Cowichan Tribes revive ancient clam gardens in B.C.'s Gulf Islands
By
Jesse Winter
Properly proved. Has structure, has flavour, has a point.
Summary
Members of the Cowichan Tribes in British Columbia's Gulf Islands are working to restore ancient Indigenous clam gardens (s'axwa') — traditional mariculture systems that cultivated butter clams as a critical food source for thousands of years. These sea gardens, nearly lost to colonization, involved careful tidal bed cultivation techniques passed down through generations. The article highlights the cultural and ecological revival of these practices, connecting modern Indigenous food sovereignty efforts with ancestral knowledge.
Key quotes
· 3 pulledCrysta Charlie presses a pitchfork into the coarse shoreline at her feet, prying up a muddy mass of beach and seawater.
Then, yes – an oval clamshell the size of a softball emerges from the muck.
It's an enormous s'axwa' (the Hul'q'umi'num word for butter clam), the kind that Ms. Charlie's ancestors in these B.C. Gulf Islands relied on as a critical food source for thousands of years.
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