Climate threatens Ojibwe's sacred wild rice

Wild rice is sacred to Indigenous peoples in the Great Lakes region. "That manoomin is our brother," Said Ojibwe band member, Dave Bismarck, as he and his family unloaded roughly 200 hundred pounds of wild rice from their canoes. "That's Ojibwe for wild rice. Manoomin. That saved us as a people in many different ways," he said. It's sacred because the wild rice is a vital part of their creation story. "Our people, the anishinaabe people, used to live on the East Coast and someone was given a vision to travel west to where the food grows on the water. And so we did. And we came out here to this manoomin." But today, changing climate, invasive species and pollution are threatening the plant. "I've been ricing since I was a teenager," said Ryan White, another Ojibwe Band member and single father of two. "I learned from my father and grandfather and they've been doing it all their lives pretty much. In the past, my grandfather, they had to come out here and get their winter food supply. And now I need to come out here because I need to keep a roof over my head and the bills paid." The ricing season can last anywhere from a week to a month from mid August to mid September, depending on the weather. White says a big storm or hail could wipe out a whole rice crop overnight. "This year, we had a lot of high water. So the beds right now are really thin," said White describing the tough harvesting conditions. Because of the climate threats and to maintain tradition, the Leech Lake Tribal College teaches students, professors and volunteers how to harvest and parch the wild rice by hand for one week each year. Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe elder Elaine Fleming says she's hopeful for the future. "We understand our responsibilities as peoples of this nation and to our responsibilities to the land because of what it gives to us and to the water," said Fleming. "And we understand that we're supposed to think seven generations into the future and take care of this land for our children in the future because those, they are sacred too."