Every year as summer ends, Indigenous Michiganders head out onto lakes and rivers to collect wild rice, a staple food with cultural significance to these communities.

Indigenous educator Roger LaBine says a popular spot for harvesting is Lake Tawas in the northern Lower Peninsula, right near the coast of Lake Huron since it's home to one of the largest wild rice beds in the state.

"There are a lot of tribes throughout the state that come and visit this bed because this is one of the ones that is most consistent, most dependable to be able to harvest some rice," he said.

LaBine comes from the Lac Vieux Desert Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians in the far western Upper Peninsula, but now he travels the state teaching both Indigenous and non-Indigenous people about manoomin, the Anishinaabemowin word for wild rice.

"This is the plant that allowed us to find our new home here in the Great Lakes basin," LaBine said.

Centuries ago while living on the East Coast, the Anishinaabe were given a prophecy telling them to leave their home and travel west until they found a place where food grew on water. They settled when they found manoomin, growing in lakes and rivers in the upper Midwest.

And at water level, it does feel like you're in the middle of a field of grains, surrounded by thousands of the thin, golden rice stalks.

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