Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T08:49:00.827Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Fishing, Subsistence Change, and Foraging Strategies on Western Santa Rosa Island, California

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 May 2020

Christopher S. Jazwa Open the ORCID record for Christopher S. Jazwa [Opens in a new window] ,
Terry L. Joslin  and
Douglas J. Kennett
Christopher S. Jazwa*
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Nevada, Reno, NV89557, USA
Terry L. Joslin
Affiliation:
Central Coast Archaeological Research Consultants, San Luis Obispo, CA93401, USA
Douglas J. Kennett
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA93106, USA
*
([email protected], corresponding author)
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Shifting from shellfish collecting to fishing as a primary coastal foraging strategy can allow hunter-gatherers to obtain more food and settle in larger populations. On California's northern Channel Islands (NCI), after the development of the single-piece shell fishhook around 2500 cal BP, diet expanded from primarily shellfish to include nearshore fishes in greater numbers. During the Medieval Climatic Anomaly (1150–600 cal BP), settlement on the islands condensed to a small number of large coastal villages with high population densities supported largely by nearshore fish species including rockfishes, surfperches, and señoritas. Faunal data from five sites on western Santa Rosa Island (CA-SRI-15, -31, -97, -313, and -333) demonstrate an increase in nearshore fishing through time. We argue that demographic changes that occurred on the northern Channel Islands were accompanied by changes in subsistence strategies that were related in part to risk of failure when attempting to acquire different resources. As population density increased, the low-risk strategy of shellfish harvesting declined in relative importance as a higher-risk strategy of nearshore fishing increased. While multiple simultaneous subsistence strategies are frequently noted among individual hunter-gatherer communities in the ethnographic record, this study provides a framework to observe similar patterns in the archaeological record.

El cambio de la recolección de moluscos a la pesca como una estrategia primaria de forrajear costero pueda permitir las cazadores-recolectores a obtener más comida y asentar con poblaciones más altas. En las islas Channel más norteñas de California (NCI), después el desarrollo de los anzuelos hechos de piezas individuales de concha cerca de 2500 años calibrados ante de presente (cal BP), la dieta expandía de moluscos ante todo a incluir peces de cerca de la orilla en cantidades mayores. Durante la anomalía climática medieval (1150–600 cal BP), asentamiento en las islas condensaba a una cantidad pequeña de pueblos costales grandes con poblaciones de alta densidad apoyados por especies de pez de cerca de la orilla incluso de los rocotes, las mojarras y las señoritas. Datos faunales de cinco sitios de la región oeste de la Isla Santa Rosa (CA-SRI-15, -31, -97, -313 y -333) demuestran un aumento en la pesca cerca de la orilla a través del tiempo. Discutimos que cambios demográficos que ocurrían en la NCI eran acompañados por cambios en las estrategias subsistencias relacionadas en parte al riesgo de el fracaso cuando intentar a obtener recursos diferentes. Mientras la densidad de población aumentaba, la estrategia de bajo riesgo de cosechar los moluscos declinaba en importancia relativa y la estrategia del riesgo alto de la pesca cerca de la orilla aumentaba. Aunque ejemplos de múltiples estrategias de subsistencia simultáneos en comunidades de cazadores-recolectores están presentes en el registro etnográfico, este estudio proporciona una estructura a observar patrones semejantes en el registro arqueológico.

Keywords

foraging strategieshuman ecologyfishingcoastal archaeologyCaliforniazooarchaeologyestrategias para forrajearecologia humanapescararqueología costeraAlta Californiazooarqueología
Type
Reports
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 85 , Issue 3 , July 2020 , pp. 591 - 608
Copyright
Copyright © 2020 by the Society for American Archaeology

