Many locals report having lived with this species for generations. "I remember my grandmother who used the acorns to make oil, tortillas," says Rogelio Rosas López, owner of a local tour agency, Rancho Ecológico El Refugio. His grandmother, he recalls, also cooked with the seeds "atole", a typical Mexican pudding. "And she used to take us and pinch us because we had to gather sacks of acorns to give to the pigs."