Wild Rice Festival Sweeps Harriet Alexander Nature Center

Roseville citizens gathered at the Harriet Alexander Nature Center to learn about everything wild rice related at the annual Wild Rice Festival on Saturday.  

The day-long event featured a large array of activities including wild ricing demonstrations, live music, arts and crafts and wild rice, of course. 

Festivalgoers feasted on various wild rice creations like soup, pancakes and sausages. Traditional Fry Bread was also a wildly popular menu item.

The festival also offered demonstrations on honey extraction. Guests gathered around to look on as a volunteer extracted the honey from the Nature Center’s hive. 

After the sweet honey was removed, it was bottled and brought outside to be sold at the festival store. 

One activity especiallly popular with children was the Apple Cider Press, where they had the opportunity to press apples to create their own cider.    

Roseville lead naturalist Debbie Cash came up with the idea for the Wild Rice Festival after attending a workshop for nature centers eght years. A topic of the workshop was how to choose a profitable fundraiser for your center.

Workshop presenters asked Cash to think about her center and what would be special to Roseville. 

“I was daydreaming about it while driving one day when it just hit me,” she said.  “We have 52 acres of marsh, which eventually led me to thinking of wild rice.”

According to Cash, it all started to flow together once she had the idea picked out.

“I had a vision of it all. Wild rice was a perfect focus for our festival. It has habitat, cultural and harvesting elements. It had cool written all over it,” she smiled.

Cash said the festival has grown since inception and its attendance ha doubled in the last couple of years.

According to Cash, the fundraising festival brings in about $3,000 each year.  All proceeds from the festival benefit various programs at the Harriet Alexander Nature Center.