Hmong Traditions

The Hmong people in Winona have brought many traditions with them from Laos. They keep doing these traditions, but they've changed some. They follow traditions in gardening, hunting, and preparing and eating food.
How do Hmong get their food? They plant food in gardens and they also hunt animals to eat. In Laos the Hmong people had farmlands to plant rice, cucumbers, corn, wheat, beans, cotton, potatoes, peppers, vegetables like cabbages, squash, sugar cane, watermelons, and tomatoes. In Winona they have gardens. They use a hand hoe to dig out the grass and to dig out the dirt to make it soft. The food we plant in Winona is watermelons, squash, sugar cane, eggplants, hot peppers, cabbages, corn, herbs, onions, garlic, ginger and cucumbers.
For hunting, the Hmong people used a crossbow and arrows, traps, slingshots, and rifles in Laos. They hunted for wild animals such as tigers, bear, fox, deer, hogs, and monkeys and also for birds and lizards. Around Winona, the Hmong people hunt with shotguns, 22 rifles and other guns. They hunt for deer, squirrels, and pheasants. The Hmong people don't hunt for fun or just to kill it. The Hmong people eat the meat they kill.
In Laos, the Hmong people had some animals near their houses, like pigs, chickens, cows, horses, and water buffaloes. They had bulls for fighting to get money or to keep and dogs for hunting or guarding the houses.
Here is some food that some Hmong still eat today. Rice is the main food that we eat everyday, like for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Hmong also cook other food besides rice, like steamed fish, boiled chicken, chicken/broccoli stir-fry. Hmong cook steamed fish for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Some Hmong each day cook something different besides the steamed fish.
Some young Hmong people are following these traditions, but some do these things the American way.