Native Californians

Thousands of years before the urban forest, trolley cars and the Golden Gate Bridge, the place we know as San Francisco had sand dunes, wetlands and was home to animals of all kinds. The plants that lived here originally are called native plants. They evolved here over thousands of years and created a complex and healthy ecosystem that the native or indigenous peoples living here called home. Local California Indian tribes like the Ohlone people lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for thousands of years and found everything they needed to survive. The Ohlone hunted, fished, and gathered a wide variety of plants for food, medicine and basket weaving. One of the staples or main items of food they relied upon came from acorns. Acorn nuts were harvested from Oak trees and cooked into porridge. The California Coast Live Oak trees that helped feed the Ohlone people can still be found throughout the city.