The Ozette Prairies of Olympic National Park - Natural Resources ...

used to make deer-hide floats, probably used in sea mammal hunting (James Wesseler pers. comm. 2003).
It is likely that the Ozette people hunted bears on the wetlands as well. We know that black bears
were hunted by the Makah, that their skins were made into blankets and capes for whalers and others,
that their claws were used to make necklaces worn by shamans, and that their meat was eaten both fresh
and dried (Gunther 1936:114). As late as the early 1970s Makah children walking through the Ozette
Prairies on their way to the Ozette archaeological digs were told by their elders to wear something that
made noise to warn the bears because, as Gary Ray put it, “you seldom went through the prairies without
seeing bears” (pers. comm. 2007).
Finally, the Ozette Prairies may have been a place where the people hunted waterfowl and other
large birds. Erna Gunther recorded that the Makah hunted sandhill cranes “in the prairie” during the
month of April. These birds were favored for their meat (Gunther 1936:108). Ducks and geese would have
been attracted to the wetlands and were probably hunted there also.
Indian Management of the Ozette Prairies with Fire
Evidence for Indian burning of the Ozette Prairies comes from three sources: (1) Elizabeth Colson’s
abstract field notes, (2) newspaper accounts, and (3) oral interviews of non-Indians from families
with long-term histories on the Olympic Peninsula (see Appendices 3 and 4). Additionally, support for
burning in western Olympic Peninsula wetlands in general comes from old General Land Office surveys
and maps and oral interviews with Makah who remember the practice of burning on wetlands (Ts’ooyuhs
Prairie) on the Makah Reservation (see Appendix 5).
Other possible lines of physical evidence are summarized that were taken from a natural history
study conducted by Andy Bach and Dave Conca (2004).
Finally, wetlands ecologist Linda Kunze observed and recorded in her field notes that not only
parts of the Ozette Prairies are former burns, but that this phenomenon exists on the Cape Alava Prairie
(also called West Prairie), Sand Point Trail Prairie, Manny’s Prairie, and Allen’s Slough (Allen’s Prairie)
(Kunze 1989) (see Appendix 1).
Anthropologist Elizabeth Colson, professor emerita, UC Berkeley, conducted field research with
the Makah in the 1940s, lived with the Makah between November 1941 and December 1944, and pub-
lished a book in 1953 entitled, The Makah Indians: The Study of an Indian Tribe in Modern American Society.
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