American Hunting Research Articles

Interspecific forced copulations generate most hybrids in broadly sympatric ducks

Although rare, hybrids are more common in broadly sympatric waterfowl than in any other avian family; yet, the behavioral ecology explaining their generation has remained controversial. Leading hypotheses are forced interspecific copulations, mis-imprinting caused by mixed broods, and scarcity of conspecific mates. Using a large sample of hybrid ducks solicited from North American hunters we evaluated these hypotheses by genetically determining the mother and father species of F1 hybrids. Based on abundances in areas where their breeding ranges overlap, the frequency of hybrids varied greatly from expectations, with hybrids between species within recently derived clades being much more frequent than those between more divergent clades. Forced copulations, as measured by large phallus-length asymmetries between parentals, strongly predicted the father species of most F1 hybrids. Thus, most Anas acuta x A. platyrhynchos (Northern Pintail x Mallard) F1s were sired by A. acuta, and most A. platyrhynchos x Mareca strepera (Mallard x Gadwall) F1s were sired by A. platyrhynchos. Siring asymmetries were consistent with phallus length asymmetries in five additional parental combinations, but none had samples large enough to be individually statistically significant. The exception to this trend was our sample of nine A. platyrhynchos x Mareca americana (Mallard x Gadwall) F1s, for which a large phallus asymmetry failed to predict the father species. Hybrids were rare in brood parasitic species, suggesting mis-imprinting to be an unlikely cause of most hybrids; however, our samples of hybrids from regular brood parasites were inadequate to strongly address this hypothesis. We could test the scarcity of mates hypothesis for only a single hybrid combination and it contradicted our prediction: most F1 M. Penelope x M. americana (Eurasian x American Wigeon) were sired by M. penelope, strongly contradicting our prediction that female M. penelope wintering in enormous flocks of M. americana (American Wigeon) on the west coast of North America would have difficulty finding conspecific mates. In general, our results support interspecific forced copulations as the predominant behavioral mechanism generating hybrids in North temperate waterfowl.

Biopolitics in the National Parks: The Life and Death of Cecil the Lion

Abstract Cecil the Lion lived in Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe and was a part of an Oxford conservation study until his death by poaching, outside of Park boundaries, at the hands of an American hunter, in July 2015. Cecil’s death caused unique levels of international outrage, though wildlife poaching in general remains an all-too-ubiquitous phenomenon. This paper enquires as to why this particular death caused such outrage. I will examine this question through two Foucauldian lenses: first, through the Parks’ discursive production of subjects – human and nonhuman animal; and secondly, by investigating Parks’ practices of understanding biopower and pastoral power. I argue that though wildlife conservation in the National Parks is generally interested in conserving the species, not individuals, Cecil’s status as a named individual in a scientific study resulted in the outrage and speaks to the paradox at the heart of Foucault’s idea of pastoral power.

Food Safety Considerations Related to the Consumption and Handling of Game Meat in North America.

Emerging foodborne pathogens present a threat to public health. It is now recognized that several foodborne pathogens originate from wildlife as demonstrated by recent global disease outbreaks. Zoonotic spillover events are closely related to the ubiquity of parasitic, bacterial, and viral pathogens present within human and animal populations and their surrounding environment. Foodborne diseases have economic and international trade impacts, incentivizing effective wildlife disease management. In North America, there are no food safety standards for handling and consumption of free-ranging game meat. Game meat consumption continues to rise in North America; however, this growing practice could place recreational hunters and game meat consumers at increased risk of foodborne diseases. Recreational hunters should follow effective game meat food hygiene practices from harvest to storage and consumption. Here, we provide a synthesis review that evaluates the ecological and epidemiological drivers of foodborne disease risk in North American hunter populations that are associated with the harvest and consumption of terrestrial mammal game meat. We anticipate this work could serve as a foundation of preventive measures that mitigate foodborne disease transmission between free-ranging mammalian and human populations.

