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Harvesting Wokas
Harvesting
Wokas is harvested
exclusively in boats of the kind known as a
"dugout." The dugout (wuns) is hollowed from
a single log, commonly of the yellow pine (Pinus
ponderosa), and ordinarily is about 18 feet
long, 2 feet wide, and 16 inches deep (Plate
4). Sometimes logs if Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga
mucronata) are used. This tree makes a
superior boat, but as the species normally
grows at a higher elevation than the lake
and marsh, it is less easily available to
the boatmaker. the dugout is propelled
usually by poling instead of paddling. The
role (la-gak'), made of a peeled sapling of
the lodge-pole pine (Pinus murrayana), is
about 9 feet long and 12 inches thick. The
lower end 3 split for a distance of about 6
inches, and the two split points are then
spread abruptly to a distance of about 4
inches, where they are held by the insertion
of a transverse brace. In all the poles seen
the brace consisted of a large wire nail.
The triangular base thus formed presents a
larger surface to the mud and often permits
the pole to rest firmly across one of the
stout rootstocks of a wokas plant. Paddles
(ka-chik') are seldom used in wokas
harvesting, as the water in the wokas fields
is rarely open, and when open is seldom too
deep for the propulsion of the boat by
poling. Within a wokas field the use of a
paddle would be very laborious if not wholly
ineffective, while the resistance offered by
the plants in the water is readily overcome
when the dugout is shoved by a pole resting
on the bottom. In localities affording
considerable deep open water, paddles also
are carried. The other necessary implements
in the boat are a flat-bottomed coarse tine
basket (tlāks) holding about half a bushel,
and a large wicker spoon (näp, or se'-ot a-ko'-olks)
made of tule or willow.
When a boat is poled by a single occupant,
she takes a position not in the stern, like
a paddler, nor at a point a little aft of
the middle, like an oarsman, but at a point
a few feet from the bow, and for the most
effective work she stands instead of
kneeling (Plate 5). As the boat is poled
slowly along among the wokas plants the
woman stoops forward, and, grasping a
full-grown wokas pod (ka-kal"-ga'-li), pulls
it off its stem and throws it into the boat.
At this point occurs the first step of
differentiation into grades or qualities of
makes. The pod when fully mature bursts open
irregularly at the base; the white, moist,
but mealy interior, as soon as it is brought
into contact with the water begins at once a
mucilaginous dissolution, and the seeds are
soon scattered in the water. The seeds
contained in these dissolving pods are more
fully matured, larger, whiter, more
palatable, and presumably more nutritious
than those of the other pods, and
consequently are much more prized and sought
after by the Indians. They have a special
designation, spokwas (spok'-was), which is
applied also to the dissolving capsule
itself and to the mucilaginous mass it forms
when gathered. Spokwas constitutes only a
small part of the whole gathering of wokas,
and this fact, in view of the great demand
for seeds of this quality, led to the
question, Why do not the women gather only
the fully matured pods of the spokwas grade?
This is clearly answered by the result of a
day's harvest of wokas pods. Ordinarily not
more than 10 per cent is spokwas, a
proportion due to the rapid dissolution of
the fully ripened pods. If the women
gathered only these, their day's harvest
would be very small, while by gathering the
full-grown but still hard pods they get a
several tithes greater product.
The spokwas pods, in a state of mucilaginous
dissolution, are lifted from the water not
by the hand, but in the wicker spoon already
mentioned, and are placed in the tlāks (tlāks),
or spokwas basket.
The wokas gatherer's day is a long and
laborious one. The women set out at about 8
o'clock in the morning and, taking a lunch
remain on the water until about 6 o'clock in
the afternoon. They often go 2 or 3 miles
from camp. An hour or so before their
arrival the various boats from any one camp
may be seen slowly approaching from
different directions, the boat itself
usually hidden the wokas leaves, its
occupant seeming at a distance to glide over
the marsh with a spectral motion,
unaccompanied by any evident means of
support or propulsion. a The alphabet and
system of diacritic marks followed in this
paper are those of the Bureau of American
Ethnology, except that "sh" is here used
instead of "c" it the sound of "sh" in
shall, and "ch" instead of "te" for the
sound of "ch" in church. Secondary accents
are not marked when they occur at the normal
distance of two syllables from a primary
accent.
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Wokas, Primitive Food of
the Klamath Indians
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