Canadian Historic Sites: Occasional Papers in Archaeology and History No. 26

Analysis of Animal Remains from the Old Fort Point Site, Northern Alberta

by Anne Meachem Rick

Abstract

A small faunal assemblage from Old Fort Point on Lake Athabasca, northern Alberta, was analyzed. Remains consisted of 2,251 fish bones, 57 bird bones, 365 mammal bones, one bone of uncertain class and two freshwater mussel fragments. Of the vertebrate remains, 1,613 fish, 29 bird and 61 mammal bones were identified. Occupants of the site utilized most species of larger fish found in the lake, all large ungulate species in the area, and several furbearer species, but caught fewer birds than might have been expected from their abundance in the region. Mammals provided most of the meat at the site according to calculations based on the faunal remains, but fish probably played a more important part in the food economy than indicated by the bone material studied. Presence of Arctic fox and willow ptarmigan bones at the site indicate that it was occupied during the period October to April. The paucity of bird remains recovered may result from the site having been utilized after most birds had gone south in the fall and before the beginning of the main spring migration. No definite faunal evidence for summer occupation was found. Results of the faunal analysis are in accord with the site's identification as Fort Wedderburn II, a Hudson's Bay Company post which existed at Old Fort Point from October 1817 to March 1818.

Submitted for publication 1975, by Anne Meachem Rick, Zooarchaeological Identification Centre, National Museum of Natural Sciences, Ottawa.