Book Reviews

Affectionate Biography of a West Coast Evergreen Shrub

Laurie Ricou (Author)
Salal: Listening for the Northwest Understory. NeWest Press
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Reviewed by Nancy J. Turner

This is a thoroughly enjoyable book. It tells the story of one writer’s journey to befriend a west coast native plant. Salal (Gaultheria shallon) is a striking yet characteristic evergreen shrub, dominating the understory of our coastal temperate rainforests. Paradoxically, it is often overlooked on account of its very commonness. Worse still, this attractive plant, which typically grows in dense, virtually impenetrable patches, is maligned by some as an undesirable “invasive” weed, blamed for suppressing the growth of Douglas-fir and other coniferous trees that are the mainstay of British Columbia’s timber production. Yet, David Douglas himself, the botanist after whom Douglas-fir is named, had no such prejudice. He summarized his impression of salal, which he first encountered on the Columbia River in 1825, as follows: “On stepping on the shore Gaultheria shallon was the first plant I took in my hands. So pleased was I that I could scarcely see anything but it.” He concurred with the assessment of naturalist Archibald Menzies, that salal would be “a valuable addition to our gardens.” They did, indeed, introduce salal to European horticulture, where it was embraced as an attractive ornamental, still to be seen in gardens around Scotland, England and elsewhere.

I was pleased to see that the author grounds his book, aptly, in the significance of this plant to First Nations of the Coast, for example in how salal is named in the diverse languages of First Peoples. He personalizes this section with quotations from leading indigenous writers like Jeannette Armstrong and Kevin Paul. For First Peoples, salal is huge in its importance—far more than just an understory shrub or a decorative delight. Its dark, purple-juiced berries, borne along the fruiting stalks in one-sided hanging rows, were probably the most important of all the traditional fruits, still relished by many families up and down the coast. It is mostly women and children who pick these berries, from August to early September. In the past, they filled enormous baskets with them, cleaning them, then mashed and cooked them in bentwood cedar boxes. (These utility boxes were made of planks, steamed or soaked until soft, then bent at right-angles along grooves to make the sides, sewn or pegged at the fourth corner and fitted with a wooden bottom and lid.) Mashed salal berries, and other berries too, were cooked in these boxes using rocks heated red-hot and dropped into the berry mix one after another, until boiling point was reached. The resulting jam-like mixture was poured out onto a bed of overlapping skunk-cabbage or other wide leaves and dried, first on one side and then the other, on a rack set over a fire, or in the sun: the original fruit leather. The dried cakes were rolled up and stored in boxes or openwork baskets. Pieces taken off and soaked overnight in water were eaten at feasts or family meals throughout the winter. Salalberries are sweet and juicy, though rendered somewhat gritty by numerous small seeds. They vary in quality depending on the locality and ripening conditions: full sunshine and moist soil yield the best and largest berries. Today, First Peoples and other coastal residents preserve salalberries by making jam, jelly, syrup, and by jarring and freezing. Salalberries remain a significant wild food, also served as a gourmet treat at bioregional restaurants such as the world-famous Sooke Harbour House.

Salal greens, emphasized in many chapters of this book, have taken on immense prominence and economic value in the global landscaping and floral industries. As Laurie Ricou examines in his thoughtful investigative journalist’s approach, through these venues salal touches the lives of an entire range of people, many of whom may not even be aware of the its immense value as a human and wildlife food. In his quest to understand the bonds that link humans and salal together, Ricou records personal interviews in charming detail, such as with Rod Nataros, the owner of a Surrey nursery, whose company plants 350,000 salal seedlings a year to grow out for the landscaping industry. We are introduced to Vanessa Adams and Angela Anderson, women who were actually undertaking the propagation, and to John Mills, who cleans salal seed and his brother, who collects the seed. The particulars of soils, pests, fertilizers, humidity and temperature required for optimal growing of salal, and the details about other nursery grown plants like salal’s relative, the eastern wintergreen (Gaultheria procumbens), are woven seamlessly into these interviews. Without even trying, we come away with a deeper, richer knowledge of this plant and the people who depend upon it. The same level of detail is given to salal in the floral industry, from picking the “hands” of leafy branches, to storing, shipping and marketing the “product”: salal as a commodity, both loved and hated by those who work with it.

Salal’s critically important role in forest ecosystems is featured in the chapter, “Depending.” (The chapter headings, each only one or two words, are evocative, encapsulating an entire body of thought and impression on any given topic in the wide world of salal.) In this truly remarkable treatment of a plant by one who sought to know it truly, the subtopics span painting, poetry, language, ecology, sociology, economics, and business development. It captures the thoughts and ideas of people who live within an arm’s length of the salal patch, and of urban dwellers who are more attached to the internet than to the mycorrhizal net of salal in the forest floor.

After my first perusal of a new book, I like to check out two things: the Bibliography and the Index. These are both indicators of an author’s commitment to quality. I was not disappointed in either case. With well over three-hundred references and a seven-page index, not to mention a detailed acknowledgements section, this book is obviously not only well written, but well researched, giving me confidence in its accuracy and thoroughness. I hope Ricou is working on more plant biographies!

This review originally appeared in Canadian Literature #197 (Summer 2008), Predators and Gardens. (pg. 181 - 183)

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