Public Access for Pheasant Hunters: Understanding an Emerging Need

ABSTRACTRing‐necked pheasant (Phasianus colchicus; i.e., pheasant) hunting participation is declining across North America, reflecting a larger downward trend in American hunting participation and threatening benefits to grassland conservation and rural economies. To stabilize and expand the pheasant hunting population, we must first identify factors that influence pheasant hunter participation. We used an extensive in‐person hunter survey to test the hypothesis that hunter demographics interact with social‐ecological traits of hunting locations to affect hunter decisions, outcomes, and perceptions. We built a series of Bayesian mixed effects models to parse variation in demographics, perceptions, and hunt outcomes of pheasant hunters interviewed at public access hunting sites across 3 regions in Nebraska, USA, that varied in pheasant abundance and proximity to urban population centers. Among pheasant hunters in Nebraska, access to private lands was negatively related to the human population density of a pheasant hunter's home ZIP code and the distance a hunter had traveled to reach a hunting location. Pheasant hunters interviewed closer to metropolitan areas tended to be more urban and travel shorter distances, and their parties were more likely to include youth but less likely to include dogs. Hunter satisfaction was positively associated with seeing and harvesting pheasants and hunting with youth. Whereas youth participation and the number of pheasants seen varied by study region, hunter satisfaction did not differ across regions, suggesting that hunters may calibrate their expectations and build their parties based on where they plan to hunt. The variation in hunter demographics across hunting locations and disconnects between social and ecological correlates of hunter satisfaction suggests that diverse pheasant hunting constituencies will be best served by diverse pheasant hunting opportunities. © 2019 The Wildlife Society.

Modern Violence: Animal Studies, Speciesism, and the Writings of John James Audubon

Modern Violence:Animal Studies, Speciesism, and the Writings of John James Audubon Eric Russell (bio) In "The Mississippi Kite," John James Audubon fires upon but uncharacteristically misses a mother kite and her young; the mother then attempts to save her offspring by rushing it to another tree. The hunter-naturalist's reaction to this event indicates something that has preoccupied Audubon scholars for decades: "My feelings at that moment I cannot express. I wished I had not discovered the bird; for who could have witnessed, without emotion, so striking an example of that affection which none but a mother can feel; so daring an act, performed in the midst of smoke, in the presence of a dreaded and dangerous enemy. I followed, however, and brought both to the ground at one shot, so keen is the desire of possession!"1 The bird's actions strike Audubon sentimentally, which produces an anthropomorphic moment that narrows the ontological gap between human and nonhuman animal. Audubon kills the kites anyway because he wants them, even managing to brag about his marksmanship. "In art and prose," Daniel Justin Herman observes in his history of American hunting, "Audubon appealed to the masculine and martial strain of American culture, whereas elsewhere—through depictions of nesting doves and delicate songbirds—he appealed to the sentimental and domestic," [End Page 470] a situation Herman characterizes as an "unresolvable contradiction."2 Similarly, Christoph Irmscher points out that Audubon by turns appears as birds' "ardent admirer as well as their inveterate destroyer" and notes that Audubon's "pervasive paradoxes" are what make him "a more interesting writer."3 Audubon's contradictions and paradoxes deserve further theorizing, and one could understandably view the naturalist as hypocritical, cognitively dissonant, or sociopathic; however, it makes more sense simply to call Audubon's actions modern. The ethical stance toward animals he presents in "The Mississippi Kite," with one foot in sentimental, anthropomorphizing sympathy and the other foot standing on a presumptive human license to kill other animals as he sees fit, fundamentally characterizes modern Western attitudes toward animals. Bruno Latour's conception of modernity, consisting partly of "translation" and "purification" processes, helps explain the apparent paradox constituting Audubon's treatment of animals. The work of purification, observes Latour, distinctly separates human society and nonhuman nature; simultaneously, however, the work of translation highlights networks in which nature and society are intertwined. More specifically, we can conceive of networks as entanglements of agencies and forces in which all things, human and nonhuman, are connected and not always definitively separable. While networks that blur the lines between nature and human culture tend to be associated with non-Western cultures in the Western gaze, Westerners characteristically view their own societies as part of a nature-society divide even as networks perpetually emerge, often unrecognized as such.4 I argue here that Audubon performs the work of purification through violence toward animals, an exercise in dominance that emphasizes nonhumans' otherness, but that he also performs the work of translation through anthropomorphizing animals and sentimentally stressing [End Page 471] their resemblances to humans. What we might call Audubon's most modern writings engage concurrently in purification and translation. Resolving Audubon's contradictions and paradoxes through the lens of Latourian modernity makes clearer a more nuanced definition of modernity for animal studies and theories of speciesism, resulting in more complex, critically versatile considerations of the human relationship with nonhuman animals. The modernity of human-nonhuman relationships does not arbitrarily begin in a historical moment, nor does it consist merely of perceiving human exceptionalism or animality: the dynamics of human ethics and violence make modernity simultaneously a matter of speciesism and sentimentalism, brutality and compassion, exceptionalism and ecology.5 Before analyzing Audubon's journals and essays, I demonstrate the need for a firmer definition of modernity when it comes to human-nonhuman relationships, and I offer a brief history of Western ethical consideration of animals; I then examine scholarship on Romantic conceptions of violence and the nonhuman world in order to situate Audubon within his contemporary ideological and theoretical milieu. the problem of modern violence Jürgen Habermas defines modern as the expression of "consciousness of an epoch that relates itself to...

