This Lost Native Grain Outperformed Wheat — and It's Still Growing Wild!

Wild rice (manoomin) is the only grain native to North America, containing twice the protein of white rice and 30 times the antioxidants, yet over 95% of commercially sold 'wild rice' is actually paddy-grown rice, not authentic lake-grown wild rice; the Ojibwe people have protected this sacred grain for over a thousand years through traditional harvesting methods and legal battles, including the 2018 Rights of Manoomin law that granted the plant legal rights, and current conservation efforts focus on re-seeding lakes and protecting water quality to preserve this endangered native species.