Once an infected area is discovered, they are most commonly clear cut, and the ash trees are then wood chipped or burned. Trees are necessary to produce oxygen and fight air pollution in the air we breathe each day. With trees being cleared faster than the replanting and growth of new trees, we are facing a serious crisis. Not only does it affect the air we breathe each day, it also affects the air we leave behind for our future
generations. Fewer trees mean more pollution, which has an impact on global warming.

This loss of ash trees also impacts our Native Nations who have utilized the Black Ash tree to make baskets for countless generations. The destruction of our ash trees means the dying out of an art that has been with Native peoples for hundreds of years. We are trying to learn how to save this art form, and so we are collecting as many Black Ash seeds as we can find this fall to send to Colorado to be stored in a seed bank until replanting ash trees becomes possible once again.

My “Seventh Generation Black Ash Basket” is made out of a vinyl blind from China. And it shows the teachings that have been passed on from generation to generation, and how future teachings will be affected. With the loss of the ash trees, we will not be able to teach tree identification during the harvesting of a Black Ash tree, or how to prepare the splints with the pounding and splitting of the growth rings, preparing the splints as our ancestors have done before us. We will only be able to teach the weaving methods involved with other materials. I chose a man made material to show how dependent we are on such materials, and how often we forget who we are and where we came from. We are all children of Mother Earth, and we haven’t been treating our Mother with the respect she deserves.

I am concerned that a “breath of fresh air” and a Black Ash basket may become “a thing of the past.”

Kelly Church