known to have stretched into Montana, Canada and California.  Each area has a name and a story of how it came to be.  These stories have been handed down from generation to generation through oral tradition in Ichi Skiin Sinwit (the words we speak), coined by linguists as Sahaptin.  It is within Ichi Skiin Sinwit where the unwritten laws are passed down to the younger generations to show them how, when, and what resources to hunt, fish, gather, and protect.  It according to those laws that Yakama people have been appointed as stewards of the land to protect, preserve, and perpetuate the land, air, water, cultural, natural and human resources for those not yet born.   

Yakama hunting, fishing, and gathering follows a seasonal round of subsistence where harvest is based on seasonal availability of resources.  Historically, homesite locations were based upon resource locations but with the coming of motor vehicles, overall mobility has since changed.  Beginning in the spring months, roots and salmon become available.   Continuing through the summer, roots are continuously extracted at incrementally higher elevations until fall when huckleberries are ready and are found at the highest elevations.  In the late fall/winter months, permanent settlement occurs in the Yakima River Valley, but hunting and gathering still occurs in both the Basin and the higher mountain regions during this time.  To put it simply, many families spend their time in the mountains during much of the summer, and winters in the Valley.