Cattails are an important traditional food source. Before colonisation, indigenous people used the starch to make a flour-like staple. This is still an excellent, gluten-free flour substitute. What if, like our ancestors, you had to survive a winter and a promised food delivery did not arrive? Knowing this could keep you from starvation.

Cattails are plentiful, and can be harvested during any season. Nearly every part of the plant is edible.

Perhaps the most important food that comes from the cattail is its root-like, underground stem. It is one of the best wild sources of carbohydrates. Cattail roots can be harvested at any time of year, but the best time is late autumn, when the cattails have died back, and have stored starch for the next growing season. It takes a lot of roots to produce a sufficient quantity of food, so it is best to gather from a sizable population, always leaving some back so as not to over harvest. Since cattails accumulate metals and other pollutants, do not gather too close to roadways.

Roots can be.taken from anywhere within the patch, but digging them out of the thick tangle at the center takes more work. The best way to gather them is to wade out to where the cattails give way to open water and follow a stem several inches down into the mud with your hand, until you feel a spongy stem, about as thick as your finger, going horizontally away from the plant. Give it a little tug. If it is connected to another cattail, you can see that plant wiggle as you pull. Cut both ends with a knife and pull the root out of the mud.

The outer layer is spongy and inedible. Remove this layer with your thumbnails, pushing off the spongy rind without pulling up any of the core’s fibers. It takes a bit of practice to get this right. The inner core should be firm, fibrous, and white. Any cores that aren’t should be thrown away.

You can make cat tail root flour by slicing the peeled cores into coins, and leaving them to dry, You can employ a dehydrator, if one is available. (My teacher told me not to be so tradish as to make life more difficult than necessary. 😁) Once they are fully dry, you grind them. You can use a mortar and pestle, or, again, use available modern technology and do this with a food processor or grain mill. This produces a starch and fiber mixture that can be sifted (a jelly straining bag works well for this) and kept in a sealed jar. The powdery starch keeps well.

Another method is to use your hands to work the peeled cores in a basin of water. The starch settles to the bottom. Most of the water can then be poured off, leaving a batter-like mixture. This can be added to breads or other baking, or used as a thickener in soups and stews.

This may seem like hard, messy work, when you can just go to the store and buy a bag of regular flour. But it is much better for your body. And you never know … if, one day, the trucks did not roll and there were no supplies available on grocery shelves … or inflation went mad, and you hadn’t enough money to buy food for your family … you might be glad to know of this.

You might just want to try making fry bread the way it was once done. If so, also render fat or use bone marrow from that animal you harvested, and use instead of lard. And set out a bowl of that batter sponge of cattail starch for 2-3 days, covered with breathable cloth to keep bugs out, while letting the wild airborne yeasts in – voilà, sourdough. Keep a cup of it back, keep it warm, and “feed” your dough starter with more starch every week. You won’t need other leavening agents.

You may never need this. Or you might. Remember … I also told you how to roast dandelion root to make a coffee-like beverage that is also a cancer-fighting antioxidant. And how willow bark tea is a traditional pain killer and anti-inflammatory, because its active ingredient is asalacylic acid – aka “aspirin.”

Knowing the past always informs the future. Do not forget the old ways. The ancestors …and Ray Wickstrom … said to remind you.