I have been fascinated with the Navajo traditionally growing peaches in Canyon de Chelly since I read about it in the Book of the Navajo (Locke). Apparently, these orchards were burned down by Kit Carson but there is a question as to just how the peaches came to be part of Navajo culture in the first place. Logic dictates that peaches arrived with the Spaniards but I have heard mentioned before that a young woman working for the park service and earning a degree in cultural anthropology noted that peach cultivation had been in practice for hundreds of years--before the Spaniards.

In the story of the coming to this world because the prior was being flooded, it is Turkey who had the foresight to carry seeds stashed in his feathers. If the Navajo brought seeds with them from their previous world, could it be possible that peaches were one of the seeds brought? Anybody have any good information on peaches and whether there is any documentation that the Spaniards introduced them or otherwise?

Stephanie

In every man there is something wherein I may learn of him, and in that I am his pupil.--Ralph Waldo Emerson