Scientist digs into Chumash background

CAL POLY - A Cal Poly archaeology professor is taking a fresh look at thousands of Chumash food remnants in hopes of gaining a better understanding of the lives of the Central Coast's earliest residents.

Using a federal grant of $34,000, Terry Jones is examining more than 20,000 animal and fish bones unearthed 36 years ago at Diablo Canyon in an effort to learn more about how the Indians lived and what effect they had on the ocean.

"I want to see what their dietary preferences were and how they might have changed over time," he said.

His work will help scientists better understand how Chumash hunting of sea otters and other animals changed the near-shore marine environment of the day. Jones plans to publish academic papers next spring summarizing his findings.

Pilulaw Khus, a member of the Bear Clan of the Chumash, said she was not aware of the study.

"We will be very interested in what the conclusions are," she said. "It is part of our history."

Stored for decades

In 1968, archaeologist Roberta Greenwood excavated a major prehistoric site at Diablo Canyon in advance of construction of the nuclear power plant. Greenwood's work changed archaeologists' understandings of Native American habitation of the Central Coast.

Radiocarbon dating of shells revealed that use of the site dated to 9,000 years ago. Until then, the oldest known Indian sites were 5,000 years old.

Some experts questioned Greenwood's findings, saying the radiocarbon testing was inaccurate. But Greenwood was eventually vindicated.

Other 9,000-year-old sites have since been found in the area. Sites going back as far as 10,000 years have been found in the Channel Islands.

As important as Greenwood's work was, it focused on the artifacts unearthed in the dig -- stone tools and shell beads, mostly. The dig also yielded 15,000 animal bones and 7,000 fish bones discarded by the Chumash. These were bagged up and stored untouched for decades in the offices of the county's archaeological society at Cuesta College.

Jones thought the bones also contained a wealth of information and proposed a systematic study of them. It is very unusual to have such an abundance of hunting remnants reaching so far back in time, Jones said.

The Sea Grant program, which funds marine studies, agreed and gave Jones its first grant to an archaeologist.

"This rare window into the past, perhaps as far back as 8,000 B.C., will help scientists develop a longer term perspective and knowledge of the characteristics of past coastal ecosystems and the effects of predation on them," said the Sea Grant program in a press release.

The first job was to identify what animals all of those bones came from. Most are deer bones as well as bones from the same near-shore fish that modern-day anglers catch -- rockfish, cabezon and lingcod.

Fifty bones, representing the entire 9,000-year history of the site, are being radiocarbon dated, and results are expected during the next couple of months. This method measures the radiological decay of carbon-14, an element found in all animals.

These tests will more accurately determine the age of the site as well as reveal periods during which the site could have been temporarily abandoned by the Indians.

The collection contains a large number of sea otter bones. These are of particular interest to Jones.

Hunting otters

The Chumash hunted otters sustainably but likely took enough to suppress the otter population to the point that the marine environment was changed.

Otter hunting would have benefited the Chumash in two ways.

In addition to getting meat and lush pelts from the otters, hunting them may have allowed the otter's favorite food, abalone, to flourish, giving the Chumash another food source. Abalone shells were another common item in Chumash discard heaps.

"They were killing sea otters on a regular basis," Jones said. "Once we start tallying the numbers, I think it will be startling to people."

The dig may also pinpoint when a flightless sea goose that inhabited the West Coast in prehistoric times went extinct. Remnants from the earliest waste heaps at the Diablo Canyon site contained bones from the extinct goose. Archaeologists theorize that the flightless birds were easy pickings and Native Americans eventually hunted them to extinction.

Finally, Jones hopes his work will show how Chumash populations evolved over time. As the tribes flourished and developed new technologies, they also developed new food sources.

Collecting and processing acorns was one such food source. Another was anchovies and other small bait fish, which were abundant but took more effort and specialized nets to catch.

Archaeological digs in other areas of the Central Coast show that anchovies were added to the Chumash diet later in their history. Jones hopes to determine whether a similar shift took place among the ancient peoples of Diablo Canyon.