UC Merced Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology Title Lake and Marsh-Edge Settlements on Malheur Lake, Harney County, Oregon Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/75j4945v Journal Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology, 14(1) ISSN 0191-3557 Author Oetting, Albert C Publication Date 1992-07-01 Peer reviewed eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California loumal of Califomia and Great Basin Antliropology Vol. 14, No. 1, pp. 110-129(1992). Lake and Marsh-Edge Settlements on Malheur Lake, Harney County, Oregon ALBERT C. GETTING, Heritage Research Associates, Inc., 1997 Garden Ave., Eugene, OR 97403. HALRNEI Y Basin is the northernmost internal­ islands and shorelines beginning to emerge from ly draining basin within the Great Basin and the the lake (Oefting 1990a). Cognizant that similar largest in Oregon. Although the basin is semi- processes of site erosion and exposure were oc­ arid in climate, it contains a complex hydrologic curring on privately owned lands flooded by the system of streams, rivers, marshes, and lakes lake, HRA obtained a grant from the Oregon maintained by precipitation to the surrounding State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) in watershed (Fig. I). Above average rainfall and 1989 to conduct a similar survey on 26 miles of snow in the early 1980s caused Malheur Lake to privately owned shoreline (Getting 1990b). flood a substantial portion of the surrounding These surveys were essentially emergency basin floor, inundating an area of more than measures with very limited goals. They were 180,000 acres. The floodwaters began to recede implemented to: (1) locate and provide basic in 1985 and continue to decline today. In doing documentation for as many newly exposed sites so, water and wave action along the changing as possible within a limited time; (2) identify, shoreline of the lake system have exposed many map, and collect artifacts likely to be stolen by archaeological sites, stripping away drowned relic collectors; and (3) locate, document, and vegetation and eroding the ground surface to cover or remove exposed human remains. Re­ reveal artifacts, assorted cultural features, and moving tools and human remains evident on the human burials. Similar natural phenomena, surface prevented their loss to vandals and at with similar archaeological results, have recently the same time made the sites less aUractive to occurred at Stillwater Marsh in Nevada (Raven these relic collectors. No subsurface testing and Elston 1988; Raymond and Parks 1990) and was conducted at any of these sites. This paper on the east shore of the Great Salt Lake (Simms introduces the reader to the recent hydrologic et al. 1991). This flood cycle has provided an events at Malheur Lake, summarizes the results excellent opportunity for archaeologists to locate of the surveys, and presents some inferences and document sites normally obscured by vege­ regarding regional chronology and land use tation and shifting surface sediments. Unfort­ prompted by the survey data. These interpre­ unately, relic collectors have taken advantage of tations should be considered working hypo­ the same opportunities. theses to be tested by continuing research in the In an effort to locate, document, and region. preserve exposed and eroded sites and human MALHEUR LAKE burials on lands around Malheur Lake admin­ istered by Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, Malheur Lake, Mud Lake, and Harney Lake the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service provided occupy the lower elevations of Harney Basin funds in 1988 and 1989 for Heritage Research (Fig. 1). Water from the Blue Mountains flows Associates, Inc. (HRA), to conduct archaeo­ into the basin and the north side of Malheur logical surveys and surface collections on Lake through the Silvies River, while mnoff LAKE AND MARSH-EDGE SETTLEMENTS 111 Harney Basin ,.-- Oregon Fig. 1. The hydrologic system of Harney Basin. from Steens Mountain provides water to the streams and the Donner und Blitzen River, southern part of the basin through several which enters the south side of the lake. Both 112 JOURNAL OF CALIFORNIA AND GREAT BASIN ANTHROPOLOGY rivers support extensive freshwater marshes elsewhere and, except in very dry periods, there along their lower courses. Through a series of are generally areas of open water. Hardstem low thresholds, water flows from Malheur Lake bulrush marshes predominate, except in the into Mud Lake and then into Harney Lake, the deeper open water zones. The eastem ecolog­ ultimate sump of the basin. Water levels in ical region is the most alkaline portion of the these lakes fluctuate seasonally in response to lake and contains the most open water (Dueb­ inflow from the rivers, direct precipitation, and bert 1969:10). Sago pondweed thrives in this evapotranspiration. unit. The edges are marshy, but are composed In general, such fluctuating conditions are of