How did Native Americans use the waterways?

Answer 1

The Pennacook Indian tribe traveled the Merrimack river to hunt and fish. They also used it to attack nearby villages. Alongside, its banks, the American Indian would collect food from berries and plants.

Answer 2

With no context to answer this question, I'll list only a handful that seem obvious, but many more ways could have been used.

• Food
  • Everything we ingest needs water to survive
• For drinking
  • yes you used to be able to drink from many rivers without treating it
• As borders
  • instruments were not available to everyone and GPS wasn't even thought of, let alone batteries. A river was a great way for everyone to visibly see boundaries
• Transportation
  • I'm sure as far back as time allowed, if something floated something was on it.
• Health and sanitation
  • probably easy to overlook, but walk without water for a couple weeks and I bet a nice flowing river would be pretty inviting to get cleaned up in. Also think of cleaning food too. Or babies, yikes!
    
• Safety
  • Water can offer some simple means of protection from wildlife or invading tribes if used right.
• Entertainment
  • Got rock... must throw in water. MEEE TOOO!
• Communication
  • Yeah, i'll go as far as to say that if someone notices they can place a floaty in the water and it goes down river without them, then they have communication. Only in one direction, but still communication. Maybe the people upstream were fatter than the ones downstream? It's something to think about.
    

Answer 3

In areas with many waterways (such as around the Great Lakes) rivers were used as highways for travelling by canoe. Dense forests made this a practical and efficient means of transport.

Rivers also provided food in the form of fish, eels, shellfish and crayfish.