Evidence on the Adequacy of First Nations Consultation - BC Hydro ...

concerning the identification of these more recent cultural heritage resources. One examination,
consisting of field work carried out by Paul Snead and his team in 1978 14 in response to a proposal to
divert the Kootenay River into the Columbia for power generation purposes, stated [pp. 51-52]:
…test excavations at the northeast end of Windermere Lake (McKenzie, 1975), Fairmont Hot Springs
(Choquette, 1971) and several other localities, have not revealed conclusive evidence of use as
habitations. According to Borden, "a test excavation just beyond the lip of a large house pit (sic) at site
EcPx-2...yielded no artifacts, but much ash, fire cracked rocks, and numerous splintered animal bones"
(Borden, 1956: 81). Reexamination of site EcPx-2 by this study team revealed no large house pit. In
fact, as mentioned before, many of the so-called house pits, previously recorded by other investigators
are natural features. Furthermore, we believe that most, if not all, of these large features were not used
as habitations but rather as large storage or food processing facilities.
Concerning their attribution to Shuswap people, he more generally concludes [p. 58]
Along with earlier investigators, we observed that the two major classes of projectile points were small
side-notched and triangular varieties and, generally larger stemmed and corner-notched varieties. In his
earlier investigations, Borden assigned the small side-notched points to the Salishan Shuswap and
considered only the larger corner-notched arrow points to be associated with the Kootenay Indians
(1956: 97). However, research by others (Choquette, 1971; and, Taylor, 1973) and our own
observations of artifact distributions indicate that this association is only partially correct, at best. The
Kootenay, also, made and used small triangular side-notched projectile points.
Features, such as the supposed housepits, exhibited on heritage sites in the Upper Columbia valley have
also been used to assign cultural identity and chronology (Borden, 1956). However, we believe this can
be tentative, at best. Features like food processing facilities are known to occur in both Shuswap and
Ktunaxa settlement patterns. Storage pits, although thought to be more closely associated with the
Shuswap, cannot be definitely assigned to them alone. Finally, the large circular depressions, thought
to be Shuswap housepits, as we have argued earlier, may not even be habitation features.
Snead’s team found evidence of considerable pre-historic and proto-historic activity in the Upper
Columbia Valley. In their Phase I reconnaissance, they discovered 180 heritage sites and reevaluated
51 more, concluding that only 13 were attributable to “historic Euro-canadian
colonization”. The study projected from its representative sampling that “there would be about 238
heritage sites in the potential impact zone which is over 100 linear miles long and 250 to 1000 feet
wide” [p. viii]. Almost 90% of these aboriginal sites were classified as close to the high water line of
the Columbia [p. 65]. The area distribution of all aboriginal sites, indicating that almost half may be
in or near the CVT study area, was given as follows [p. ix]:
119 (55%) are recorded in the area from Canal Flats to Invermere (Section 1), 93 (42%) are recorded in
the area from Invermere to Spillimacheen (Sector 2), and 6 (3%) are found in the area from
Spillimacheen to Golden (Sector 3).
The Snead report cautiously concludes that from at least the middle of the Late Prehistoric Period (ca.
A.D. 500-1800) “there is evidence of substantial occupation, probably by ancestral Kootenay
speakers, in the Upper Kootenay River valley and, by extension, probably in the Upper Columbia
River Valley."
Although they are most famously thought of as passing over the Rockies to hunt buffalo, the Upper
Ktunaxa regularly travelled westward over the mountains too. For example, Choquette observed 15 :
14 Snead, Paul G., Kootenay River Diversion - Cultural Heritage Resources, Phase I Impact Statement, January 1978
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