salt-tolerant plants common to shallow water, beneficial and necessary for the maintenance of such as Baltic msh. marsh water chemistry and productivity. Con­ Abnormally high precipitation and heavy trary to common intuition, wet years and high snowpacks from 1981 to 1984 provided in­ water levels are more destmctive to the lake and creased water to this closed-basin system. its wetlands than are dry years, since high water Water levels rose and flooded all of the Malheur drowns both the marshes and the adjacent ter­ Lake ecological units. Water continued to flow restrial areas, while periods of low water only in and the three lakes (Malheur, Mud, and Har­ constrict marsh extent and allow a variety of ney) coalesced, forming a single body of water plants to gain temporary footholds on the expos­ 33 miles (53 km.) long and as much as 12 miles ed recessional mudflats. Oxygen exchanges and (19.5 km.) wide. The level of Malheur Lake replenishment of certain other elements neces­ peaked at a historic record high of 4,102.68 ft. sary to maintain the soils essential to the growth in 1985, having risen about eight feet. Since of marsh plants can only occur when marsh bot­ the basin floor is very flat, the lake more than toms are periodically dry (Duebbert 1969:20). doubled in surface area, drowning most of the In times of low to moderate water levels, land near the lake within Malheur National Malheur Lake forms a complex series of fresh­ Wildlife Refuge and flooding thousands of acres water-to-alkaline marsh habitats, supporting a of private land beyond the Refuge boundaries. wide variety of plant and animal life (Duebbert During the surveys the surface of the lake was 1969). Three distinct ecological units can be about 4,097 ft. and water still covered large identified (Fig. 2). The westernmost unit gener­ areas of land on the northem and eastern ally has very shallow water and often consists of shores. many small ponds separated by low undulations It must be remembered that the config­ in the topography. Water is usually less alka­ urations of the islands and shorelines of the lake line than in the lake to the east. Emergent change as the water level changes. Despite the vegetation is primarily hardstem bulmsh extent of the lake in 1988 and 1989, its depth (Scirpus acutus), burreed (Sparganium eury- was no greater than 2.45 m, and, in many carpum), cattail (Typha latifolia), and Baltic areas, was less than 60 cm. This shallowness msh (Juncus balticus) (Duebbert 1969:8). Sub- makes the position of the shoreline dynamic, mergent plants, especially pondweeds (Potamo- since small changes in lake level may result in geton pectinatus and P. pusillus), are common extensive shoreline shifts. During periods of in the water. The central ecological unit low water many of the sites presenfly located on occupies the lowest part of the basin and "islands" will become "mainland" sites receives the flow of both the Donner und situated on low topographic rises surrounded by Blitzen and Silvies rivers (Duebbert 1969:9). shallow ponds and extensive marshes. Figures The water is deeper and more permanent than 2 and 3 depict the configuration of Malheur LAKE AND MARSH-EDGE SETTLEMENTS 113 Fig. 2. Ecological units of Malheur Lake (after Duebbert 1969). Lake during the summers of 1988 and 1989. tract consisted of a 200 m. corridor along the The lake has continued to decline since that existing water's edge. The shorelines and time. islands were completely examined by archaeo­ logists maintaining transect intervals of 15 m. THE SURVEYS AND THEIR FIIVDINGS In all, 73 archaeological sites were visited The surveys conducted for Malheur Na­ and recorded (Fig. 3) (Oetfing 1990a, 1990b). tional Wildlife Reftige in 1988 and 1989 in­ Only four of these localities had been previously spected 28 islands and two small sections of the recorded during widespread archaeological re­ southem shoreline. Most of the new islands had connaissances conducted on the refuge in the been completely submerged and were simply 1970s (Newman et al. 1974). Twenty-five sites low rises with eroded ground surfaces just above were located on islands. The other 48 sites the lake level. Three islands had elevated were recorded on the mainland, 15 on the south central terraces that had remained above the shore and 33 on the north shore. floodwaters, set off by 1 to 3-m. high eroded The recorded sites range in size from less cutbanks. Twenty-four of the islands were than 200 m.^ to as much as 80,000 m.-. Differ­ along the northwest shore of Malheur Lake and ences in size and artifact density suggest that the others were in the eastern part of the lake. some functional differences may distinguish the The SHPO-funded survey of private lands exam­ various sites. Many of the smaller sites ined 26 miles of the 1989 main shoreline, (< 10,000 m.') had low density artifact scatters divided into three tracts on the south shore and (averaging less than 5-10 items/m.-) and rela­ two on the north shore.