Black Ash is favored by Native American Tribes as a basket making material because it separates easily from the bolts is flexible when wet and strong and durable when dry. It has been used for making carry baskets, corn baskets, ash sifting baskets and pack baskets for as at least as long as our people have harvested corn and needed to carry their possessions over long treks. Today the work baskets made by Mohawks and other Native People are prized by trappers, hunters and outdoor enthusiasts.
Fancy baskets, ornate and interwoven with sweet grass and color dyed Black Ash, have become popular collector pieces and is a wonderful expression of Native American creativity. Fancy baskets are found in a wide range of sizes and styles, such as small pin cushions, sewing baskets, strawberry baskets, pine-cone baskets and many others. The styles and designs of fancy baskets are limited only by the creativity and imagination of the weaver.
Identification and Characteristics
Fraxinus nigra (F. nigra) is the Latin name used for the Black Ash tree. Black Ash is similar in appearance to its relatives White Ash, Fraxinus americana and Green Ash, Fraxinus pennsylvanica, but can be easily distinguished from them by the characteristics of its bark, buds, seeds and leaves. It also loves to grow in wet areas and thus is typically found in hardwood swamps where other tree species don't do as well. It is one of nine native ash species in North America belonging to the genus Fraxinus. Members of the genus Fraxinus have large opposite, usually deciduous, feather like (pinnate) compound leaves composed of from 1 to 11 leaflets.
Black Ash leaflets are not stalked, the 7 to 11 leaflets are always toothed. The twigs are round, hairless and rather dull. Leaf scars are not deeply notched. The buds are very dark and nearly black, hence giving it the name Black Ash. The trunk bark is tight and furrowed and sometimes scaly. If you rub your hand on the bark the scales will fall off. Leaves are 12"-16". Black Ash will grow to mature heights of 40'-80' and diameters 1'-2', although I have had a MicMac basket maker tell me of finding trees that are abut 3' in diameter. The Champion Black Ash tree is located in Adrian, Michigan; Circumference: 99 inches, Height: 155 feet, Spread: 108 feet http://www.championtrees.org/oldgrowth/index.htm. The tree flowers in April-May. The seed, or fruits, are blunt at both ends, winged to the base. The seeds are important food for the animals that live in the hardwood swamp habitat, such as wild wood-ducks, grouse, turkey, many song birds, and small mammals.
Black Ash bears both male and female flowers (said to be dioecious) and occasionally bears only one or the other (moneicious). My personal observations of trees in Manitoba and Western Ontario were that the trees were moneicious in many instances. The flowers are small and hard to see, you really have to look closely and they appear little more than tiny leaves. You would need a magnifying lense to get a good look at them. They are sometimes unisexual, sometimes perfect, covered in bud by black scales, the male flower consisting of 2 large deeply pitted dark purple anthers attached to broad stalks, the female in an ovary terminating in a long slender style deeply divided into 2 purple stigmas, or the pistillate flower accompanied by 2 small stamens with pink anthers. When collecting seeds the male flowers are frequently found remaining on the twigs and found in the baskets when cleaning seeds. They look like dried berries.
The seeds ripen from August to September, are dispersed from July through October and to early spring. The Forest Service reports that an average of 8100 seeds per pound of seeds, cleaned. An interesting characteristic of Black Ash seeds is their dormancy and they have to be stratified by subjecting them to of warm and cold temperatures, before they are mature enough to germinate. I have done this to seeds before sending them to a tree nursery, but it is time consuming and most often a nursery will just direct plant any seeds they receive. Stratification increases germination rates and eliminates the need for having to wait a second year for seeds to germinate in a nursery plot.
Black Ash ranges geographically from Western Newfoundland, Anticostie Island and Quebec to Manitoba, North Dakota and Iowa, south to the Ohio River valley, northern Virginia, northern Delaware, central New Jersey and western Connecticut. It is rare in western New Brunswick, absent from southeastern New England and Long Island and large areas between Lake Superior and Hudson Bay.
Black Ash habitat is deep cold swamps or hardwood swamps and bottom lands. It grows in bogs, along streams and in areas where there is a high water table. My experience is that it grows in these areas as well as some upland areas is given a chance, usually by someone cutting other more desired and profitable trees. The best trees for basket making are found where there is standing water for about 3/4 of the growing season. Areas where the water is standing 100% of the time contributes to heart rot in Black Ash and makes it unsuitable for basket making. The wisdom of Mohawk elders is Black Ash growing with conifers not be used as it is found to be brittle.
Black Ash likes peat soils, high organic soils, but it also grows on soils with sands under lain by sandy till on sands and loams under lain by lake-washed clayey till. Black Ash grows in a pH range of soils and tolerates pH 4.1 to 8.2.
The USDA has characterized Black Ash habitat as having a humid climate, in areas with annual precipitation ranging from 20 to 45 inches per year, with 15 to 25 inches occurring during the warm period of the year. The temperature range averages are from 0 to 70 degrees Fahrenheit; annual snowfall ranges are from 30 to 100 inches; the average frost-free season is from 80 to 180 days ( United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. Seeds of Woody Plants in the United States. Agriculture Handbook No. 450. Washington, D.C. 1975; United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. Silvics of North America, Volume 2, Hard woods. Agriculture Handbook 654. Washington, D.C. 1990).
