Abraded grooves have been observed on the anterior teeth of all the adults in a small population of prehistoric California Indians. These dental effects show considerable variety, appearing on maxillary and mandibular teeth, on approximal and occulusal surfaces, and either isolated or bilaterally aligned. Although many of the grooves are indistinguishable from those reported for other prehistoric populations, their variety illustrates the limited applicability of etiological hypotheses previously proposed to account for such effects. It is suggested that the grooves represent traces of a task activity involving the pulling of fibrous materials across the teeth.

The archaeological record of California was surveyed to gain an understanding of Native American fisheries and to locate the prehistoric distributions of freshwater and anadromous fishes. Over 152,000 piscine elements were added to prior totals. On San Francisco Bay, important prehistoric intertidal fisheries were especially well documented for bat rays Myliobatis californica, sturgeons Acipenser spp., Chinook salmon Oncorhynchus tshawytscha, clupeids, and atherinopsids. The same sites also indicate the former presence of various freshwater species, including steelhead O. mykiss and coho salmon O. kisutch, in tributary streams from which they were extirpated prior to modern surveys. Slow‐moving waters of the Central Valley were heavily exploited, with most sites dominated by Sacramento perch Archoplites interruptus, thicktail chub Gila crassicauda, Sacramento suckers Catostomus occidentalis, Sacramento blackfish Orthodon microlepidotus, hitch Lavinia exilicauda, and tule perch Hysterocarpus traski, which collectively comprised 84.9% of the remains. Sacramento perch alone produced 45.7% of the identifiable elements. Noteworthy among the other identified species was the endangered delta smelt Hypomesus transpacificus. Salmonids Oncorhynchus spp. constituted only 6.3% of the remains from the Central Valley, despite their importance in the ethnographic record. Marine fishes were found far from the coast in San Diego, Monterey, and Kern counties. Freshwater species transported from the San Joaquin Valley were found as far eastward as San Bernardino County in the Mojave Desert. Steelhead were found among archaeological materials of coastal California as far south as Los Peñasquito Creek in San Diego County, but no salmon remains of any kind were found south of San Francisco. Too little sampling has been completed from coastal sites between San Francisco and Monterey Bay to rule out salmonid presence at locations where habitat was appropriate and where early reports indicated their existence. Chinook salmon were the most abundant salmonid in the Sacramento River drainage. No salmonids were found in the archaeological record in the San Joaquin River drainage south of San Joaquin County. Elements identifiable as either rainbow trout O. mykiss or cutthroat trout O. clarki were found in middens in the Lahontan system and in headwater streams of the Pit River in northeastern California. The rarity of salmonids in archaeological materials suggests that the ethnographic record overstated the importance of salmonids to the Native Americans of California and dramatically understated the importance of the Sacramento perch and its associated fauna.

Hypoplastic defects of tooth enamel and Harris lines in the long bones have been heralded as potentially useful indicators of health conditions in prehistoric populations. Both result from temporary cessation of growth processes due to similar types of disease, malnutrition, or other metabolic insult. An association test for the first six years of life was conducted on a large series of prehistoric California Indians, using femora and canines from young adults. No significant association was found. This is ascribable to differences in etiology and stability.

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