Porch Notes
Manoomin — Wild Rice
History and culture
Michigan’s newest symbol is also one of its oldest foods. In November 2023, the state designated manoomin — wild rice — as its official state native grain, becoming the first state in the country to name one.
Manoomin (the Ojibwe word means roughly “the good berry” or good seed) is a tall aquatic grass that grows in the shallow, quiet waters of Michigan’s marshes, inland lakes, and slow streams. It is far more than a crop to the Anishinaabek — the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi peoples of the Great Lakes. Their migration story tells of a prophecy to travel west until they reached “the place where the food grows on the water”; that food was manoomin, and finding it is part of why the Anishinaabe settled this region. It is gathered much as it always has been — two people in a canoe, one poling while the other gently bends the stalks and knocks the grain loose — then parched over a fire.
The designation, championed for years by tribal advocates, is partly an honor and partly a rescue: wild rice has declined with habitat loss and poor water quality, and naming it focused new attention on protecting it.
Where to see it
Manoomin grows in quiet shallows around the state; restored beds include sites on the St. Clair Flats near Harsens Island. Note that harvesting is a tribal cultural practice governed by tradition and law.