MARINE MAMMALS

Marine mammals constituted a potentially significant resource for the prehistoric peoples of coastal San Diego County. Species that were present in the regional waters included cetaceans (whales, porpoises, and dolphins), seals, sea lions, and sea otters. However, the use of these resources may have been limited by difficulties in their procurement or the vulnera­bility of some species to overexploitation.

The ethnographic record is generally of little help concerning the use of marine resources. The Luiseño are said to have exploited marine mammals for food (Bean and Shipek 1978:552). Early in the historic period, the Yuman speakers of northwestern Baja California hunted sea otters to use their pelts for clothing (Sales 1956); the Russian trade for sea otter pelts may have been involved in this practice, although the technology that was used was aboriginal.

George Shumway, Carl L. Hubbs, and James R. Moriarty (1961:104) reported the conspicuous absence of marine mammal remains at the early Archaic-period Scripps Estates Site in La Jolla, while noting that such remains "occur (often plentifully) in some younger middens along the coasts of southern California and Baja California".

Claude N. Warren (1964, 1968) proposed that marine mammal exploitation, to the extent that it occurred, was characteristic of the later portions of the Archaic period, after about 3000 B.C., and of the southern rather than the northern portion of the county.

William R. Hildebrandt and Terry L. Jones (1992) reviewed the evidence concerning prehistoric exploitation of pinnipeds and sea otters throughout the California and Oregon coasts. They argued that the marine mammal species that establish rookeries on land would have been a relatively attractive resource, in optimal foraging terms, but that those species would have been quite vulnerable to overexploitation. The archaeological evidence suggested to Hildebrandt and Jones that mainland rookeries were a major focus of earliest coastal adaptations and that exploitation tended to shift to non-rookery species (such as harbor seals and sea otters) when rookery species became scarce or locally extinct. Responding to criticisms by Roger H. Colten (1993) and by Colten and Jeanne E. Arnold (1998), additional evidence of overexploitation in central and southern California was adduced by Jones, Hildebrandt, Douglas J. Kennett, and Judith F. Porcasi (2004).

A sampling of faunal evidence from San Diego County suggests that marine mammal hunting was practiced during both the Archaic and Late Prehistoric periods. In general, marine mammals appear to have been a fairly minor resource, particularly during the later period. One exception may be the Spindrift site in La Jolla (SDI-39), at which marine mammal bone (Mirounga angustirostris, Zalophus californianus, Enhydra lutris, and Delphinidae) represented 30% of the analyzed bone, by weight (Arter and Roeder 2010).

Site Period Marine Species Mammal NISP Percent Marine References
SDI-48 Archaic Callorhinus ursinus;
Enhydra lutris;
Phoca vitulina;
Zalophus californianus		 143 18.2 Gallegos and Kyle 1988
SDI-811 Late Enhydra lutris 439 0.7 Hudson 1996
SDI-4513 Late Tursiops truncatus 107 0.9 Christenson 1989
SDI-4609 Late Enhydra lutris 1298 0.2 Lippold 1983
SDI-4609 Late Zalophus californianus -- -- Carrico and Gallegos 1988
SDI-5017 Late Enhydra lutris 89 7.9 Winterrowd and Cardenas 1987
SDI-5353 Late Enhydra lutris 1898 0.7 Koerper et al. 1992
SDI-10728 Archaic Enhydra lutris 926 0.2 Wake 1997
SDI-10945 Archaic Enhydra lutris;
Phoca vitulina;
Zalophus californianus		 25 16.0 Pigniolo et al. 1991
SDI-13325 Archaic Arctocephalus townsendi;
Enhydra lutris;
Zalophus californianus; Phoca vitulina		 1007 5.5 Byrd et al. 1995; Porcasi and Andrews 2002

PROSPECTS

Future archaeological investigations may be able to clarify the extent of marine mammal exploitation during various periods of prehistory, the hunting strategies that were used, and the impacts of expolitation on the natural populations.


Taxon Common Name Comments
Arctocephalus townsendi Guadalupe fur seal mate and give birth in rookeries
Balaena glacialis northern right whale --
Balaenoptera acutorostrata Minke whale --
Balaenoptera borealis Sei whale --
Balaenoptera musculus blue whale not common in coastal waters
Balaenoptera physalus fin whale --
Callorhinus ursinus northern fur seal mate and give birth in rookeries
Delphinus delphis common dolphin --
Enhydra lutris sea otter associated with kelp beds; nonmigratory
Eschrichtius robustus gray whale --
Globicephala macrochynchus pilot whale frequently beach in groups
Grampus griseus Risso's dolphin usually pelagic, not coastal
Kogia breviceps pigmy sperm whale --
Lagenorhynchus obliquidens white-sided dolphin --
Lissodelphis borealis northern right whale dolphin usually pelagic, not coastal
Megaptera novaeangliae humpback whale --
Mirounga angustirostris northern elephant seal mate and give birth in rookeries
Orcinus orca killer whale --
Phoca vitulina harbor seal give birth in rookery; common inshore
Phocoenoides dalli Dall's porpoise --
Physeter macrocephalus sperm whale --
Pseudorca crassidens false killer whale --
Stenella attenuata Pacific spotted dolphin --
Stenella coeruleoalba blue and white dolphin mainly pelagic
Tursiops truncatus bottlenosed dolphin --
Zalophus californianus California sea lion mate and give birth in rookeries; common inshore
Ziphius cavirostris Cuvier's beaked whale --
Source: Jameson and Peeters (1988)