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

References Cited

Arnold, Jeanne E. 1992 Complex Hunter-Gatherer-Fishers of Prehistoric California: Chiefs, Specialists, and Maritime Adaptations of the Channel Islands. American Antiquity 57:60–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arnold, Jeanne E. 1995 Transportation Innovation and Social Complexity among Maritime Hunter-Gatherer Societies. American Anthropologist 97:733–747.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bernard, Julie 2004 Status and the Swordfish: The Origins of Large-Species Fishing among the Chumash. In The Origins of a Pacific Coast Chiefdom: The Chumash of the Channel Islands, edited by Arnold, Jeanne E., pp. 25–51. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.Google Scholar
Bird, Douglas W., and Bird, Rebecca Bliege 1997 Contemporary Shellfish Gathering Strategies among the Meriam of the Torres Strait Islands, Australia: Testing Predictions of a Central Place Foraging Model. Journal of Archaeological Science 24:39–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bird, Douglas W., and Bird, Rebecca Bliege 2002 Children on the Reef: Slow Learning or Strategic Foraging? Human Nature 13:269–298.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bliege Bird, Rebecca 1999 Cooperation and Conflict: The Behavioral Ecology of the Sexual Division of Labor. Evolutionary Anthropology 8:65–75.3.0.CO;2-3>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bliege Bird, Rebecca, and Bird, Douglas W. 2008 Why Women Hunt: Risk and Contemporary Foraging in a Western Desert Aboriginal Community. Current Anthropology 49:655–693.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bliege Bird, Rebecca, Codding, Brian F., and Bird, Douglas W. 2009 What Explains Differences in Men's and Women's Production? Determinants of Gendered Foraging Inequalities among Martu. Human Nature 20:105–129.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bliege Bird, Rebecca, and Smith, Eric A. 2005 Signaling Theory, Strategic Interaction, and Symbolic Capital. Current Anthropology 46:221–248.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bliege Bird, Rebecca, Smith, Eric A., and Bird, Douglas W. 2001 The Hunting Handicap: Costly Signaling in Human Foraging Strategies. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 50:9–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bronk Ramsey, Christopher 2009 Bayesian Analysis of Radiocarbon Dates. Radiocarbon 51:337–360.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Colley, Sarah M. 1990 The Analysis and Interpretation of Archaeological Fish Remains. Archaeological Method and Theory 2:207–253.Google Scholar
Colten, Roger H. 2001 Ecological and Economic Analysis of Faunal Remains from Santa Cruz Island. In The Origins of a Pacific Coast Chiefdom: The Chumash of the Channel Islands, edited by Arnold, Jeanne E., pp. 199–219. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.Google Scholar
Davenport, Demorest, Johnson, John R., and Timbrook, Jan 1993 The Chumash and the Swordfish. Antiquity 67:257–272.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Erlandson, Jon M. 1994 Early Hunter-Gatherers of the California Coast. Plenum Press, New York.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eschmeyer, William N., Herald, Earl S., and Hermann, Howard 1983 A Field Guide to Pacific Coast Fishes. Houghton Mifflin, Boston.Google Scholar
Gamble, Lynn H. 2002 Archaeological Evidence for the Origin of the Plank Canoe in North America. American Antiquity 67:301–315.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gamble, Lynn H. 2017 Feasting, Ritual Practices, Social Memory, and Persistent Places: New Interpretations of Shell Mounds in Southern California. American Antiquity 82:427–451.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gill, Kristina M. 2013 Paleoethnobotanical Investigations on the Channel Islands: Current Directions and Theoretical Considerations. In California's Channel Islands: The Archaeology of Human-Environment Interactions, edited by Jazwa, Christopher S. and Perry, Jennifer E., pp. 113–136. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.Google Scholar
Glassow, Michael A. 1993 Changes in Subsistence on Marine Resources through 7,000 Years of Prehistory on Santa Cruz Island. In Archaeology on the Northern Channel Islands of California, Coyote Press Archives of California Prehistory Vol. 34, edited by Glassow, Michael A., pp. 75–94. Coyote Press, Salinas, California.Google Scholar
Glassow, Michael A., Braje, Todd J., Costello, Julia G., Erlandson, Jon M., Johnson, John R., Morris, Don P., Perry, Jennifer E., and Rick, Torben C. 2010 Channel Islands National Park Archaeological Overview and Assessment. Report prepared for and on file at the Cultural Resources Division, Channel Islands National Park, Ventura, California.Google Scholar
Gobalet, Kenneth W., and Jones, Terry L. 1995 Prehistoric Native American Fisheries of the Central California Coast. Transactions of the American Fisheries Society 124:813–823.2.3.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gobalet, Kenneth W., and Jones, Terry L. 2018 Revisiting the Fish Remains from CA-SLO-2, Diablo Canyon, San Luis Obispo County California: Searching for the Elusive Wolf Eel (Anarrhichthys ocellatus). Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology 38:101–118.Google Scholar
Hawkes, Kristen 1991 Showing Off: Tests of an Hypothesis about Men's Foraging Goals. Ethology and Sociobiology 12:29–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hawkes, Kristen, James F. O'Connell, and Blurton-Jones, Nicholas G. 1991 Hunting Income Patterns among the Hadza: Big Game, Common Goods, Foraging Goals and the Evolution of the Human Diet. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B 334:243–251.Google ScholarPubMed
