An interview with Rose Bear Dont Walk
The COVID-19 pandemic, for better or worse, has shifted some important facets of our lives. For some, it has encouraged starting a garden or cooking more at home. This might be just enough, but I wanted to speak to someone who could impart local knowledge about food relationships in the Flathead, and perhaps inspire an even deeper connection. I was curious--is it possible and practical to obtain and enjoy ancestral foods as part of the modern diet? Would this adoption or increase in locally foraged, fished, or hunted food improve health? I turned to Salish ethnobotanist, Rose Bear Dont Walk, for a thought-provoking interview bringing out her traditional and ancestral foods knowledge and hopes for the future of our local food system. Rose reminds us that the very earth around us provides plants, berries, roots, herbs and animals that can satisfy a healthy portion of our diets, and even save our lives.
Here is a small taste of our conversation:
Salish ethnobotanist, Rose Bear Dont Walk holds up a camas bulb. This and many other traditional foods are still harvested to this day.
Introduce yourself. Tell us where you are from and anything you would like us to know about you.
I am from St. Ignatius and grew up on the Flathead Reservation. I come from the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes as well as the Crow Tribes in eastern Montana. I went to St. Ignatius High School and from there I went and got my Bachelor of Arts from Yale University in political science with a focus in environmental science and I recently graduated from the University of Montana with a Masters of Science in environmental studies.
Did anything along the way influence you to go down this path?
When I went and got my bachelors, I really dug deep into the food system of America but also what food systems look like in Native America, historically and currently. When I went to Connecticut, I didnt realize that I lived in a food desert! We didnt have as much access to local, healthy, nutritious foods in my hometown, or even my school. It took going away to have that realization. My senior thesis was about food systems and how policy, as well as economic and social issues go into how we access food, where our food comes from, and how our food choices affect our health. When I did my masters program, I randomly took a class called Plants and Culture and I was blown away by how amazing plants are. Learning about how plants were utilized around the world, not just for food but for religious purposesfor ceremonies, it inspired me to learn more about the plants of my people. My background studying food systems and food sovereignty in Native America could mesh with studying the plants and incorporate traditional uses of food plants into these frameworks. For Salish people, meat and fish are primary foods in the diet, but the rest of the vitamins and nutrients you need to live healthy were historically supplemented with plants.
Can you give me an example of a couple plants that are or were primarily part of the Salish diet?
A lot of people know the staple plants, which are bitterroot and camas. Those were harvested in large quantities because of their ability to be eaten on the spot or feed the community, but also for their ability to be dried and reconstituted at a later time. Those two are the big ones. But in my study, Ive come across some lesser known food plants that the Salish use. They had glacier lily and yellowbell corm, which is delicious; some lesser known berries like thimbleberries or even chokecherries, which I dont know that a lot of western Montana people know about. They kind of have an acquired taste. Chokecherries were amazing because they could be pounded out, dried, and made into cakes.
Many native plants were the food source for tribal people before farming and commerce was introduced to this continent.
Interesting, these plants were eaten all year-round.
Right. At the very start of Spring, harvesting begins because youre hungry coming out of the cold of winter. These little plants called spring beauties, sometimes called Indian potatoes, were probably the first to be harvested. They are very tiny and grow underground. Their latin name is Claytonia lanceolata, and they just taste like potatoes!
How do you prepare them?
They are kind of the same as regular potatoes, which only keep for a certain amount of time. They do have higher water content and get moldy easy, so I imagine because of their size and because they dont keep for very long, I think Salish people just ate them on the go. You can just peel off the skin and pop them in your mouth. But you could also cook them in a skillet with oil, salt and pepper. Its delicious!
That does sound good. When growing up, did your family have any special food rituals or traditions?
My mom did a very good job bringing me to different community feasts and ceremonies. We participated in the bitterroot feast that the community puts on, weve done several camas bakes, and berry picking. Growing up I had a pretty good grasp on some of the food traditions that we had involving plants. I personally dont know how to fish and I dont know how to hunt, but I am wanting to learn.