Associated tree species growing with Black Ash, include Picea mariana (black spruce), Abies balsamea (balsam fir), Thuja occidentalis (Northern White Cedar), Tsuga canadensis (Eastern Hemlock), Larix laricina (Tamarack), Betula alleghaniensis (Yellow birch), Betula papyrifera (Paper birch) (Elias), Ulmus americana (American Elm, and Acer rubrum (Red or Soft maple) (United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. Silvics of North America, Volume 2, Hard woods. Agriculture Handbook 654. Washington, D.C. 1990). In my seed expeditions I have also observed, Fraxinus americana (White ash), Fraxinus pennsylvanica (Green ash).
Black Ash is well suited for the splints that go into the baskets, the most important characteristic of Black Ash which is exploited by native peoples is its capacity for “splitting easily into very thing yet remarkably tough pieces” (Peattie, Donald Culross. A Natural History of Trees of Eastern and Central North America. Second Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1950). This is on account of the “spring wood...the portion of the annual growth ring that is laid down in the spring months when water and sap are abundant and growth is fast - is made up almost entirely of large pores...so that it is largely air spaces.., as a result, billets of Black Ash are easily separated into thin strips” (Peattie).
Key to my work has been working with others and networking with them to advance efforts for learning more about Black Ash and preserving it. I have worked with Richard David, Mohawk Council of Akwesasne, Environment, who developed a similar interest in Black Ash preservation and linked up with me for seed collection and tree planting and networking with other Tribes and Nations.
From the start, Dr. Mike Bridgen, SUNY-ESF, Wanakena Ranger School and an expert on hard woods, has been a great resource for Black Ash preservation. He held a class in 1993 at the Ranger School that instructed on tree stand management practices. Here is a link to his web site that details his work including that of his Black Ash efforts,
Tom Touchet was a graduate student in the mid ‘90s at SUNY-ESF and devoted his time to studying the ecological aspects of Black Ash. Mike Benedict, is my older brother, and also devoted his graduate work to studying Black Ash in Minnesota.
Abstract: Touchet, Thomas J. Ecological Requirements for the regeneration of black ash (Fraxinus nigra Marsh.) in central and northern New York State. A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment for the Master of Science Degree, State University of New York, College of Environmental Science and Forestry. June 2000.
Black ash (Fraxinus nigra Marsh.) plays an essential role in the traditional culture of Native Americans in New York since it provides the main source of ash "splints” for native basketry. The decline in supply and quality of black ash has prompted concern among Iroquois environmental leaders. The goal of this study was to determine which environmental variables most influence the regeneration of black ash. Age structure analyses of black ash populations were performed at six sites in central and northern New York. These data indicate a failure of regeneration. Success of juvenile black ash was found to be limited by dense herbaceous cover and low soil moisture conditions. There is evidence that forest gaps may positively influence radial growth, survivorship and seed production in black ash. Abstract: Michael Alexander Benedict. Black Ash: Its Use By Native Americans, Site Factors Affecting Seedling Abundance and Ring Growth in Northern Minnesota. A Thesis Submitted To The Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Minnesota. August 2001. Black ash (Fraxinus nigra Marsh.) is commonly found growing in wetland areas from the central lake states through southeastern Canada and the northeastern United States. Forest managers have for the most part ignored this species because it has had relatively few commercial uses. In recent years, there have been intense cutting of black ash for a few specialty product in parts of the United States and Canada for veneer, paneling and log export to Japan and other Asian Markets. This opportunistic harvesting of black ash could mirror other harvesting of the pacific yew, which also was never an important commercial species. Few have really studied black ash, except for several Native American groups throughout its range. These groups have, since before pr European settlement, used black ash for basket making. A number of these tribes have voiced concern over the dwindling supplies for basket making. An important component of this study was looking at traditional ecological knowledge of these basket makers. In order to assist in the reintroduction and management of black ash for growing trees specifically for basket making, two studies were conducted to investigate what influences black ash regeneration and annual ring growth. Three ecosystems, lowland-wet forest, upland-mesic forest and vernal forest ponds were studied on the Chippewa National Forest in Northern Minnesota. The first study looked at site factors affecting black ash regeneration. The site factors studied were; forest under story vegetation, basal area, other seedling interactions and diameter of over story trees. Analysis of this study indicates that competition from herbaceous forest under story vegetation is a significant negative factor for black seedling establishment. The second study compared site factors affecting average 5-year growth in mature black ash trees. The site factors studied were; forest under story competition, basea area/ha, DBH of mature trees, and volume of hummock. An interesting finding on the lowland black ash sites indicates that herbaceous forest under story vegetation is having a significant negative affect on mature tree ring growth.
Dr. Peter Smallidge of Cornell University and Dave Green of Sea Grant should be acknowledged for their efforts in teaching small woodlot management and funding a study of weed and protective tree shelters.
Thanks to these people knowledge about Black Ash continues to grow and expand. Working with others who share the same interest in working with Black Ash has been vital to the success of the project.
Most important of all has been the support of the American Friends Services Committee (AFSC) web site: http://www.slic.com/atfe/atfe.htm who supports the ATFEs Black Ash project and funded the trips taken to collect seeds, visit tree nurseries, and do field studies.
In the past a couple of conferences were held in Akwesasne to bring Black Ash preservationists and and basket makers together to highlight much of the work that is being done. These events were great ways to share and learn about basket making as well as to learn more about Black Ash from those who use it in making baskets. Hopefully, there will be more conferences and meetings to continue the networking and sharing. Recently the USFS has taken an interest in working with the Black Ash project and supported the reprinting of the book that I co-authored and in hosting conferences and training.
The highlight of my Black Ash endeavor was when Richard David and I received a Forest Stewardship Award from the Eastern Ontario Model Forest and the Governor General of Canada for the work we have been doing to promote the protection and preservation of Black Ash.