WILD SEEDS OF EOOD VALUE 



sexes. These are succeeded in September by the 

 purplish spikes of rijoened seeds occupying the tip 

 of the panicle. The seeds are slender and cylindri- 

 cal, one-half to three-fourths of an inch long, within 

 a long-bearded husk and attached so loosely to the 

 branchlet that bears them that they drop at a touch. 

 They must needs be gathered, therefore, with great 

 care or many may be lost. The Indians customarily 

 harvest them just before they attain complete ripe- 

 ness, visiting the rice swamps with canoes, which 

 they push ahead of them, pulling the fruiting stalks 

 over the hold of the canoe and beating the seeds 

 into it with a stick.^ The grain is then taken ashore 

 where it is dried, either in the sun or by artificial 

 heat upon racks under which a slow fire is kept burn- 

 ing. The husk must then be threshed off, which 

 may be done by pounding with a heavy-ended stick 

 in a bucket; and finally the chaff is got rid of by 

 winnowing. The seeds are then ready for use or for 

 storing away. Readers of old journals of the so- 

 journers in the Northwestern wilderness wdll recall 

 the important role played by such stores of Wild 



3 The best results are attained by first tyiiif; the standing stalks 

 together at the head into small bunches. This is done a couple 

 of weeks before maturity and serves to conserve the grain and 

 lessen the depredations of the birds — particularly the bobolinks — 

 which are famous rice eaters. 



47 



