Forged in Heat
With hardly a cloud in the sky for the past month, the unstoppable summer sun has progressively dried out and heated up the ground. Then...
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Ian Thompson
- Jun 12
- 4 min
Continuing an Ancient Harvest
It’s one of our favorite seasons at Nan Awaya Farm: the sand plum harvest is upon us! These colorful gems of bold, native flavor can’t...
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Ian Thompson
- May 29
- 6 min
A Good Spirit Came to Visit Us
With COVID restrictions fully lifted, our work pace at Choctaw Nation has been frenetic this spring. That's left only a few hours...
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Ian Thompson
- Feb 21
- 7 min
Our First Controlled Burns
Fire is one of the oldest and most effective tools that humans have for managing the land. The Indigenous peoples of North America began...
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Ian Thompson
- Feb 5
- 4 min
Hvshtula: The Reclining Sun
Our part of the world doesn't get winter weather every single year. Over the past couple of days, though, we've been blessed with ice,...
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Ian Thompson
- Jan 23
- 8 min
The Extermination of the American Bison (almost)
Warning this post contains some graphic content- This photo was taken by LA Huffman in eastern Montana in 1880. It captures one of the...
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Ian Thompson
- Jan 3
- 6 min
Practical Prairie Rehabilitation - Little Bluestem
After record-warm temperatures in December, we're finally enjoying our first taste of real winter weather this weekend. First thing this...
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Ian Thompson
- Nov 21, 2021
- 6 min
Restoring Little Suns in Our Prairie Pastures
For several years now, we’ve been actively working to restore the native landscapes of Nan Awaya Farm. One of the things the experience...
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Ian Thompson
- Oct 30, 2021
- 9 min
Braintanning a Buffalo Robe
A traditionally tanned buffalo robe is something pretty special. If any single thing can embody the connection between people, the...
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Ian Thompson
- Sep 26, 2021
- 4 min
Cooking Choctaw Sassafras Dishes
The sassafras tree, kvfi in the Choctaw language, has been a part of the American landscape for a very long time. 65 million years ago,...
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Ian Thompson
- Sep 16, 2021
- 4 min
Those Bad Buffalo Blues
It was a little bit like the plot of an Alfred Hitchcock movie... We use an electric fence to keep the herd buffalo on our farm. An...
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Ian Thompson
- Aug 16, 2021
- 6 min
Code Red - Humanity
Gideon Lincecum was a naturalist, healer, and free-thinker. In 1819, he moved his family to Columbus, Mississippi, on the border of the...
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Ian Thompson
- Aug 4, 2021
- 3 min
Chahta Nowvt Anya: The Choctaw Journey
The Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma recently opened its cultural center in Durant. Through it, the Choctaw people completed a dream that...
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Ian Thompson
- Jun 14, 2021
- 3 min
Taking Out the Trash - A Life-Affirming Experience?
From my earliest memory and again today, Sunday evening is the night to take out the trash. I've gotten to take out the trash while...
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Ian Thompson
- May 21, 2021
- 4 min
It's Not Too Late
One of the joys of fall when I was growing up was getting to experience the monarch migration. With the first hint of cool in the air,...
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Ian Thompson
- Apr 21, 2021
- 4 min
Electrify Us
Tomorrow is Earth Day! We'd like to honor the day by sharing our household's experience of trying something new in '21 that was a little...
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Ian Thompson
- Apr 2, 2021
- 5 min
The Attack of the Killer Foots
Those of you who have been following our blog for a while know that Nan Awaya Farm is about more than raising buffalo. One of our goals...
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Ian Thompson
- Feb 16, 2021
- 4 min
A Little Above Texas; a Little Below Zero
Almost every year as I was growing up, my family watched Holiday Inn. This 1942 film features Bing Crosby as a nightclub performer who...
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Ian Thompson
- Jan 30, 2021
- 7 min
Prairie Connection Experiments
We've been silent for a little bit. This blog was temporarily interrupted by life at Nan Awaya Farmstead. In November, we helped run...
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Ian Thompson
- Nov 28, 2020
- 5 min
Owvtta: The Fall Hunt
An ancient Choctaw story tells of a hunter who, one evening after killing a doe far from his village, made his camp for the night near...
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