Synthesis of faunal collections from several archaeological sites on the three southernmost California Channel Islands and one in the Cape Region of Baja California reveals a distinctive maritime adaptation more heavily reliant on the capture of pelagic dolphins than on near-shore pinnipeds. Previous reports from other Southern California coastal sites suggest that dolphin hunting may have occurred there but to a lesser extent. While these findings may represent localized adaptations to special conditions on these islands and the Cape Region, they call for reassessment of the conventionally held concept that pinnipeds were invariably the primary mammalian food resource for coastal peoples. Evidence of the intensive use of small cetaceans is antithetical to the accepted models of maritime optimal foraging which assume that shore-based or near-shore marine mammals (i.e., pinnipeds) would be the highest-ranked prey because they were readily encountered and captured. While methods of dolphin hunting remain archaeologically invisible, several island cultures in which dolphin were intensively exploited by people using primitive watercraft and little or no weaponry are presented as possible analogs to a prehistoric Southern California dolphin-hunting technique. These findings also indicate that dolphin hunting was probably a cooperative endeavor among various members of the prehistoric community.

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AMS radiocarbon dating of two modified pearls from the Covacha Babisuri site, Espíritu Santo Island, Baja California Sur, México, corroborates associated midden dates suggesting that traditional indigenous use and modification of pearls as items of adornment began at least 8,500 years ago. To our knowledge, these are the oldest modified pearls found in dated archaeological contexts anywhere in the world. The presence of similarly modified pearls in later components at Covacha Babisuri suggests that this custom continued throughout the Middle Holocene, and ethnohistoric accounts indicate that similar modifications of pearls continued up until the Historic Era. These data show a long history of cultural continuity in the region in pearl harvesting, modification, and use as adornment.