Hokkaido Island dogs and human diets 1500 YBP

Hokkaido Island dog today

One of the disadvantages of keeping dogs is their requirement for a high protein diet, placing them in competition with humans. On the other hand if dogs and humans are eating the same things it would suggest a reason for them to come together when food was plentiful. Feeding dogs would give the dogs a reason to follow hunters, and cooperate with humans.

In a forthcoming paper Tsutaya et al. (in press 2014) analyze carbon and nitrogen isotopes from human and dog remains from the Moyore site on eastern Hokkaido Island, Japan. The Moyoro archeological site is located on an estuarine sand area of the Abashiri River and is representative of the shell mounds of the Okhotsk culture. The site has been excavated several times during the 20th century and contains human burials and the remains of pit dwellings. Radiocarbon and palaeomagnetic dating suggest the site was used 1500 YBP.

The isotopic data shows the dogs were predominantly feeding on brackish-water fish, marine fish, and marine mammals (5-45%). The presence of marine mammals in the dog’s diet suggests that humans were feeding the dogs.

The δ13C and δ15N values of adult human bone collagen found terrestrial food sources provided less than 16% of the diet and that the Moyoro human population depended heavily on marine mammals for dietary protein. Marine mammals made up 80-90% of the Moyoro human diet. Thus, there was no significant overlap in the diet of the dog and the human population.

Ethnographic studies of the late 19th and early 20th century reported on dog use and dog diet of the indigenous Ainu people in Hokkaido and Sakhalin, and fishers in Kamchatka. Ethnographic accounts of the Ainu population in Hokkaido and Sakhalin reported dogs were used for hunting terrestrial mammals and sledging. Dog skins were used to make clothes and shoes. The Ainu people fed their dogs with low-sodium trout and the isotope ratio of trout in Hokkaido is similar to that of brackish-water fish. Fishers in Kamchatka in the late nineteenth century fed their domesticated dogs with dried or fermented fish and used them to pull sledges. Although the cultural traits reported in modern ethnographic studies are not directly comparable with those in the ancient Okhotsk population, such ethnographic observations agree well with the isotopic results in the Tsutaya et al. (2014) study.

Citation

Tsutaya T, Naito YI, Ishida H, and Yoneda M. (in press 2014). Carbon and nitrogen isotope analyses of human and dog diet in the Okhotsk culture: perspectives from the Moyoro site, Japan. Anthropological Science. 

Dog remains from Santa Rosa Island, California

Remains of a dog on Santa Rosa Island, CA (T. Rick)

In a recent paper in Ethnobiology Letters Hofman and Rick (2014) report on the remains of six dog skeletons from Santa Rosa Island, in the Channel Islands of California. Native Americans colonized the Channel Islands about 13,000 YBP and inhabited the islands until about 1822. The island Chumash people were maritime foragers during the Late Holocene and potentially earlier. They lived in large villages and had sophisticated mainland and island exchange networks. Dog remains have been found in Channel Island sites as early as ~6000 YBP, but they are most common in sites dated from ~1500 YBP to the Historic Period. Ethnographic accounts of dogs are limited, suggesting that the mainland Chumash may have occasionally used dogs for food, but it is unclear if they were used in hunting.  Archaeological data suggest that dogs may have been used for hunting and as working animals. Documents discussing Vizcaino’s 1602 expedition suggested that Santa Catalina Island dogs were of medium size and similar to spotted retrievers found in Europe at the time.

CA-SRI-2 is a large late Holocene village and cemetery complex on northwest Santa Rosa Island and has produced a number of dog remains. The site was excavated by Phil Orr in the 1940s-1960s and then revisited in by Rick in 2000-2003. Rick et al. (2011) used δ13C and δ15N data from dog, fox, and human bones to reconstruct diet among these three species. The Native Americans and their dogs at CA-SRI-2 had similar diets -high trophic marine organisms like finfishes, marine mammals, and seabirds, complemented by seeds, corms, and other carbohydrates. In contrast, the CA-SRI-2 island foxes appear to have eaten lower trophic level terrestrial foods. Their data confirm the commensal relationship between dogs and people, with some modest carbon enrichment in dogs perhaps from higher consumption of C3 plants and bone collagen.

The CA-SRI-2 dogs are similar in size and share some aspects of morphology to other Channel Island dogs. Two of the CASRI dogs are consistent with medium facial size (mesaticephalic dogs) and have similar characteristics to a dog from San Nicolas Island though that dog was more brachycephalic than the CA-SRI-2 dogs. Shoulder height estimates suggest that the CA-SRI-2 dogs were large to medium in size (42.52-55.09 cm), falling within or above the estimates for three other Channel Island dogs.

The CA-SRI-2 dogs share many characteristics with Plains-Indian Dog breed measurements reported by Allen for San Nicolas Island but, like some of those dogs, they also have some overlap with the Shortnosed Indian Dog. The mix of Allen’s Shortnosed and Plains-Indian Dog characteristics is further supported by dog mandible and teeth measurements reported by others for three dogs from Santa Cruz Island and a dog from San Miguel Island. These data suggest that prehistoric southern California dogs had a mix of traits with many falling into the large Indian Dog category and still others falling into the small Indian Dog category. Domestic dogs were important companions for humans on the northern and southern Channel Islands, and were scavenging and/or being fed the same types of foods that people were eating, and were often given special burial treatment.

Citations

Hofman, C., & Rick, T. (2014). The Dogs of CA-SRI-2: Osteometry of Canis familiaris from Santa Rosa Island, California. Ethnobiology Letters, 5, 65-76.

Rick, T. C., B. J. Culleton, C. B. Smith, J. R. Johnson, and D. J. Kennett. 2011. Stable Isotope Analysis of Dog, Fox, and Human Diets at a Late Holocene Chumash Village (CA-SRI-2) on Santa Rosa Island, California. Journal of Archaeological Science 38:1385-1393.