There are 7 groups in the Pomo language family, the Northern, Northeastern, Eastern, Central, Southwestern and Southern (Kashaya). They live on the coast, in the Coast Range Mountains and in the east side of the Central Valley on the Sherwood Valley, Potter Valley, Redwood Valley, Coyote Valley, Scotts Valley, Geyserville, Pinoleville, Yo-Ka-yo, Hopland, Graton, Manchester and Point Arena , Dry Creek, Cloverdale and Upper Lake Rancherias.

The Pomo are artists in basketry, making both twined and coiled types, and decorated them with brilliant feathers. They made traps for fish like long tubes of basketry, and similar ones for ground dwelling birds like quail. Their houses were circular of willow branches, covered with reed mats. Like the Yokuts, they traveled on water in reed boats. The acorn was their most important staple food.

They gave the Yuki hinnites shell beads, clam disc beads, dentalia, moccasins, sea shells, seaweed, salt and magnesite beads, and got furs, beads, baskets and skins. They gave the Huchnom clam disc beads. They gave the Lake Miwok acorns. They gave the Wappo tule mats, magnesite beads, sinew-backed bows and fish. They gave the Patwin shell beads, salt, obsidian, fish and clams and got sinew-backed bows, yellow hammer headbands, woodpecker scalp belts, and cordage for making deer nets. They gave the Coast Yuki clam disc beads, acorns, fire drills of buckeye wood and got surf fish, abalone, giant chiton, seaweed, mussels, dried kelp for salt, and shells of Hinnites giganteus.They traded shell beads to "the North" for iris fiber cord for deer snares, arrows, and sinew-backed bows of yew. (Davis: 1966)

Kathleen Smith is Dry Creek Pomo/Bodega Miwok artist who studied at the San Francisco Art Institute and the College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland. Donald Duncan, who does beadwork, is a Yokayo Pomo. (This information is from the California Native American Artists Calendar for 1998 by Heyday Press)

There is a Pomo Museum and Cultural Center on the north shore of Lake Mendocino where visitors may learn about these people.

Kule Loko Center at Point Reyes National Seashore has an annual Strawberry Festival, held this year on April 25th.

A web site with information about the Pomo, and pictures of their baskets is http://www.web.reed.edu/academic/departments

/english/courses/English558/mabelmckay.html

Another site is http://www.pinoleville.org/

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California Native American Language Map