I
’m not writing here about the wild abundance that grows on trees
and shrubs and other plants. Even as curious as you might be about
that subject. Even as important as wild plants were to the Indians
and early settlers. Most of the park’s wild fruit just isn’t sweet,
and heck, a lot of the wild
plant foods aren’t even fruits.
I’m not writing here about the wild abundance that grows on trees and shrubs and other plants. Even as curious as you might be about that subject. Even as important as wild plants were to the Indians and early settlers. Most of the park’s wild fruit just isn’t sweet, and heck, a lot of the wild plant foods aren’t even fruits.
Take ground nuts for example, which are neither fruit nor sweet. Nuts? You might think, correctly, that nuts are close enough to being a fruit. But “ground nuts” are nuts in name only. They’re really a root, not a fruit – the bulbs of the wildflower.
Blue Dicks, nick-named “ground nuts” because they’re small and crunchy, with nut-like texture and (some think) flavor. Indians used these and several other wild bulbs as a major food source, both plentiful and nutritious – the plants pack away food for next year’s growth in these underground storage structures.
Ground nuts are good, but you won’t eat them in the park. Nor any other wild plant food. You appreciate that the park is there to preserve and protect a natural area for everyone to see and enjoy, and it is good that gathering wild foods is prohibited. And you also know that some wild plants are poisonous and can make you sick if you eat more than a taste, so you need to be sure of your identification.
If you want to know more about wild foods, you can find publications in the visitor center.
And watch the schedule of nature programs (at other area parks as well as Coe) – for opportunities to learn more and even to taste some wild foods.
It wasn’t just ground nuts, the Indians also found fruit aplenty in what would become the park. Like the fruit of the oak tree – acorns, the most abundant fruit of all. Not that you would consider an acorn to be “sweet fruit”, one taste and you’d spit on the ground!
Of course, if you’ve been in the Bay Area for any amount of time, you probably already know that the Indians had special methods for making acorns palatable.
Lots of wild berries out there, too! Redberry, elderberry, gooseberries, currants, and manzanita are among the most common.
Now we get to the sugar (and very little of it) – if you can get past the spines and the taste and the texture! Not what I’d call sweet fruit.
No, the sweet fruit I’m writing about is the sweet fruit of labor, the labor of citizens who volunteer time so that all of us can have a more enjoyable park experience.
The cast is literally in the hundreds, currently well over a hundred uniformed volunteers, as well as hundreds of other citizens who have contributed time and effort outside of the park’s uniformed volunteer program. For example, you can now enjoy over a mile of new trail this summer thanks to three days of hard work by local Scout Troop 390.
Volunteer contributions amount to half of the total hours required to administer the park – its as if the park had a doubling of staff. Volunteers lead nearly all the programs and hikes offered for the public, as well as take care of visitor center staffing. In fact, volunteers are involved in nearly every aspect of maintaining and running the park. The Coe Park Volunteers have been recognized as one of the best such programs in the state by both the State of California and by peer organizations.
You don’t have to join the Uniformed Volunteers or be a scout to make a contribution to the park, but you would miss the outstanding training and other benefits that come with being a Uniformed Volunteer. Check out the Coe Park website at http://www.coepark.org/volprogram.html for more information and an invitation to join. Just print an application form, fill it out and mail it to the address that’s given (deadline is Aug 13 for the 2005 class) and you’ll be well on your way to picking Coe Park’s sweet summer fruit.
Larry Haimowitz is a Coe Park volunteer.
