THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



Photograph by C. Hart Merriam 



ANOTHER TYPE OE LEACH, MADE BY THE WUKSACHE INDIANS OE ESHOM VALLEY 



This leach consists largely of sand placed on a bed of dry, dead leaves and twigs sup- 

 ported on a square framework of poles. The looped stick resting against the leach is used 

 for stirring the hot stones in the basket while the cooking is going on. 



these, the fat acorns of the blue oak of 

 the dry foothills and the elongate ones 

 of the valley oak of the bottomlands and 

 adjacent slopes are gathered and con- 

 sumed in large quantities ; and in years 

 when the nut crop of the favorite species 

 fails, most, if not all, of the others are 

 turned to account. 



Even at the present time hundreds of 

 bushels of acorns are annually gathered 

 and eaten by California Indians; but the 



quantity consumed by the white popula- 

 tion is negligible, the main part of the 

 crop (amounting to thousands of bush- 

 els) being devoured by hogs, bear, deer, 

 squirrels, and other animals or allowed 

 to go to waste on the ground. 



ACORNS AS A BREAD SUBSTITUTE IN 

 EUROPE 



In the old world the utilization of 

 acorn food for man and beast dates from 



