Supercharged chew is a tradition in the Yukon-Kuskokwim ...

1 Supercharged chew is a tradition in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta | Rural Alaska | [10/8/12 11:03:16 AM]ClassifiedsJobsCarsHomesApartmentsPla ce an ad50 ForecastLog In or Join Report News Customer ServiceWeb Search powered by YAHOO! SEARCHHomeNewsSportsLivingEntertainmentO pinionPhotos/VideoLocal DealsAn iqmik user shows his container of iqmik on the street in Bethel, AK on Monday, September 24, 2012. Iqmikis a mixture of punk ash and tobacco which is used like Hallinen Anchorage Daily NewsBuy PhotoRelated Links:Rural blog: The VillageRelated Stories:Bethel smokers pay less for cigarettes than urbandwellersBy KYLE HOPKINS -- Jennifer Wilson, a dentist here,thought she knew chew .

2 Growing up in tobacco-loving Kentucky, it was common to see menloading up on Copenhagen or Skoal. she found while treating patients inWestern Alaska's largest city and thesurrounding villages was something different:People of all ages, sometimes entire families,chewing an earthy, super-charged variety ofsmokeless 's called iqmik, or blackbull, and it makes amule kick of a first impression. Like allsmokeless tobacco it can lead to a lifelongnicotine addiction, receding gums and low-birthweight for babies of mothers who chew . It mayenter the bloodstream even faster than over-the-counter chew . A University of Alaska Anchorageresearcher is studying potential links between thehomemade mixture of fungus ashes and tobaccoleaves to oral cancer in salmon fishing or steam houses, some Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta residents who chew iqmikconsider the habit to be part of living a Yup'ik lifestyle, a separate study found.

3 Prying the fungusfrom birch trees and selling the resulting ash for $25 a bag is a rare source of cash for shocked Wilson, the dentist, was theRural Alaska< State News< NewsNEXT STORY >Bethel smokers pay less for cigarettes than urban dwellersSupercharged chew is a tradition in theYukon-Kuskokwim DeltaPublished: October 6, 2012 Tweet23 COMMENTSE-MAILPRINTR ecommend116 Supercharged chew is a tradition in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta | Rural Alaska | [10/8/12 11:03:16 AM]Next PageRelated Galleries:Gallery: Iqmik is ubiquitous in western AlaskaStory Photos:widespread many as three of 10 children she treatsunder the age of 18 chew blackbull, with thehighest use in villages outside Bethel, she aides use it.

4 So do pregnant mothersbelieving it to be a safer alternative to elders prescribe it to children to soothetoothaches."I've seen more than one family where the kid,maybe between 5 and 10, they're chewingiqmik," said Wilson, who spends 50 days a yearvisiting patients in Lower Kuskokwim River villages. "I ask them where they get it, and they sayeither the parents or the grandparents."The flat, river-fed Y-K Delta is home to roughly 25,000 people spread across about 50 villagesand the Bethel hub. It's the size of Oregon and the only area in Alaska where residents reportwidespread iqmik use. Between 15 percent and 20 percent of Alaska Native adults here chew ,according to state Division of Public Health for the evidence just outside many village schools, said Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Gene Peltola.

5 "The closer you get to the front door in the winter, the more brown snowyou see."Peltola said he sent a letter to the Bethel mayor last month calling for a new tax on tobaccoproducts, saying the added cost would discourage kids from chewing and smoking. But someiqmik users and sellers say raising the price won't necessarily quash the the mixture among friends and family is a Delta tradition .'THING TO PUT IN THE MOUTH'In Bethel, there is a story that many women of a certain age tell about their childhood. It goessomething like this:When I was young, someone gave me a pinch of iqmik to chew . It made me miryaq -- throw up. Ifelt dizzy and went to sleep for are describing the symptoms of nicotine poisoning.