Hurtado, A. Magdalena, Hill, Kim, Kaplan, Hillard, and Hurtado, Ines 1992 Trade-Offs between Female Food Acquisition and Child Care among Hiwi and Ache Foragers. Human Nature 3:185–216.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jazwa, Christopher S., Braje, Todd J., Erlandson, Jon M., and Kennett, Douglas J. 2015 Central Place Foraging and Shellfish Processing on California's Northern Channel Islands. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 40:33–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jazwa, Christopher S., Kennett, Douglas J., and Winterhalder, Bruce 2016 A Test of Ideal Free Distribution Predictions Using Targeted Survey and Excavation on California's Northern Channel Islands. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 23:1242–1284.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jazwa, Christopher S., Kennett, Douglas J., Winterhalder, Bruce, and Joslin, Terry L. 2017 Territoriality and the Rise of Despotic Social Organization on Western Santa Rosa Island, California. Quaternary International 518:41–56. DOI:10.1016/j.quaint.2017.11.009.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jochim, Michael 1988 Optimal Foraging and the Division of Labor. American Anthropologist 90:130–136.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Johnson, John R. 1993 Cruzeño Chumash Social Geography. In Archaeology on the Northern Channel Islands of California, Coyote Press Archives of California Prehistory Vol. 34, edited by Glassow, Michael A., pp. 19–46. Coyote Press, Salinas, California.Google Scholar
Jones, Terry L., Brown, Gary M., Mark Raab, L., McVicar, Janet L., Geoffrey Spaulding, W., Kennett, Douglas J., York, Andrew, and Walker, Phillip L. 1999 Environmental Imperatives Reconsidered: Demographic Crises in Western North America during the Medieval Climatic Anomaly. Current Anthropology 40:137–170.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kaplan, Hillard, Hill, Kim, and Hurtado, A. Magdalena 1990 Risk, Foraging, and Food Sharing among the Ache. In Risk and Uncertainty in Tribal and Peasant Economies, edited by Cashdan, Elizabeth, pp. 107–144. Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado.Google Scholar
Kennett, Douglas J. 1998 Behavioral Ecology and the Evolution of Hunter-Gatherer Societies on the Northern Channel Islands, California. PhD dissertation, Department of Anthropology, University of California, Santa Barbara.Google Scholar
Kennett, Douglas J. 2005 The Island Chumash: Behavioral Ecology of a Maritime Society. University of California Press, Berkeley.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, Chester D. 1990 Evolution of Chumash Society: A Comparative Study of Artifacts Used for Social System Maintenance in the Santa Barbara Channel Region before A.D. 1804. Garland Publishing, New York.Google Scholar
Muhs, Daniel R., Simmons, Kathleen R., Randall Schumann, R., Groves, Lindsey T., DeVogel, Stephen B., Minor, Scott A., and Laurel, DeAnna 2014 Coastal Tectonics on the Eastern Margin of the Pacific Rim: Late Quaternary Sea-Level History and Uplift Rates, Channel Islands National Park, California, USA. Quaternary Science Reviews 105:209–238.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Paige, Peter 2000 Archaeological Fish Remains as Indicators of Paleoenvironmental Change: An Ichthyofaunal Analysis of Two Multi-Component Sites on Western Santa Rosa Island. Master's thesis, Department of Anthropology, University of California, Santa Barbara.Google Scholar
Perry, Jennifer E., and Jazwa, Christopher S. 2010 Spatial and Temporal Patterning in Chert Exploitation on Eastern Santa Cruz Island, California. American Antiquity 75:177–198.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pletka, Scott 2001 Bifaces and the Institutionalization of Exchange Relationships in the Chumash Sphere. In The Origins of a Pacific Coast Chiefdom: The Chumash of the Channel Islands, edited by Arnold, Jeanne E., pp. 133–150. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.Google Scholar
Reimer, Paula J., Bard, Édouard, Bayliss, Alex, Warren Beck, J., Paul Blackwell, G., Ramsey, Christopher Bronk, Buck, Caitlin E., Cheng, Hai, Lawrence Edwards, R., Friedrich, Michael, Grootes, Pieter M., Guilderson, Thomas P., Haflidason, Haflidi, Hajdas, Irka, Hatté, Christine, Heaton, Timothy J., Hoffmann, Dirk L., Hogg, Alan G., Hughen, Konrad A., Felix Kaiser, K., Kromer, Bernd, Manning, Sturt W., Niu, Mu, Reimer, Ron W., Richards, David A., Marian Scott, E., Southon, John R., Staff, Richard A., Turney, Christian S. M., and van der Plicht, Johannes 2013 IntCal13 and Marine13 Radiocarbon Age Calibration Curves 0–50,000 Years Cal BP. Radiocarbon 55:1869–1887.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rick, Torben C., Erlandson, Jon M., Vellanoweth, René L., and Braje, Todd J. 2005 From Pleistocene Mariners to Complex Hunter-Gatherers: The Archaeology of the California Channel Islands. Journal of World Prehistory 19:169–228.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rick, Torben C., and Glassow, Michael A. 1999 Middle Holocene Fisheries of the Santa Barbara Channel, California: Investigations at CA-SBA-53. Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology 21:236–256.Google Scholar
Rick, Torben C., Vellanoweth, René L., Erlandson, Jon M., and Kennett, Douglas J. 2002 On the Antiquity of a Single-Piece Shell Fishhook: AMS Radiocarbon Evidence from the Southern California Coast. Journal of Archaeological Science 29:933–942.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Timbrook, Jan 2007 Chumash Ethnobotany: Plant Knowledge among the Chumash People of Southern California. Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, Santa Barbara, California.Google Scholar
Winterhalder, Bruce, Kennett, Douglas J., Grote, Mark N., and Bartruff, Jacob 2010 Ideal Free Settlement on California's Northern Channel Islands. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 29:469–490.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Jazwa et al. supplementary material

Jazwa et al. supplementary material

Download Jazwa et al. supplementary material(File)
File 646.9 KB