Wahta (Maple)

It was the time of the Great Tardiness of the year (Ennisko:wa) and people were hungry. Hunters left the village looking for game to feed their people; however, game was scarce. These hunters were away from their village for several days. Some of the men returned back to their village discouraged and hungry.

One young man said he would stay behind a little while longer to find game. Two days went by and the young man became ill from hunger. As he lay by his campfire, he watched this squirrel running from tree to tree with great energy. The young man thought how good it would be to catch the squirrel for food.

As the young man watched he noticed the squirrel was eating the bark from the trees. So the young man went to the tree for a closer look. He was so hungry that he thought, “What could it hurt, I’ll eat some bark too.” As he cut a piece of bark to eat, he noticed liquid come from the place he cut. He cut deeper and more liquid came out. He went back to his campfire to get a water basket. As the sap dripped the young man drank it. In a short while the young man noticed how good he felt.

He stayed there gathering sap for a while. The sun was shining onto the sap and this made it sweeter and taste better. He took the sap back to his village for his people to drink and heal themselves to feel better. The young man told the story of the squirrel.

As years passed, these people forgot their duties to plant and make fire for cooking. It was the intention of the Creator to return to Turtle Island from time to time to see how his people were doing. He was surprised to find the village deserted, no fires were made and the gardens were overgrown with weeds. The Creator searched the land and found his people lying under the maple trees with mouths open and sap dripping in. The Creator shouted HEY! Instantly the maple trees dried up and the people looked to see the Creator standing there. He told his people he dried the trees because they became lazy.

From now on the trees will drip for a short time and you must work hard to gather your sap and put it away for future use. The rest of the year you are to work in your fields and hunt for meat again. So it is this day we gather our sap for a short time each spring and we give thanks in the longhouse for our sap every year. This sap is good medicine and we should drink it every spring to clean our bodies.