Watching Willows

As the climate changes, people are starting to realize how personal the impact is. Indigenous women, specifically, are reaping the consequences of the warming environment.

“Did everyone check the willows this morning?” Asks Regina Lopez-Whiteskunk in a Facebook group for Ute Women’s Wellness.

The young willow shoots are traditionally used by Indigenous weavers to make baskets and cradleboard caps because they are easy to bend without breaking. Women also collect the willow later in the season to help cool the male participants of a ceremony called Sundance, where dancers fast for 3-4 days in the summer months.

As the climate gets warmer, the critical window of Red Willow harvest gets earlier and earlier in the year. This means the Ute women need to keep an eye the plants’ development sooner.

Regina Lopez-Whiteskunk, a Ute Mountain Ute Tribal member and a Cross-Cultural Programs Officer with the Montezuma Land Conservancy, notes that several aspects of the harvest are different now. The temperature in the Southwest is getting warmer sooner, land is harder to access, and invasive species are starting to overrun the ones that typically grow here. Things aren’t like they were even a couple of generations ago.

“There is a very narrow period of time when you can harvest willow” shares Regina, “it has to be after the cold ends, but before the willows bud. Otherwise, the plant will be much too brittle for manipulating. My grandparents probably would have missed it because they don’t understand the impacts of climate change as well as my generation”

According to History Colorado’s exhibit, Written on the Land: Ute Voices, Ute History, women craft these cradleboards to keep babies safe and to facilitate transportation. To use them, the mother places the baby in a pouch that is stabilized by a board. Once there, the mother can secure the baby by “lacing up the front and fastening a buckskin band across the baby’s chest.” The cradleboard cap, woven from young willow growth, works as a sunshade to protect the child from the elements and can protect their head from bouncing around.

Indigenous people have been using young willow branches for weaving for centuries. Now, Regina Lopez-Whiteskunk laments as she looks down at her lap, “I can count all of the Ute Mountain Ute basket makers on one hand.”

Factors such as land development, invasive species, land privatization, and climate change have made willows and other culturally important species difficult to access.

One of Regina’s grandmothers used to say that she couldn’t make the baskets and cradleboard caps like she used to because she can’t access land like she used to.

In the old days, there was a reciprocal relationship between the private landowners and the Tribal members because some plants that are integral for cultural uses can be viewed a nuisance to some farmers and ranchers. In fact, several local landowners put money and resources into removing willows from their irrigation ditches, only for them to pop up year after year. However, through relationships with Tribal harvesters, both interests were met. The farmer could remove a nuisance and the Ute women could collect the plants that are sacred to the Ute way of life.

Unfortunately, these relationships have been lost as people sell their land and the community grows. Women used to go into Sand Canyon, an area bordering Tribal and non-tribal land outside of Cortez, to look for willows to use during the summer Sundance ceremony.

Now that most of the land these women are used to visiting during harvests has changed hands, the places where they can find willows are dwindling.

Climate change has rendered historical traditional harvest grounds obsolete or, at the very least, changed the harvest timeline and plant populations.

Development has taken the place of natural wetlands that hosted a variety of local flora. Invasive species that have been introduced by the high traffic corridor of highway 160 have taken over the more fragile desert species.

Indigenous women are finding that they need to get more creative about where they look for ceremonial plants.

Growing up, Regina remembers her grandmother driving to town, then screeching off to the shoulder of the road- just to exclaim that she spotted a special herb. “I remember one time when she did this and when she peered down at the plant, she deemed it ‘not ready’ for harvest. Instead, she said that we would have to come back and check on it in a couple of weeks.”

Now, Regina says that she finds herself doing the same thing.

Although she keeps her eyes peeled for willows that are in that fleeting stage before budding and after the cold, she never had the chance to learn the art of basket weaving for herself. “My grandmother always asked me to sit down and learn and I’m constantly kicking myself for not taking her up on it.”

Now, the remaining basket makers are checking in on the few willows they have access to- watching them and waiting for the opportunity to practice their quickly disappearing art.

The Montezuma Land Conservancy, located about 15 miles North of the Ute Mountain Ute Reservation, wants to help re-establish the connection between landowners and Tribal women. In the next few months, they will be releasing resources that help local property owners learn if they have culturally significant vegetation on their land. If the landowners are interested in creating a reciprocal relationship with the Tribe for a “cultural harvest,” then MLC can serve as a bridge between the two parties.

Hopefully, they’re not too late for this year’s willow harvest window.