"Early colonists on Turtle Island were stunned by the
plenitude they found here, attributing the richness to the bounty
of nature. Settlers in the Great Lakes wrote in their journals
about the extraordinary abundance of wild rice harvested by
Native peoples; in just a few days, they could fill their canoes
with enough rice to last all year. But the settlers were puzzled by
the fact that, as one of them wrote, “the savages stopped
gathering long before all the rice was harvested.” She observed
that “the rice harvest starts with a ceremony of thanksgiving and
prayers for good weather for the next four days. They will harvest
dawn till dusk for the prescribed four days and then stop, often
leaving much rice to stand unreaped. This rice, they say, is not
for them but for the Thunders. Nothing will compel them to
continue, therefore much goes to waste.” The settlers took this as
certain evidence of laziness and lack of industry on the part of
the heathens. They did not understand how indigenous land-care
practices might contribute to the wealth they encountered.
I once met an engineering student visiting from Europe who
told me excitedly about going ricing in Minnesota with his
friend’s Ojibwe family. He was eager to experience a bit of Native
American culture. They were on the lake by dawn and all day
long they poled through the rice beds, knocking the ripe seed
into the canoe. “It didn’t take long to collect quite a bit,” he
reported, “but it’s not very efficient. At least half of the rice just
falls in the water and they didn’t seem to care. It’s wasted.” As a
gesture of thanks to his hosts, a traditional ricing family, he
offered to design a grain capture system that could be attached to
the gunwales of their canoes. He sketched it out for them,
showing how his technique could get 85 percent more rice. His
hosts listened respectfully, then said, “Yes, we could get more
that way. But it’s got to seed itself for next year. And what we
leave behind is not wasted. You know, we’re not the only ones
who like rice. Do you think the ducks would stop here if we took
it all?” Our teachings tell us to never take more than half."
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