Gathering California Native Plants

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Gathering Deergrass documents Abe Sanchez, Marian Walkingstick, and Fran Yorba gathering deergrass, a traditional southern California basketry plant. They’re gathering at Rancho Cuyamaca State Park after the 2003 fires, so the deergrass, Muhlenbergia rigens, is especially lush and tall. Abe is a descendant of Purapeche people in Mexico. Marian and Fran are Acjachemen from San Juan Capistrano.

The Gathering Deergrass video is part of a collaborative project to document traditional gathering practices in southern California. Music is by composer William Bradbury.

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Gathering Chia documents Abe Sanchez (Purapeche); Marian Walkingstick (Acjachemen); Diania Caudell (Luiseño); Irving Morales (Luiseño); and Maureen Castillo (Cupeño) harvesting the tiny black seeds of the chia plant, a vitally important edible food for southwest native people. The group are basket weavers passionately interested in anything related to traditional native basketry. In southern California, chia seeds were harvested using a seed beater woven from willow and other local basketry plants. The seeds were collected in a a burden basket or basket tray, then winnowed to remove the chaff using a woven winnowing tray. Except for Abe, no one is using traditional tools, but rather whatever is at hand. Irving is beating the seed heads with a fly swatter and using a plastic bucket to collect them. Although his pink plastic fly swatter works well enough as a seed beater, it doesn’t have the beauty or resonance of a woven seedbeater. And the red bucket from Home Depot, although inexpensive and functional, lacks any connection to the gathering site, unlike traditional collecting baskets woven with the the local juncus, deergrass, Rhus trilobata, and yucca.

The Gathering Chia video is part of a larger project to document traditional gathering practices in southern California. Music is by composer William Bradbury.

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A traditional Acjachemen Planting Song using elderberry clapper sticks, sung by members of Tushmalum Heleckum, the Hummingbird Singers, from the San Juan Capistrano area. With Fran Yorba, Kathy Sandoval, and Marian Walkingstick.

The Acjachemen Planting Song video is part of a collaborative project to document the gathering of traditional southern California plants used in Native American basketry.

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Gathering yucca shows Acjachemen elder Marian Walkingstick gathering the heart of the Yucca whipplie plant, whose fibers she will use to start her traditional southern California basket. She is gathering the yucca leaves off the Ortega Highway.

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Youtube lower resolution versions:

Gathering Yucca

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gathering chia ( a lower resolution version)