Yeah! I have talked to several people in their 20s and younger and they have expressed the same. Surely people have these skills, especially older folks. Why do you think younger people are not partaking in hunting and fishing as much as their parents and elders?
You know, I dont know either. And I think there are a lot of kids in my generation that dont have these basic knowledge pockets. Things like chopping wood or how to build a fire, basic survival skills. Some of these skills I have come into later in my life and I fully appreciate the work that goes into these types of things.
Rose Bear Don't Walk gives a presentation on native plants.
Switching gearsIf you were to close your eyes and envision food sovereignty in action in this community, what would it look like?
In my vision, especially with the research and work I am doing with my fellowship, would be to have more Salish people engaged in our traditional food ways, whether it is just going out berry picking for a day or preparing a traditional meal or even just being out in the wilderness identifying native plants. Aside from finding and knowing traditional food, I would hope that we start moving towards participating more in our local food economy. We have some amazing farms within a 15-mile vicinity to access a locally grown, healthy, low environmental impact food system. You know, these foods are not that expensive. There is a lot of people that think local, organic food is pretty expensive and that its a hassle to go out and get it, but really a lot of that is accessible within our own community, we just have to know where to look.
And I wonder if we need to figure out how to connect more people to these agricultural local products in addition to increasing the knowledge base of traditional foods. The marriage of these two would make for a healthy diet.
I agree 100 percent, and I think if somebody were to take on a fully traditional diet, that would need to be their only commitment for whatever length of time that they decide. Technically, thats part of what the traditional existence was. Day in and day out, hunting, foraging, having connections with the tribe and the community, with the family. But because we have transitioned to a wage economy and a more sedentary lifestyle, thats just not in the cards. So, I agree that we should be looking at the local environmentnot just hunting, foraging, fishing, but what is being grown in the soil nearby and how can we access it as a community. It seems like during the pandemic, a lot of people are learning to grow their own food. Ive seen a lot of gardens popping up and its making me really happy because they are reconnecting with where their food comes from. And in turn, people are cooking with foods they may not have eaten before, which is just another vein of becoming food sovereign.
What challenges are we facing to make your vision a reality?
The challenges stem from a shift in our biological palate. We are in this space where we crave sugar and we crave flour and we crave fat and I think just finding little ways in our everyday life to tweak that a little bit would make a difference. Instead of just using regular sugar why dont we use some local honey? Or consider flour alternatives? We can still cook our favorite comfort foods, but make them in a healthier way. Maybe then we would not require so much salt, sugar, and fat. The shift to a westernized diet is what truly impacted the Native community. Our bodies were not designed to process white flour, white sugar, or lard. The Salish diet was primarily roots, shoots, berries, meat and fish so if there is any way we can incorporate those foods little by little, we start to build a healthier future for ourselves and can continue diversifying our diets.
Bear Don't Walk does walks in the woods of the Flathead Reservation.
What practical choices can an individual make to include more traditional foods in their diet?
Start learning how to grow your own food. It just takes starting some seeds in any type of vessel. Seeds are cheap! Utilize the soil, sow the seeds, and just keep up with the plants. Of course, this takes time and effort that some may not have time for, so in this case, look for local opportunities to buy food. Are there community supported agriculture (CSA) options available? How about farmers markets or local farms that have eggs, poultry, pork, or vegetables? Choose to participate in the local economy rather than just going to the grocery store.
In closing, do you have any direction or advice for people looking to learn more about their ancestral diet?
Get out! Get dirty and get your hands in the soil. Connect with your food in a whole different way than the typical plastic package. In a pandemic where we are in close spaces and having a lot of free time, there is no better time to engage with our food and get to know it a little better. Start an herb garden or plant vegetables in the backyard. Pick berries with the family and try a new recipelearn how to make your own pasta or bread! Now is the time to get engaged because we have the time to be home, learning about ourselves and our food, and connecting more deeply in these ways.
This column is a project of Kati Burton, CSKT Guided Care Dietitian. She hopes to bring local voices to the table to discuss food traditions and memories that reconnect us with our food history and help us to eat well.
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Now is the time to eat close to home: - Char-Koosta News
