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specific information about the particular species or indigenous group in question, natural resource 

 managers are still attempting to develop viable, long-term, management strategies. Additional studies 

 are necessary that integrate humans, hunting, and conservation. 



An analysis of subsistence hunting by Maya Indians may be valuable in understanding how an 

 indigenous people apparently can exploit wildlife for subsistence purposes. A biological analysis will 

 help understand if this hunting is being conducted in a sustainable manner. Maya Indians have 

 practiced shifting cultivation and subsistence hunting in southern Mexico and Central America since at 

 least 1,500 B.C. (Adams, 1991). Archaeological evidence from Cerro Brujo, in northern Panama, 

 indicates that the species composition and relative abundance of game taken by indigenous people at 

 that site during 960-985 AD is similar to that taken by Maya subsistence hunters today (Linares, 1976). 

 Assuming that hunting practices today are similar to those conducted several centuries ago in the 

 region, and that hunting practices throughout the Maya realm were similar, this suggests that 

 subsistence hunting by Maya Indians may be sustainable and could be used to develop alternative 

 resource management strategies. 



The evidence that this hunting could be sustainable was based on an examination of the 

 behavior, species composition, and relative abundance of wildlife at Cerro Brujo compared with their 

 current abundance at other forested Neotropical sites. Linares (1976) noted that certain wildlife species 

 at Cerro Brujo were relatively more abundant than expected, based on an analysis of bones at a village 

 refuse site, when compared with their abundance at other forested Neotropical sites that were not 

 populated by people. According to Linares (1976), these relatively abundant species used the gardens 

 planted by the Cerro Brujo people and benefitted from the interspersion of small gardens in the 

 surrounding forest. Although no data were presented, Linares (1976) postulated that the population 

 density of the species using the gardens was greater because they regularly fed on cultivated crops 

 planted by the hunters. These people subsequently modified their hunting practices and began to 

 specialize on the wildlife species that foraged in the gardens. Linares (1976) called this practice 

 "garden hunting" and defined it as an association between hunters and prey where the prey, due to the 



