Written by Lisa Wachtel, Colorado Master Gardener since 2018

Planting season is often regarded as the beginning of a new year. Indeed, spring is full of fresh green growth and tender new life. For thousands of years, people have also marked time by the harvest. If the toils of spring and the fickleness of summer weather bestowed a bountiful harvest, then families would be nourished through the cold of winter. Bulging grain baskets also kindled a deep sense of joy, reverence, and gratitude.  As daylight hours shorten, colors turn crimson and gold, and the chill of the morning air increases, it is harvest time around the world. Celebrations honoring the crops around the world are both incredibly diverse and a common thread that binds us together.  The time to reap is a time to give thanks for family, cultural traditions, and the earth. To help ensure that cultural harvest traditions are passed down through the generations, it’s important to understand and value the sense of time, people, and place that they represent.

From humble beginnings as a wild plant, maize (Zea mays) has been cultivated in regions of Mesoamerica for centuries. Mayan and Aztec people nurtured maize as one of their primary crops and developed an incredible array of strains. La Milpa is an ancient cyclical practice from Central America based on planting and harvesting maize in harmony with the surrounding environment. Beginning the cycle is fire to clear parts of the forest for agriculture. A low-burn fire is used to ensure that the ash will enrich the soil without harming the soil and its essential living components. Then seeds are planted together which will develop into the crops which sustain both people and animals. After a few years of intense agriculture, followed by years of less intense agriculture, the cycle is closed by encouraging the forest trees to return.  All phases of La Milpa are carefully managed and are symbolic of a connection to the Earth. La Milpa continues to be acknowledged as a sustainable gardening technique that binds people together by cultural traditions. Harvesting maize, peppers, and squash from La Milpa is done with reverence in recognition of the life-giving crops. Meals prepared from the harvest are flavored with a sense of connection to the earth.

Fire-stimulated regeneration: the lowland Maya milpa cycle. (Courtesy of A Ford/ISBER/MesoAmerican Research Center, UCSB).

In Aztec and Mayan cultures, corn was much more than a food, it was symbolic of life. Around August the corn cobs were beginning to ripen. The husks were bent over while still on the stalk and left to finish maturing. August and September were critical months because too much rain during the ripening period could spoil the crop. In the eleventh calendar month (Ochpaniztli, the Month of Brooms) people performed rituals designed to keep the rain away at harvest time. By September, the corn was harvested and tied into bundles. Shelled maize was preserved for winter by drying and storing in jars for household use or in baskets covered with mortar.

Image credit: Sacred maize, Codex Borbonicu The Heart of Each Meal. Mexicolor.com

Over the centuries, the practice of planting maize spread northward through the Americas. Many indigenous people grounded their year upon the cyclic planting and picking of corn. Observing celestial objects were initially key for the purposes of determining the right time to plant and pick. The grouping of different seeds together for mutual growth benefits, also called companion planting, stems from La Milpa. Planting corn, beans and squash together is referred to as the Three Sisters in parts of North America. A culture based on corn began to flourish and evolved into an identification as People of the Corn.

The Legend of the Three Sisters Oneida Indian Nation https://www.oneidaindiannation.com/the-legend-of-the-three-sisters/

While agricultural food staples are linked with the region and its climate, honoring the harvest of different crops across the continents is uniquely human. In northern Europe, the season to reap wheat (Triticum) was a particular time of thanksgiving. Titled Lammas, or Lughnassadh, the ancient roots of this celebration fall near the autumnal equinox. Lammas means loaf mass, pertaining to grain essential for making bread. The illustration shows an image of the Grain Mother, also called Earth Mother or Harvest Queen. She depicts the ripe grain from the year’s harvest while her daughter represents the seed that will be planted again in the spring for new growth.

The Grain Mother. The Goddess and the Greenman.  https://www.goddessandgreenman.co.uk/lammas/

Closer to home along the Arkansas River, green chile and pinto beans have been thriving as well as the cultural traditions for their harvest and culinary delights. Pueblo is the place to be for the premier chile and frijoles festival in Colorado held annually in late September.  Our harvest attracts thousands of people each year from around the state and nation to partake in chile roasting and sampling green chiles served in a wide variety of menu options.

Maize silk tassels have changed color and the ears are plump and full. Beans have twined up around its taller sister and dangle with luscious green pods. Winter squash vines have outgrown their garden borders and reveal large fruits resplendent with fall colors, formed in every shape possible. It’s harvest time. This year at your thanksgiving table with family and friends, take a moment to honor a harvest tradition from your heritage that ties your food to who you are.

For more information on La Milpa and Three Sisters

Nigh, Ronald, Diemont, Stewart. The Maya milpa: fire and the legacy of living soil. The Ecological Society of America. www.frontiersinecology.org.

Three Sisters and La Milpa, Public Broadcasting System and Modern Gardener, Episode 64. https://www.pbs.org/video/three-sisters-planting-and-la-milpa-qbnsp7/