The Prehistoric Bison of Yellowstone National Park

On the Ground • When Yellowstone National Park (YNP) was established in 1872, American bison (Bison bison) were living in the park's forests and mountains. • A study conducted in the 1960s concluded that those were Mountain bison (Bison bison athabascae), a subspecies adapted to mountain habitat. It was assumed that those historical bison occupied their native habitat and had done so in prehistoric times. • When archaeological evidence of YNP bison was discovered in the mid-1990s it seemed reasonable to assume that those bones were derived from a herd of native prehistoric bison. • However, a review of archaeological, historical, genetic, and ecological evidence suggests a different history. Namely, herds of bison were absent before 1840. Sometime between 1840 and the mid-1850s, plains bison were driven into the mountain forest in and near YNP. In those forests, bison were relatively safe from horse-mounted, bow-and-arrow-armed Native American hunters. • Archaeological evidence suggests that YNP’s prehistoric bison were bulls that left herds on the low-elevation plains that surround the park; the bulls would have traveled up mountain drainages to the Yellowstone volcanic plateau. • Bison played no significant role in the ecological processes that shaped YNP’s prehistoric landscape. YNP’s modern bison herd is causing significant changes in range condition.

Review of best practices in recruitment and retention of North American hunters and anglers

The aging population of hunters and anglers, and the low rate of recruitment of new participants, represent major challenges for this sector of activities and for the regions where these activities are practiced, especially in North America. To counter this decline, initiatives and programs aimed at the recruitment and retention of new participants have been developed in recent years. This study tries to identify and evaluate the best practices in recruitment and retention of hunting and fishing clienteles. Generally speaking, these programs are intended to educate, inform, and initiate new participants and beginners about these outdoor activities in an entertaining fashion. They mainly take the form of weekend camps, special events targeting different market segments, competitions, seminars, and educational courses. These initiatives typically combine an educational component with a hands-on experience. In the end, the study highlights the need to develop a global strategy for the recruitment and retention of hunting and fishing clienteles in the province of Québec. Consequently, the programs and initiatives need to have a common vision and need to be developed in such a way as to complement one another, thus contributing to the optimization of financial resources as well as to recruitment and retention of hunters and anglers.

Managing the vanishing North American hunter: a novel framework to address declines in hunters and hunter-generated conservation funds

ABSTRACTAs long as the funding mechanism supporting state wildlife conservation relies heavily on hunter-generated funds, declines in hunter participation are a threat to the conservation of both game and nongame species. To address options to bolster wildlife agency profit from the sale of hunting licenses, we developed a stage-based, stochastic population model of a hunter population, and demonstrate its utility within a decision-making framework to inform state wildlife agency decisions. We evaluated hypothetical youth and adult recruitment-focused outreach programs over 10 years to increase license sale profit. Using our model as the core of a decision analysis, state agencies can set hunter population or license profit targets, and evaluate management actions designed to achieve those objectives. We expect that our approach will provide a valuable framework for anticipating the future of hunting and hunting-generated conservation funds, and can be extended to other user groups, including target shooters and anglers.

