USEFUL WILD PLANTS 



times frequently made forced marches of a day on 

 no other ration than a small sack of pinole, con- 

 sumed in instalments as they traveled. 6 More often, 

 however, it is moistened with water and eaten as 

 mush or thinner as a gruel, or baked in the form of 

 cakes. While the different sorts of seeds are col- 

 lected and ground separately, it is not unusual to 

 combine them for consumption, as taste may dictate. 7 



It would be tedious to enumerate all the plants 

 which have been found of sufficient food value to 

 grind into pinole, but the following may be men- 

 tioned as of especial interest and worth : 



Of wide distribution in our Far West are two 

 annual species of the homely Goosef oot or Pigweed. 

 One is Chenopodium Fremontii, Wats., with more or 

 less mealy leaves of triangular shape, a plant usually 

 a foot or two high but sometimes attaining in over- 

 flowed lands a height of six feet or over ; the other is 

 C. leptophyllum, Nutt., with very narrow leaves that 

 are scarcely mealy. The latter species occurs also 

 in seashore sands of the Atlantic coast from Con- 

 necticut to New Jersey. The inconspicuous green 



6 For white consumption, the digestibility of this ration is im- 

 proved by thorough and repeated grinding and parching after each 

 operation. 



7 V. K. Chesnut : "Plants Used by the Indians of Mendocino Co., 

 California," Printed as Contributions from the U. S. National 

 Herbarium, Vol. VII, No. 3. 



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