Louisiana Tribes Restore River Cane to Preserve Their Culture and the Environment

By Eva Tesfaye

WWNO-FM 89.9

Rose Fisher Greer and her daughter are the only basket weavers left in the Jena Band of Choctaw Indians, a tribe based in Central Louisiana.

To practice her craft, Greer needs river cane. For that, she has to go into Kisatchie National Forest, and she’s the only person in her tribe willing to make the journey. At one patch just off the side of the road, a few feet into the forest, the river cane grows in clusters of green stalks several feet high.

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