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ABSTRACT-Human population size in the Great Plains ecosystem before European contact has been of longstanding interest to scholars. The same is true of bison numbers. Given the near total dependence on bison by nonagricultural precontact humans, integrating information on both human and bison numbers from that time is of further interest, providing the focus for this paper. Recent research on the behavioral ecology of bison and related ungulates has led to the identification of two distinct, although not mutually exclusive, populations: resident and migrant herds. Moreover, migrants tend to vastly outnumber residents, often by more than 4 to 1. The best available evidence supports estimates of about 30 million bison in the Plains ecosystem during prehistoric and early historic times. Of these, about 6 million likely were nonmigrants at any one time. These numbers provide a basis for estimating the numbers of human bison-hunters. We review four possible combinations of human use of resident and migratory bison populations and their implications for human numbers. Archaeological and historical information provides evidence that year-round use of residents, together with seasonal use of the more numerous migrants, was the most likely pattern of human usage of bison. Hence, we estimate the sustainable human bison-hunting population to have been 86,000-130,000. This estimate is close to past population estimates based on direct counts and other extrapolations.
Introduction
Early records and archaeological data show that bison once existed throughout the North American Great Plains and that nonagricultural aboriginal people were dependent on the bison as their principal means of subsistence (Roe 1970; Dyck 1983; Bamforth 1988; Dyck and Morían 1995). Estimates of early historic Plains bison populations often have been high, up to 40 million animals at any one time (e.g., Roe 1970). At the same time, estimates of early historic human populations of Plains bison-hunters have tended to be relatively low, in the range of 100,000-200,000, except for several much higher estimates that are meant to compensate for postulated effects of European diseases (e.g., Mooney 1928; Dobyns 1983; Ramenofsky 1987; Ubelaker 1988; Campbell 1989; Daniels 1992; Owsley 1992; Thornton 1997).
Our goal is to deduce human population potential in relation to bison population estimates in the Plains ecosystem during late prehistoric and early historic times, and to relate...