@農자료창고

The concept of companion planting, in which one plant helps the other, is the basic idea behind the Three Sisters, but focusing on this alone glosses over many of the nuances in native garden traditions. Growing plants to work together symbiotically — using hills of corn to serve as poles for beans, and interplanting this with squash to keep down invasive weeds — is as much about compatibility and harnessing nature to do part of the work as it is a study in what we take from nature and what we give back. Modern agribusiness is based on yields extracted from the land as though strip mining. The Native American garden, which was actually a form of small-scale farming, made the land richer — one reason why early settlers were eager to seize Native American fields.

Some of the earliest illustrations that have survived of Native American fields — depictions of patches of corn and squash from the 1580s — show no evidence of Three Sisters gardening. They do show a clear understanding of the separation of corn varieties so they tassel at different times and thus do not cross-pollinate. Some native peoples farmed with other mixes of plants. The Hopi introduced a fragrant wildflower into their gardens to attract pollinators. Other peoples intermingled their corn and beans with sunflowers, which make wonderful “poles” for beans that grow too tall to climb up cornstalks.

Native American gardens were fine-tuned to their local micro-climate, and this is a feature often overlooked by gardeners today. one seed does not fit all gardens. Native peoples maintained a wide selection of plants because they often moved around, so what may have worked well in North Carolina among the Cherokee may not have been successful on the Great Plains. The Pawnee of the Midwest, for example, maintained four sacred corn varieties, of which their white-flour corn, called “Mother Corn,” was the most highly venerated. If one failed, they had others they could rely on.

Native American Corn

Native corns are heartier and generally more drought-resistant and adaptable than modern-day industrial varieties. Choosing the right corn to grow in your region is important, especially because the corn more or less serves as the “framework” for a Native American garden. If you plan to save seed for next year, choose one variety of corn to grow at a time in a given area to prevent cross-pollination.

I have been growing native corns for many years and recently began large-scale grow-outs at Mill Hollow Farm near Edgemont, Pa. Two corns in particular — ‘Tutelo Strawberry’ (a short-eared flint) and ‘Delaware Indian Puhwem’ (flour corn) — have done extremely well, and seeds are available directly from the farm (see the chart key in Seed Varieties for Your Native American Garden). In the future, I plan to offer some Seneca corns, particularly ‘Ha-Go-Wa’ (hominy corn) and ‘Blue Bear Dance,’ as well as ‘Tuscarora’ flour corn.

Native American Squash and Beans

Locating authentic Native American squash for your garden will prove extra challenging, because many of the squash varieties have been “improved” over the years by plant breeders looking for characteristics that appeal to present-day cooks. ‘Early White Scallop’ and ‘Yellow Summer Crookneck’ are examples of this kind of improved plant stock. While both can be documented to the 18th century and earlier, they are somewhat different from the Native American originals. The old-style plants were vining rather than bush in habit, for example.

Aside from pattypan squash, finger squash and a few others, not many varieties of squash and pumpkins have survived from early Native American gardens, especially in the eastern part of the United States. I have been involved in a project in my own garden to recover Nanticoke “maycocks,” an old native name for summer squash eaten green. These squash probably represent a range of what native peoples were looking for in squash, as some are good for cooking fresh, some for drying, some for seed oil, and others for long-term storage.

There are a great many Native American beans, but few of them are preserved under their original Native American names. After quite a bit of research and some luck, I discovered that the meaty ‘Ohio Pole Bean’ — a favorite of mine — was actually an old variety grown by the Delaware, Potawatomi, Shawnee and Miami living in the vicinity of Ft. Wayne, Ind., in the 1790s. The ‘Amish Nuttle’ bean is another Native American variety that has come down to us under several non-native names. The chart in Seed Varieties for Your Native American Garden has many more recommended varieties.