The sturgeon-nosed canoe, also known as a Kootenay Canoe or Kootenay-nosed Canoe (

Ktunaxa The Kutenai ( ), also known as the Ktunaxa ( ; ), Ksanka ( ), Kootenay (in Canada) and Kootenai (in the United States), are an indigenous people of Canada and the United States. Kutenai bands live in southeastern British Columbia, northern ...

: ''yaqsuʔmiǂ'' ), was a distinctive

canoe A canoe is a lightweight narrow water vessel, typically pointed at both ends and open on top, propelled by one or more seated or kneeling paddlers facing the direction of travel and using a single-bladed paddle. In British English, the term ...

style used by the

Sinixt The Sinixt"Sinixt Nation…" (also known as the Sin-Aikst or Sin Aikst,Reyes 2002, ''passim.'' "Senjextee", "Arrow Lakes Band", or — less commonly in recent decades — simply as "The Lakes") are a First Nations People. The Sinixt are ...

and

Kalispel The Pend d'Oreille ( ), also known as the Kalispel (), are Indigenous peoples of the Northwest Plateau. Today many of them live in Montana and eastern Washington of the United States. The Kalispel peoples referred to their primary tribal range a ...

First Nations in Interior

British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...

and the

Pacific Northwest The Pacific Northwest (sometimes Cascadia, or simply abbreviated as PNW) is a geographic region in western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Though ...

into the last century.

History and design

Scottish

botanist Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...

David Douglas, the first scientific traveller to visit the

Arrow Lakes The Arrow Lakes in British Columbia, Canada, divided into Upper Arrow Lake and Lower Arrow Lake, are widenings of the Columbia River. The lakes are situated between the Selkirk Mountains to the east and the Monashee Mountains to the west. Bea ...

, wrote about the Sinixt People in his 1827 journal: The sturgeon-nosed canoe was designed with a reversed prow to be most suitable for travel through bulrushes, and maneuverable in turbulent waters.{{Fact, date=December 2010 Author Eileen Delehanty Pearkes records in her book about the Sinixt, ''The Geography of Memory'', that ethnographer William Elmendorf recorded the process of making a sturgeon-nosed canoe based on a description by Sinixt Nation elder Nancy Wynecoop: "The mature tree must be felled in spring, when the sap is running. The outer bark is scraped off, then the inner bark is split and peeled off the heartwood in one sheet. The outside shape of the canoe is marked on the ground with stakes. Poles used for the gunwales are fastened to these stakes. Next,

willow Willows, also called sallows and osiers, from the genus ''Salix'', comprise around 400 speciesMabberley, D.J. 1997. The Plant Book, Cambridge University Press #2: Cambridge. of typically deciduous trees and shrubs, found primarily on moist s ...

ribs are fastened to the gunwales, using willow bark twine. The bark is then sewn onto the ribs, using cedar root. An additional layer of bark is fastened less securely on to the outer side of the craft. All seams are glued with warm pine pitch. On the bow and stern of the canoe, the bark is folded over rings of willow. Extra layers are added for strength, shaped into a point, and sewn. A frame of woven poles is placed in the bottom of the canoe and covered with loose grass to sit on."Pearkes 2001, p. 47. Elmendorf also refers to a ceremony, including dancing, fasting and sweatbathing, held by Sinixt men prior to the building of a new canoe. The purpose of the ceremony was to make the group "more agreeable with each other and focus their energy". The sturgeon-nose design is unique to North American canoes, but craft of similar design were discovered in the

Amur River The Amur (russian: река́ Аму́р, ), or Heilong Jiang (, "Black Dragon River", ), is the world's List of longest rivers, tenth longest river, forming the border between the Russian Far East and Northeast China, Northeastern China (Inne ...

region of

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a part of ...

in the mid-19th century.The Canoe in Canadian Cultures. John Jennings, Bruce W. Hodgins, and Doreen Small, eds. Dundurn Press Ltd.
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Sources

References

* Eileen Delehanty Pearkes, ''Geography of Memory'', Sono Nis Press, 2001 Canoes Indigenous boats Sinixt Ktunaxa

History and design

See also

Sources

References