Trophy Hunting A Relic of the Past

It seems so obvious: you don't save rare animals by shooting them. Yet, trophy hunters stubbornly argue that this is just the case. They claim that their hunts help raise awareness about species extinction and that the money they pay for the hunts helps conservation efforts and contributes to local economies. Conservationists point out that these arguments are not based on solid proof and that trophy hunting – the killing of big game for taxidermied body parts or photos with the killed animal, typically in Africa – fails to account for the fact that rare animals have a much higher value alive than dead, not to mention the interest by virtually everyone in safeguarding the species for the long run. While this debate continues to rage, the world’s grandest and most threatened animals are disappearing rapidly. In 1900, for example, there were about half a million rhinos in the world. Today, less than 30,000 exist. In the early part of the 20th century, there were as many as 3-5 million African elephants. Now, there are only around 415,000 left with tens of thousands being slaughtered every year. 100,000 elephants were killed by poachers between 2010 and 2012 alone. On average, one elephant is currently killed every 25 minutes. In just one decade, the Central African elephant population has declined by 64%. Other species fare no better. Once the “King of the Animal Kingdom,” the African lion population has declined from about 100,000 in the 1960s to no more than 35,000 today. Since 1970, a whopping 80% of all wild animals have been lost to poaching, habitat loss, human-wildlife interaction, and hunting. These numbers are sobering: we are in the midst of a sixth mass extinction losing species at 1,000 to 10,000 times the natural rate. As many as 30-50% percent of all species may be extinct by 2050. Even so, trophy hunting continues. Many of the targeted animal species are highly endangered or threatened with extinction. For example, despite the low and declining population of African lions, American hunters killed more than 5,600 of these majestic animals and imported parts of them as trophies between 1999 and 2008. Between 2005 and 2014, more than 1.2 million “trophies” of over 1,200 different kinds of animals were imported into the United States. When it is typically illegal to import actual parts of the animals, trophy hunters often resort to taking a picture of themselves with the animals they have just killed (“kill shots”) as a means of commemorating the occasion. This practice contributes to the extinction of already very rare animals and has become objectionable to the majority of people, including even hunters. It must come to an end.

Values, trust, and cultural backlash in conservation governance: The case of wildlife management in the United States

The global rise of populism is having a profound effect on policies across many issues. We explore the potential effects on wildlife conservation using the western United States as a case study. Global populist trends have been explained through the phenomenon of cultural backlash, wherein those left behind in the value shift beginning post-World War II started to mobilize by the end of the century to protect their core values and traditions. Our prior work suggests that wildlife values in the western United States are shifting from traditional domination to mutualism orientations. The current study looked for indications of backlash from the American hunting culture that may be associated with that shift. Data from a 19-state survey (n=12,673) revealed that, in states with a higher prevalence of mutualism, residents with domination values had lower levels of trust in the state wildlife agency. Traditional residents were also less supportive of broadly-inclusive governance models, and the potential for social conflict over wildlife issues was much higher in those states. Finally, we found evidence of actions to “fight back” against change among traditional groups in the growth of ballot initiatives from 1990 to 2016 to protect hunting rights. Backlash will likely affect different countries and jurisdictions differently, contingent on the historical and cultural context. Nonetheless, it will be a global force with important implications for conservation governance, even if only to intensify conflict. Governance innovations will be necessary to help conservation institutions adapt to dramatic changes in the socio-political environment.

Adult sex ratios and partner scarcity among hunter-gatherers: implications for dispersal patterns and the evolution of human sociality.

Small populations are susceptible to high genetic loads and random fluctuations in birth and death rates. While these selective forces can adversely affect their viability, small populations persist across taxa. Here, we investigate the resilience of small groups to demographic uncertainty, and specifically to fluctuations in adult sex ratio (ASR), partner availability and dispersal patterns. Using 25 years of demographic data for two Savannah Pumé groups of South American hunter-gatherers, we show that in small human populations: (i) ASRs fluctuate substantially from year to year, but do not consistently trend in a sex-biased direction; (ii) the primary driver of local variation in partner availability is stochasticity in the sex ratio at maturity; and (iii) dispersal outside of the group is an important behavioural means to mediate locally constrained mating options. To then simulate conditions under which dispersal outside of the local group may have evolved, we develop two mathematical models. Model results predict that if the ASR is biased, the globally rarer sex should disperse. The model's utility is then evaluated by applying our empirical data to this central prediction. The results are consistent with the observed hunter-gatherer pattern of variation in the sex that disperses. Together, these findings offer an alternative explanation to resource provisioning for the evolution of traits central to human sociality (e.g. flexible dispersal, bilocal post-marital residence and cooperation across local groups). We argue that in small populations, looking outside of one's local group is necessary to find a mate and that, motivated by ASR imbalance, the alliances formed to facilitate the movement of partners are an important foundation for the human-typical pattern of network formation across local groups.This article is part of the themed issue 'Adult sex ratios and reproductive decisions: a critical re-examination of sex differences in human and animal societies'.

