Zooarchaeological Analyses of Holocene Central Coastal California Archaeofaunas

在这个项目中，黛安·吉福德-冈萨雷斯博士和学生们将对加州中部沿海蒙特利湾的一个大型考古遗址和大约18个较小的考古遗址的动物进行详细的分析。这项研究的目的是评估在过去的6000年里，环境过程是否以及如何影响了生活在沿海地区的人们。今天，全球气候变化威胁着环太平洋地区人们的生计和动物物种的持续生存。考古遗址包含了过去气候事件和人类对此的反应的记录。因此，它们是关于前工业化时代海洋和陆地生产力极端波动的关键证据的宝库。我们知道，就像今天一样，全球气候变化影响了陆地和海洋上的生命。尽管蒙特利湾是美国的主要农业基地，也是寻找丰富海洋生物的人的旅游目的地，但人们对该地区更深层的历史知之甚少。大约六年来，吉福德-冈萨雷斯博士和地球科学系的同事们一直在研究海洋温度和生产力的历史，同时也在研究大约1000年前加利福尼亚沿海地区北部毛海豹消失的原因。目前的项目是在一个由美国国家科学基金会资助的为期三年的合作项目之后进行的，该项目表明，目前受到威胁的物种——北方毛海豹——已经从根本上改变了它们的繁殖和迁徙行为。对它们骨骼的放射性碳年代测定表明，它们的繁殖地并不是在整个太平洋边缘同时被遗弃的。研究结果表明，NFS在加利福尼亚中部的消失与海洋上升流模式的变化不一致，而海洋上升流模式可能会影响它们的食物基础，这加强了古人参与其区域灭绝的可能性。然而，到目前为止，我们还没有详细的证据表明人们是由于饥饿而被迫消灭海狗的，无论是中世纪气候异常（公元800-1350年）期间的严重干旱是否影响了NFS殖民地本身，还是干旱驱使人们导致这些动物灭绝。吉福德-冈萨雷斯，考古学的研究生，和被选为特殊技能发展的本科生，将用地区考古遗址的动物遗骸来探索这些问题。其中一个遗址，莫斯登陆点（CA-MNT0234）是一个未被开发的“罗塞塔石碑”，用于区域考古学，其组成部分可以追溯到8500年前的西班牙接触。在洛马普里塔地震后，联邦应急管理局资助了莫斯兰丁海洋实验室的重建工作，并对该遗址进行了很好的挖掘和策划。然而，由于合同考古的时间要求，无法对该遗址进行详尽的分析，以完整地讲述气候变化、人力资源利用和动物地理。这项研究将深入了解前现代人类的土地利用以及与食物物种的相互作用。我们关于历史人类和动物生态学的数据将提供给野生动物和保护生物学家对这些物种进行管理决策。它将为考古学研究生提供优秀的专业培训，并为本科生提供非凡的现场研究机会。

In this project, Dr. Diane Gifford-Gonzalez and students will undertake detailed analysis of fauna from one large and about 18 smaller archaeological sites on the Monterey Bay, in central coastal California. The aim of the study is to evaluate whether and how environmental processes affected people living along the coast over the last 6000 years. Today, global climate change threatens the livelihoods of people and the continued survival of animal species, along the Pacific Rim. Archaeological sites contain records of past climatic events and human responses to them. They are thus repositories of crucial evidence on how extreme swings in ocean and land productivity were in pre-industrial times. We know that, just as today, global climate change affected life on both land and sea. Although a major agricultural powerhouse in the United States and a tourist destination for those seeking abundant marine life, the Monterey Bay area's deeper history is as yet poorly understood. For about six years, Dr. Gifford-Gonzalez and colleagues from the Department of Earth Sciences have been researching the history of marine temperatures and productivity, as well as shedding light on the disappearance of northern fur seals from coastal California about 1000 bp. The present project follows a three-year NSF-funded collaborative project that indicated that northern fur seals - a presently threatened species -- have radically changed their breeding and migratory behavior. Radiocarbon dates on their bones show their breeding colonies were not abandoned simultaneously along the entire Pacific margin. Research results indicate that NFS disappearance in central California did not coincide with changes in marine upwelling patterns that could have affected their food base, strengthening the odds that ancient people had a hand in their regional extirpation. However, so far, we have no detailed evidence that people were driven to wipe out fur seals due to hunger, whether the severe droughts during the Medieval Climatic Anomaly (800-1350 AD) could have affected NFS colonies themselves, or whether the droughts drove people to drive these animals extinct.Dr. Gifford-Gonzalez, graduate students in archaeology, and undergraduates chosen for special skills development will explore these questions with faunal remains from regional archaeological sites. One of these sites, the Moss Landing Site (CA-MNT0234) is a virtual untapped "Rosetta Stone" for regional archaeology, with components dating from 8500 years ago to Spanish contact. This site was well excavated and curated during FEMA-funded rebuilding of the Moss Landing Marine Laboratories after the Loma Prieta Earthquake. However, time demands of contract archaeology precluded the close analysis that the site deserves, to tell its full story of climate change, human resource use, and animal geography. This study will provide insights into the pre-modern human land use and interactions with food species over time. Our data on historical human and animal ecology will be available to wildlife and conservation biologists making management decisions about such species. It will provide excellent professional training for graduate students in archaeology and extraordinary, on-site research opportunities for undergraduates.