Bird Behavior and Biology: A Consideration of the Agentive Role of Birds in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico

Summary

As one of the only classes in the animal kingdom capable of flight, birds are privy to a realm of movement that humans can only partially control. Birds possess specific traits and engage in a variety of behaviors that directly affect the mechanics of capture and use, such as gregariousness and flock size, preferences in nesting and feeding locations, wing strength and readiness to flush, and aggressiveness and territoriality. Human-bird relationships also move beyond the semantics of capture to cases in which birds are kept in captivity as sources of feathers and/or awaiting sacrifice, as pets, and as domestic birds. Chaco Canyon, New Mexico was the center of a large regional system in the Pueblo II period (AD 850-1150). The avifaunal assemblages from one great house, Pueblo Bonito, and two small sites, BC 57 and BC 58, will be examined and compared. I will consider the qualities and behaviors of the avifaunal taxa in these assemblages that would have influenced human-bird interactions. I will then discuss the implications of these behaviors and the unique ways that birds may have exerted agentive force and control over the experiences of bird capture, captivity, management, and use.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 83rd Annual Meeting, Washington, DC (2018)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 18853