Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology

Tushingham and Christiansen (2015) recently reviewed data from 22 fish assemblages from coastal archaeological sites in northern California and southern Oregon. They characterized the assemblage from the Chetco Indian village of Tcetxo (35-CU-42) as dominated by nearshore littoral fish including rockfish, surfperch, and greenlings, drawing from Ricksí (2012) analyses reported in Minor (2012). Our recent analyses of fine-screened samples from Tcetxo reveals that both surf smelt and northern anchovies were abundant, but only in materials recovered using 1 mm. mesh screens. This demonstrates the importance of analyzing fine-screened materials to document Native American fishing practices along the Pacific coast, especially to find the remains of forage fish, which form the foundation of entire marine ecosystems. Overall, our data support Tushingham and Christiansenís thesis that Native Americans living along the coast of northern California and southern Oregon focused substantial fishing effort on mass-capture of smelt, anchovies, and other forage fish.