06/09/2026
Charlene Grandmaison
This month we are welcoming Odemin Giizis -
The Strawberry Moon.
The sixth moon of Creation is the Strawberry Moon. The medicine of the strawberry is reconciliation. It was during this moon cycle that communities usually held their annual feasts, welcoming everyone home, regardless of their differences over the past year, letting go of judgment and/or self righteousness. The strawberry is the first berry to ripen it is thought to be a good medicine for the heart and the teeth.
The Makwa (Bear) & Odemin (Strawberry)
An Anishinaabe Story & Teaching
Long ago, when the world was young, after Nanaboozhoo rid the world of evil and built the land, but before the human beings were here.
The plants and animals were all new and getting used to each other and things looked much different. The rabbits had long tails and short ears.
The bears were giants with short noses. The bears didn’t have enough food to eat because someone was eating all the strawberries, and the bears were starving.
They were upset because they became too skinny and weak to hunt and only had bitter roots to eat to survive. They weren’t sure they could survive the next winter, so they asked Nanaboozhoo for help. He said he would help and sent the bears back home.
The moment the bears went home and told their families that he would help the next year, but they had to survive the winter without food and only bitter roots to eat.
Nanaboozhoo watched over the berry patch for the whole year. The next spring when the strawberries were ripe, Nanaboozhoo saw rabbit eating everything and saving nothing for anyone else. So he spoke to rabbit about the bears starving because they were eating all the strawberries. The rabbits didn’t care because the bears were eating all the rabbits when they were healthy.
Just then, Nanaboozhoo caught the giant bear eating a rabbit and grabbed it by the snout, holding its mouth closed. They locked for months and years. The bear refused to stop eating the rabbit and Nanaboozhoo refused to let the bear go so he could finish swallowing the rabbit. The giant bear shrunk in size and its snout became brown and long where Nanaboozhoo held on.
The strawberries were upset because the rabbits were still eating all the strawberries when they were instructed to share their medicine with all beings.
Nanaboozhoo tried to catch him, but the rabbit started running away. Nanaboozhoo lunged at rabbit and caught it by the tail. Rabbit twisted away and broke its tail off to escape. As it was about to make its escape, Nanaboozhoo grabbed the rabbit by the ears and its ears stretched out and became long. The rabbit stopped running before its ears broke off too! Now the rabbits could hear the bears coming and have lots of time to escape.
Next, he changed the medicine of the strawberries to be much sweeter. The next spring, the rabbit could only eat a few of them, and only once in a while. So there were lots of strawberries for the bears to eat when they came out of their fast.
That’s why the first thing we eat when we emerge from our fast is bear root and strawberries. We do this to honour the gifts and the medicines of our closest relatives, the bears.
Story & Painting by: Tom Sinclair, TMS Woodland Art
Artist Inquiries: [email protected]
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