Sampling Fish Bones: A Consideration of the Importance of Screen Size and Disposal Context in the North Pacific

Pacific Islands Ichthyoarchaeology: Implications for the Development of Prehistoric Fishing Studies and Global Sustainability

“…Cooke and Ranere (1999: 105) state that 6.4 mm screens are sufficient for recovering bones of large mammals, but the recovery of fish remains requires a minimum size of 3.2 mm mesh. Partlow (2006) queried the emphasis on the use of finer-mesh screens within the global fisheries literature, given that a more pressing concern is the inconsistent use of screen sizes across a region. In Pacific archaeology, there has been a preference toward 3.2 mm and/or 6.4 mm screens since 1960.…”

Fish bone chemistry and ultrastructure: implications for taphonomy and stable isotope analysis

“…Butler and Chatters, 1994;Nicholson, 1992;Rojo, 1987;Wigen and Stucki, 1988) and recovery methods employed during excavation (e.g. Nagaoka, 2005;Partlow, 2006;Reitz, 1988;Stewart and Wigen, 2003;Vale and Gargett, 2002;Zohar and Belmaker, 2005). Conversely, the influences of the chemical and ultrastructural properties of fish bone on determining their survival in the archaeological record have not been examined in detail.…”

The influence of screen mesh size, and size and shape of rodent teeth on recovery

“…Many previous analyses have focused on the poor recovery of small remains of fish when coarse-mesh sieves are used (e.g., Wing and Quitmyer, 1985;Gobalet, 1989;Gordon, 1993;Nagaoka, 1994Nagaoka, , 2005Ross and Duffy, 2000;Vale and Gargett, 2002;Stewart and Wigen, 2003;Quitmyer, 2004;Zohar and Belmaker, 2005;Partlow, 2006;Densmore, 2009). These studies have been valuable because, using different taxa, they confirm Thomas's (1969) original observation that (in his case, mammal) body size is directly related to recovery probability.…”