Season 6 // Episode 2: Summer
/Mesa Tops in Summer
The summer time on the mesa would’ve been the busiest time of the year.
“These seeds are like children to us. These things have memory.”
The Ancestral Pueblo people were skilled farmers, growing staple crops of corn, beans, and squash through the practice of dryland farming - a tradition that has been passed down to their descendants still today. In this episode, we’ll hear from Satchel Martin (Hopi) and Thomas Maddox (Hopi, Ohkay Owingeh, Fort Belknap), Indigenous Ranger Interns at Mesa Verde National Park, as they paint a picture of the busy farming plots on the mesa tops during the summer months.
And Dr. Michael Kotutwa Johnson (Hopi) tells us about the modern practices of dryland farming at Hopi, offering insights into how his ancestors may have farmed the landscape at Mesa Verde based on his personal experiences as a farmer and the traditional knowledge that has survived for centuries within Hopi. He also discusses the concepts of “ways of knowing” in terms of ecology and agriculture.
NPS PHOTO // KAYLA WOODWARD
Additional Resources
Visiting Hopi
If you plan to visit Hopi, here are links to some useful information to help plan your trip.
Hopi websites: https://hopi.org/hopi-sites/
Visiting the Hopi Reservation [PDF]
Indigenous Resilience Center
The University of Arizona’s Indigenous Resilience Center (IRes) works with local tribes to center Indigenous ways of knowing into co-designed environmental solutions and trains the next generation of community leaders. Working on areas of food, water, and energy, IRes identifies and looks for resources to support co-designing solutions with Indigenous communities. Learn more about their past and current projects on their website.
Michael Kotutwa Johnson
Find Dr. Michael Kotutwa Johnson on Instagram @Dr._Hopi_Farmer. Michael was also featured in the documentary INHABITANTS.
Episode Sources
David H. Kinder, Karen R. Adams, Harry J. Wilson. “Solanum jamesii: Evidence for Cultivation of Wild Potato Tubers by Ancestral Puebloan Groups.” Journal of Ethnobotany. Volume 37, Issue 2. 1 July 2017.
Native Seeds Search - “Rematriation”
Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA)
Crow Canyon Archaeological Center. 2014 Peoples of the Mesa Verde Region [Goodman Lake: An Ancient Reservoir]. Available: https://www.crowcanyon.org/peoplesmesaverde.
Crow Canyon Archaeological Center. 2014 Peoples of the Mesa Verde Region [Introduction]. Available: https://www.crowcanyon.org/peoplesmesaverde.