November 1–30, 2023
At the Garden | Online
Join NYBG to celebrate Native American Heritage Month. On-site programming in and around the Thain Family Forest as well as digital offerings highlight the plant-based traditions of Native Americans from the Northeast and throughout the Americas.
November 4–5 & 11–12; 10 a.m.–3 p.m.
Thain Family Forest
The Thain Family Forest—New York City’s largest remaining tract of old-growth woodland—is your fall foliage headquarters! Leaf locally and explore the Forest’s 50 acres full of vibrant fall color.
November 4, 5, & 12, 2023; 2 p.m.
Meet at the Entrance to the Thain Family Forest
These tours will begin with an overview of the history and traditional culture of Indigenous peoples, and will guide participants through natural areas, explaining how particular plants are identified and harvested in traditional and modern times. These tours are curated by Moskehtu Consulting.
November 9; 6–7 p.m.
Online
Join Mohawk Seedkeeper Rowen White to explore stories from the Indigenous Land and Seed Sovereignty movement.
Ongoing; Self-guided
As you walk through this collection, we invite you to join Indigenous perspective historian and entrepreneur Chenae Bullock on a self-guided tour of the Thain Family Forest.
Bullock is an enrolled Tribal Member of the Shinnecock Indian Nation and descendant of the Montauk Tribe in Long Island, New York. Bullock lends her extensive knowledge of Northeastern native plant life to explore contemporary and historic perspectives on some of the forests’ most important plants.
The New York Botanical Garden is located on land that is part of Lenapehoking, the traditional territory and homeland of the Lenape people. The Lenape use hundreds of plants for food, medicine, tools, building materials, and other purposes. Discover more about Lenape Plantways on The Hand Lens.
NYBG scientists are launching two new initiatives to support the preservation of biological diversity and cultural knowledge, the Shinnecock Cultural Resources and Environmental Departments, University of Waterloo.
The Shinnecock Ethnobotany Project will document local botanical diversity and traditional knowledge about its use and management, and the Shinnecock Indicators of Climate Change Impacts will study ecological processes related to climate change along with community perceptions and adaptations to them.
Usnea, a genus of lichen known as old man’s beard, is used in traditional herbal medicine in many cultures worldwide—from ancient Greece to China to Native American groups—to treat respiratory and other conditions. It is known to grow on the north sides of trees, earning it the name chan wiziye (“on the north side of the tree” or “spirit of the north wind”) in the Dakota language.
Location At the Garden & Online
Location At the Garden & Online