Collecting seeds and connecting with grasses

LAUGHTER AND the chirping of grasshoppers mingled on a mild August morning as several young women, members of the Aaniiih and Nakoda tribes, searched for sweetgrass, running vegetation through their fingers as they tried to determine whether they held satiny sweetgrass or rough sedges. One held strands of sweetgrass in her mouth as the plant’s scent, reminiscent of vanilla and oak, drifted through the air. Sweetgrass is braided, used in smudging ceremonies and presented as a gift by many Indigenous people, both here on the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation as well as across the United States and Canada. “Can I come back next summer?” Savannah Spottedbird, a 17-year-old member of the Nakoda Tribe, shouted across the meadow, waving long blades of grass. “I want to do more of this!”

The moist meadow was surrounded