6 Some never used iqmik again. Somenever quit."I tried it but I passed out," said Carrie Anvil, 87. That was in eighth of 11 children, Anvil grew up in a village that later moved to nearby Kasigiluk when,she said, the slough grew shallow and the river slowed. Her father was a preacher. Her motherchewed."When we go around the wilderness, you know, when we saw a punk (the fungus iqmik is madefrom), we give it to Mom," Anvil use of iqmik, which means "thing to put in the mouth," began after the mid-1700s whenAlaska Natives began to trade tobacco with Russian and European explorers, according to a 2007state Health Department report. Often prepared by women and girls, iqmik is sometimes madefrom willow ash when the more desirable punk -- a loaf or clam-shaped fungus called Phellinusigniarius -- isn't a sixth-grader in the Nelson Island village of Toksook Bay, Caroline Nevak remembers chewingPrevious PageRECENT HEADLINESS upercharged chew is a tradition in theYukon-Kuskokwim DeltaBethel smokers pay less for cigarettes thanurban dwellersUAF unveils cold weather housingexperimentKivalina teens arrested after $189,000 incash stolen9-year-old shoots another boy to death,troopers sayFeatured AdvertisersView AllAlaska Institute ofOriental Medicine,AcupunctureMile , LLCD eals!

7 $35 for 10 tans from Planet BeachSearch for DealsSearch local inventory, coupons and more Powered bySupercharged chew is a tradition in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta | Rural Alaska | [10/8/12 11:03:16 AM]iqmik before school and sneaking a second pinch at recess."I would get nauseated. I would feel sick, but I would still continue using it," said Nevak, who laterstudied iqmik habits for the regional health corporation. She now works for the Alaska NativeTribal Health Consortium in Anchorage, where she's met many people who chew iqmik in the said her mother still chews. Her mom gained weight when she tried to quit. Nevak, too,craved iqmik after meals or when it was time to go berry picking but stopped cold turkey about 14years gums were beginning to look strange, she said, turning from pink to IQMIKA long the Kuskokwim River, the raw ingredients for iqmik are as easy to buy as paper towels the village of Kwethluk, fresh milk is hard to find but the tribe-owned grocery store sells "punk"fungus for $ a pound.

8 A half-hour boat ride down river, in Bethel, the ash is advertised onstore bulletin boards beside used snowmachines and one of the numbers and you meet George Philbrick and Alice Noah, a couple making extracash selling aqaq (ash) by the collects the fungus, kumakaq, from decaying birch trees upriver of Bethel, gathering asmuch as 80 pounds in an hour and a half, he said. Sometimes he uses a hammer to break thefungus free. It's then dried, cleaned of wood and bark and burned to a fine white ash in a can ortrash late September the couple was selling 10 bags of fungus ash that Alice's nephew broughtdownriver from Tuluksak. Retail value: $ often try to save money by buying from sellers here in the city where ash prices arelower, Philbrick said.

9 "We had this little old lady from Kipnuk yesterday, and she bought themajority of it."Cured tobacco leaves complete the recipe. At least two local stores sell them. Some people makeiqmik by chewing the ash and tobacco together, then storing the mix in tins or boxes for mix it by hand in a bowl, adding water or tea. Some people mix it up with a coffee grinder,which is known as electric iqmik.'100 TIMES MORE POTENT'Originally from Massachusetts, Philbrick met Noah 17 years ago in Anchorage. They quit drinkingtogether and moved to Bethel about three years ago. On a recent weekday, the couple sat lookingafter an elderly relative at a quiet row of senior housing apartments.

10 A cop drama played on thesmall flat-screen produced a can of iqmik, which looks a little like store-bought tobacco and smells likesomeone poured water on a campfire. Noah is originally from Tuluksak, she said, and startedchewing when she was maybe 11. She remembers throwing up and her mother giving her grandmother chewed too and once said that girls in the village would iqmik -- people use theword as a verb and as well as noun -- before it was time to "story knife," a tradition of sketchingpictures in the ground or snow."My mom started when she was 9 years old. She's now 84," Noah said, touching her knew it might be bad for you back then, she & VIDEOSMORE >Videos Photos Submit Your PhotosAtwood Hallenchanted during'Shrek'.