Using combined biomolecular methods to explore whale exploitation and social aggregation in hunter–gatherer–fisher society in Tierra del Fuego

Cetaceans were an important food and raw material resource for the South American hunter–gatherer–fisher (HGF) communities of Tierra del Fuego. Historic ethnographic evidence suggests that relatively mobile HGF groups came together in large numbers to exploit carcasses from individual cetacean stranding events. Substantial accumulations of whale bones within shell middens in the Lanashuaia locality of the Beagle Channel suggests that these social aggregation events may also have occurred in pre-historic periods. The difficulty in assigning taxonomic identifications to the fragmentary whale remains, however, made it difficult to explicitly test this hypothesis. Here, we applied two different biomolecular techniques, collagen peptide mass fingerprinting (ZooMS) and ancient mitochondrial DNA analysis to 42 archeological bone fragments from the Lanashuaia locality to provide accurate species identifications. There was a clear correspondence between ZooMS and DNA results, identifying five different cetacean species (Southern bottlenose, blue, humpback, right, and sei whale) as well as human and sea lion remains. The biomolecular results were not conclusively consistent with HGF social aggregation, revealing an unexpectedly diverse range of cetaceans within the Lanashuaia middens. However, the results could not fully refute the hypothesis that cetacean remains can be used as anthropic markers of aggregation events, as the observed species and haplotypes revealed potential shared exploitation of some whale resources between midden sites.

Evidence and Potential Implications of Exponential Tails to Concentration Versus Time Plots for the Batch Dissolution of Calcite

Calcite batch dissolution kinetics behaviour has been described as complex for more than half a century. The dissolution of 100- to 250-μm particles of natural calcites at 20–35 °C in Tris buffer or alkali at pHs 8–10.6 reveals that the non-ideal, long tails to the plot of calcium concentration versus time, are probably exponential. Equivalent alternative evidence from elsewhere for both calcite and gypsum is supplied. Inadequate kinetics templating of earlier results is believed to have obscured this exponential character, but rectification could induce a renaissance for batch dissolution study of calcite as well as for silicate and aluminosilicate minerals, too. The work extends a programme of study of the shrinking object (SO) model which has already considered a variety of substances such as sucrose, sodium chloride, gypsum, and silica gel, through which it has operationally defined ideal dissolution as an exponential rise in concentration with time, at high solids loadings. The SO model is limited to a constant surface area of the solid during dissolution. However, the possibility of explaining non-ideal dissolution of calcite by including a reduction in the apparent surface area during a dissolution, is explored here. In this the model shifts from an initial mode under one reaction rate constant to a terminal mode under a second rate constant, and by this the SO model is shown to share properties with a decelerating bolas—the South American hunting tool. The bolas model is consistent with earlier suggestions elsewhere that non-ideality arises from the surface being either poisoned or otherwise changed during dissolution. This current investigation derives from Empirical Kinetics, which is defined here as the wisdom of kinetics collected by the middle of the last half of the twentieth century. With the preliminary success gained with the exponential tails, the paper overcomes much confusion in the literature by differentiating direct measurements of rates of dissolution made for the purposes of chemical kinetics, from those needed for biogeochemical field purposes.

Economic and social benefits of hunting in North America

Hunting is an integral part of North American cultures, providing a powerful connection to the outdoors for millions of people and generating billions of dollars to local and national economies. Socially, hunting has been part of hominid cultures since very early in the fossil record; a tradition that contemporary North American hunters tend to pass down to subsequent generations through family and community networks. The 13.7 million American hunters and 2.1 million Canadian nature-recreationists spend more than $38.3 billion and $1.8 billion, respectively, on non-commercial hunting-related expenses each year. Hunting activities also yield hundreds of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in tax and other revenues in both countries. The contributions of hunters serve as the fundamental foundation for a social and economic support system for conserving wildlife and habitats for future generations.

Ecological Change on California's Channel Islands from the Pleistocene to the Anthropocene

Historical ecology is becoming an important focus in conservation biology and offers a promising tool to help guide ecosystem management. Here, we integrate data from multiple disciplines to illuminate the past, present, and future of biodiversity on California's Channel Islands, an archipelago that has undergone a wide range of land-use and ecological changes. Our analysis spans approximately 20,000 years, from before human occupation and through Native American hunter–gatherers, commercial ranchers and fishers, the US military, and other land managers. We demonstrate how long-term, interdisciplinary research provides insight into conservation decisions, such as setting ecosystem restoration goals, preserving rare and endemic taxa, and reducing the impacts of climate change on natural and cultural resources. We illustrate the importance of historical perspectives for understanding modern patterns and ecological change and present an approach that can be applied generally in conservation management planning.

