Indigenous languages are founts of environmental knowledge

Reading this text immediately reminded me the Kaingang, a local folk here in Paraná. One of their myths, about the creation of poisonous snakes, involves one of the two predecessors of humankind burning a thorn and smearing its ashes into the snake's teeth. The first thing that came to my mind: "don't throw random stuff into the fire; be mindful on what you use as lumber, it might be poisonous". I bet that a lot of other myths has this sort of built-in lesson.