Category: Free Inquiry

This week I went for a walk at Swan Lake. “Swan Lake Nature Sanctuary is a charitable, non-profit organization that cares for 170 acres of wetlands and Garry oak meadow.” (Swan Lake christmas hill nature sanctuary). The nature sanctuary has a garden that features many local native plants. They have lots of resources available in the nature house and on their website. Additionally, they offer native plant workshops and native plant sales.

This photo, taken from the Swan Lake nature sanctuary website, shows the nature house where the workshops are available. The image is a hyperlink to take you to their page on native plant workshops. They teach you native plant identification and their ecological benefits among other things. Around the garden they have posted wooden signs with QR codes that tell you the name of the native plant in multiple languages including SENĆOŦEN and lək̓ʷəŋiʔnəŋ.

The specific plant that I will be focusing on for this blog post is the native strawberry plant! While they are not in season yet there were still some growing in the native plant garden at swan lake. There are lots of uses for these plants both medicinally and culinarily. I have a set of Pacific Northwest Plant Knowledge Cards (which I will link down below) that highlight edible and medicinal plants.

The strawberry plant card or t̕íl̕əqʷ(SENĆOŦEN), features some of its traditional uses. Indigenous people used the leaves to brew a tea that soothes sore throats. The leaves can be chewed up and put on an open sore to heal the wound. In terms of culinary usage, strawberries can be eaten off the vine or made into a jam. When confronted with wild strawberries it is important to remember the guidelines of the Honourable Harvest (Kimmerer, 2013).

This video is from the novel Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Kimmerer (2013).

References: Kimmerer, R. W. (2013). Braiding Sweetgrass. Milkweed Editions. Swan Lake christmas hill nature sanctuary. Swan Lake Christmas Hill Nature Sanctuary. (n.d.). https://www.swanlake.bc.ca/

The image is a hyperlink to the strong nations site to purchase the cards.

For my Free Inquiry project I will be learning about local indigenous plants and how to use them in day to day life. I will be taking walks during which I will identifying some of the plants I see and whether they are in season. I will be linking related information as I learn the traditional uses of such plants, whether that be for cooking or medicinal purposes. It is important to know the plants that grow around you as well as to respect the land that you are on.

As I will be learning about plants on the unceded territory of the Lək̓ʷəŋən (Songhees and Esquimalt) and W̱SÁNEĆ peoples, I will add the Indigenous names of the plants and the traditional territory where I find them. It is important to understand that while I will include the uses of the plants that that doesn’t mean that the plants should be harvested. There are some plants that are endangered and should only be viewed and not taken. The resources that I will be referencing in my quest for Indigenous plant knowledge will be hyperlinked in the post in which they are mentioned. The video included in this post features an introduction into the Indigenous plants and their spiritual and medicinal uses.