Tending the wild : Native American knowledge and the management of California's natural resources

Anderson, Kat 1955- (Author).

Summary: Tending the Wild is an examination of the extensive knowledge Native Americans brought to bear in managing California's natural resources and the imprint this management left on the state's landscape. M. Kat Anderson presents a wealth of information gleaned from biological research and historical literature, as well as interviews with California Indians who describe the Old Ways of relating to nature they learned from their parents and grandparents and still practice today. The complex picture that emerges dispels the stereotype of Native Americans as hunter-gatherers, a stereotype long perpetuated in anthropological and historical literature.

Record details

ISBN: 0520238567 (cloth : alk. paper)
ISBN: 9780520238565 (cloth : alk. paper)
ISBN: 0520248511 (pbk : alk. paper)
ISBN: 9780520248519 (pbk : alk. paper)
Physical Description: print
xxix, 526 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm.
Publisher: Berkeley : University of California Press, c2005.

Content descriptions

Bibliography, etc. Note:

Includes bibliographical references (p. 411-470) and index.

Formatted Contents Note:

pt. I. California at contact -- 1. The wildlife, plants, and people -- 2. Gathering, hunting, and fishing -- 3. The collision of worlds -- pt. II. Indigenous land management and its ecological basis -- 4. Methods of caring for the land -- 5. Landscapes of stewardship -- 6. Basketry : cultivating forbs, sedges, grasses, and tules -- 7. From arrows to weirs : cultivating shrubs and trees -- 8. California's cornucopia : a calculated abundance -- 9. Plant foods aboveground : seeds, grains, leaves, and fruits -- 10. Plant foods belowground : bulbs, corms, rhizomes, taproots, and tubers -- pt. III. Rekindling the old ways -- 11. Contemporary California Indian harvesting and management practices -- 12. Restoring landscapes with native knowledge -- Coda : indigenous wisdom in the modern world.