We know from the ethnographic literature that rabbit hunting was a major communal activity practiced by Native American groups in the Great Basin. Julian Steward’s classic Basin-Plateau Aboriginal Sociopolitical Groups describes these and the equipment used in some detail. The major quarry was jackrabbits (Lepus californicus). Communal hunts were held in the Fall and accounts …
Little Petroglyph Canyon – Coso Rock Art District
In conjunction with the Society for California Archaeology Data-Sharing meeting in Ridgecrest, CA last week-end, a tour was arranged for us at the nearby Coso Rock Art District, a National Historic Landmark. This is a world-class archaeological resource that is located on the China Lake – Naval Air Warfare Center. The fact that this important …
Lives of Pronghorns
This article in the LA Times yesterday by Deborah Sullivan Brennan, laments the decline of pronghorn antelope herds in California from populations estimated at 500,000 at European contact to something in the range of 5-6,000 today. We all lament that. You should look at her piece, but Brennan says that there are too few open …
Trona Pinnacles
While in Ridgecrest, CA over the weekend for an archaeology society meeting, I made a side trip to the Trona Pinnacles National Natural Landmark. Ridgecrest and the Pinnacles are located in the high desert, east of the Sierra Nevada. During the Pleistocene and early Holocene, the Pinnacles area was at the bottom of Searles Lake, …
Security, as it is practiced
From the Arizona Daily Star via the Alpha Environmentalist. “On her way to a recent meeting at the Superior Court building Downtown, an Arizona Daily Star reporter put her purse on the conveyor belt to be scanned for potential weapons. “After staring at the monitor a good long time, the security guard asked if she …
For Dog Lovers
For all of us who think dogs superior to pigs or goats (a little in- joke– Patrick will understand) a quote from Matt, when we were talking about his old dog Meng. I said: “Loving dogs will break your heart– but how could we do anything else?’ And he replied: “There is nothing else to …
Condor Feeding Habits
This article from the NYT suggests that California Condors have changed their diet in the past (megafauna to beached sea mammals, then to beef) and maybe should change again. The hypothesis dovetails well with the theories of the grand old man of ReWilding, Paul Martin, in his book Twilight of the Mammoths. He notes that …
Three Martini Lunch!!
Roseann Hanson, who to his great good fortune is the wife of the Alpha Environmentalist, has decied to start her own blog, Three Martini Lunch. I want to quote at length from her absolutely delightful Credo, but for the moment I don’t seem to be able to cut and paste, and there is too much …
Of “Save” the Falcons: Big Lies
This meme probably should have been swatted long ago– in fact, I thought it had been– but it has reared its head in a new place. The political site Frontpage , in an unexceptionable (and as far as I know mostly correct) but heated article on Saudi money’s use in funding terrorism, cited the Arab’s …
Early Falconry
A topic perfectly–perhaps uniquely–suited to the particular mix of interests here: Who were the first falconers? In a flurry of emails between us, Steve pulling in the expert testimony of his friend John Burchard and adding his own considerable insight; Reid, the ever-sober archeologist, providing lines of evidence from peer-reviewed literature and I wildly speculating …