[2] By extension, the name was also applied by the colonial European hunters, traders, and settlers to various shrubs of which the bark or leaves are used in the mixture,[3] most often bearberry (Arctostaphylos spp.
Bartlett quotes Trumbull as saying: "I have smoked half a dozen varieties of kinnikinnick in the North-west — all genuine; and have scraped and prepared the red willow-bark, which is not much worse than Suffield oak-leaf.
), and the dried, powdered root of a plant identified as Aster novae-angliae L. Two sorts of bark were smoked, one being known as "red willow" (Cornus stolonifera Michx.)
This mixture, too, is used today for ceremonial smoking.Kinnikinic, n. caŋṡaṡa.There are also certain creeks where the Indians resort to lay in a store of kinnik-kinnik (the inner bark of the red willow), which they use as a substitute for tobacco, and which has an aromatic and very pungent flavour.
It is prepared for smoking by being scraped in thin curly flakes from the slender saplings, and crisped before the fire, after which it is rubbed between the hands into a form resembling leaf tobacco, and stored in skin bags for use.