In 1985 a settlement and subsistence model of seasonal round mobility was proposed by Statistical Research, Inc. This model proposed four travel routes used by the Late Prehistoric Serrano to access the higher elevation village site known as Rock Camp to gather acorns and pinyon nuts in the fall. This research investigates the proposed routes, as well as an additional route, for energy efficiency and archaeological evidence of use in prehistory. Data collection involved using experimental methods designed to gather controlled physiological data for evaluating the efficiency of traveling each route. Archaeological sites present on the travel routes and within the research area and were analyzed for elements indicative of prehistoric settlement characteristics. A combination of physiological evidence and archaeological evidence are the basis for determinations on which routes were most likely to have been used in prehistory. An analysis of the settlement model is also provided in order to provide future research with guidelines and context for evaluating sites within the region. Suggestions are provided for future studies to focus on chronology and expansion of the settlement model.

This thesis focuses on the traditional cultivation of an edible root species by Kwaxsistalla, Clan Chief Adam Dick, of the Qawadiliqalla Clan, of the Dzawada ēnuxw, a subgroup of Kwakwaka’wakw, occupying the Kingcome Inlet area on the Central Coast of British Columbia. Kwaxsistalla is a traditionally trained Clan Chief and potlatch speaker with recognized authority to share his detailed knowledge and experiences of his clan’s food production system. This research is centered on his Clan’s tekkillakw (estuarine salt marsh root garden) root gardens of the Kingcome River estuary, and the long-standing practices associated with the large-scale production of tleksem Pacific silverweed [Argentina egedii (Wormsk.) Rydb.; syn. Potentilla pacifica (L.) Howell.], is one of the four cultivated root species. Kwaxsistalla has shared his hands-on knowledge of how root garden cultivation fits into his family’s seasonal patterns of food production as well as detailed accounts of how to construct and use tools for cultivating, weeding, harvesting, and cooking estuarine roots. He has also provided information that has been instrumental in developing a model of aboriginal management of estuarine root gardens (Deur 2005). This thesis builds on Deur’s model by attempting to experimentally replicate tekkillakw management in order to better understand the management effect on the abundance, size, and flavour of Argentina egedii roots. Over the course of the 2008 growing season I randomly subjected 60 ¼ square meter patches of Kwaxsistalla’s fallow tekkillakw to either a “till” or “till + weed” treatment and allocated 30 similar patches as a control. I applied a roto-tilling treatment just prior to the growing season, a weeding treatment mid-summer, and harvested the roots near the end of the growing season. While the short duration of my study and use of a roto-tiller limit the inferential power of my results, I found that tilling and weeding significantly increased the abundance or A. egedii but significantly decreased the root size. Throughout the same 2008 field season I also collected root specimens for analysis of their bitter and sweet constituents and found (bitter) tannins concentrations to be highest in the late summer and lowest in the spring and fall. / Graduate