From Voyageurs to Bush Pilots

From Britain’s establishment of the first Hudson’s Bay Company charter in 1670 that laid open the Canadian wilderness to the European fur trade, through the post–World War II (WWII) explosion of American hunting and fishing tourism that laid waste to Aboriginal lands, peoples, and habitats, Canada’s colonial history reveals its own “cowboy” mythos of frontiersmen–heroes and the practice of killing and selling animals for profit. This autoethnography explores themes of resonance and resistance to the American cowboy mythos through Canadian icons of entrepreneurial frontiersmenship and their dominion over indigenous life, both human and animal. By interlocking autobiographical, dramaturgical, and cultural/fokloric narratives, I weave a critical historiography of growing up in a small Ontario bush town where “cowboys and Indians” carried unique geopolitical implications.

Risk, mobility or population size? Drivers of technological richness among contact-period western North American hunter–gatherers

Identifying factors that influence technological evolution in small-scale societies is important for understanding human evolution. There have been a number of attempts to identify factors that influence the evolution of food-getting technology, but little work has examined the factors that affect the evolution of other technologies. Here, we focus on variation in technological richness (total number of material items and techniques) among recent hunter-gatherers from western North America and test three hypotheses: (i) technological richness is affected by environmental risk, (ii) population size is the primary determinant of technological richness, and (iii) technological richness is constrained by residential mobility. We found technological richness to be correlated with a proxy for environmental risk-mean rainfall for the driest month-in the manner predicted by the risk hypothesis. Support for the hypothesis persisted when we controlled for shared history and intergroup contact. We found no evidence that technological richness is affected by population size or residential mobility. These results have important implications for unravelling the complexities of technological evolution.

Hunter–gatherer use of wild plants and domesticates: archaeological implications for mixed economies before agricultural intensification

Much of our success as a species derives from the ability to adapt hunting and gathering to diverse ecologies and incorporate a wide range of food resources. Hunter–gatherers maintain broad dietary options through an array of alternative and fallback strategies. While many decisions facing foragers have been analyzed, few paired nutritional and return rate data are available, especially in relation to the value of wild roots. Ethnoarchaeological data from a group of South American hunter–gatherers allow us to comparatively assess the value of root resources by observing what mobile foragers do when presented with the option to retain or replace wild foods with domesticates. Nutritional content and foraging returns indicate that cultivated tubers provide no clear nutritional or labor advantages. Evidence also does not suggest that wild roots are inferior resources. This may explain why some foragers incorporate domesticates without replacing dependence on wild foods, or signaling a transition to an agrarian economy. This perspective has archaeological implications for modeling of past subsistence during initial and early exploitation of cultigens.

The Hunt As Love and Kill: Hunter-Prey Relations in the Discourse of Contemporary Hunting Magazines

Full-length feature articles in eight popular American hunting magazines were assessed to better understand hunter-prey relationships as depicted in contemporary hunting discourse. Our findings suggest hunters regard prey using two contradictory paradigms-Love and Kill. In the Love category, we find respect for life, admiration for nature and animals, and a sense of kinship between hunter and prey. In contrast, writings consistent with the Kill theme focus on conquest, objectification, hunter physiological responses, and violence. Of the 23 articles reviewed, 61 percent of the sample had multiple representations of Love and Kill in the same article, revealing a multilayered discourse. Many scholars have written about Love and Kill as separate constructs in hunting, suggesting they are mutually exclusive. Our empirical study counters this claim, finding instead that individual hunters often view their prey through a mixed lens that includes both Love and Kill.

The pre-Hispanic ceramic technology of South American hunter–gatherers (Paraná River Delta, Argentina): a preliminary archaeometric study

This work presents the preliminary results of studies conducted on pre-Hispanic pottery produced by the South American hunter–gatherer communities that inhabited the Parana River lowlands during the Late Holocene. The data generated allow advancement of knowledge and discussion regarding the ceramic technologies employed by these groups, which have to date received little archaeological study. Specifically, technological and formal-functional analyses have been performed on a ceramic assemblage from the site of Cerro Puesto Acosta, located in the upper region of delta formed by this high-volume South American river in northeastern Argentina. Both macroscopic and microscopic aspects of these ceramics have been studied using archaeometric techniques (petrographic analysis). The patterns revealed by these analyses suggest the implementation of technological choices oriented towards the creation of vessels especially suitable for the processing, cooking, and serving of foods, which indicates the economic importance of these artifacts in allowing maximum advantage to be taken of the area’s available resources.