Abalone @apy`in

Hesquiaht First Nations abalone article
Karen Charleson

A long, long time ago animals had human characteristics. Son of raven tried to surprise Miss octopus, but was surprised himself. Son of Deer, Son of raccoon, Son of Moths, Miss Crow – the Nuu-chah-nulth world was full of animal/human creatures. Stories of Son of raven and his compatriots, have been passed down from generation to generation. They illustrate a worldview in which humans and animals not only co-existed, but existed interconnected with one another, in an environment where all life was sacred and respected. A world of diverse habits and behaviours to be sure, but one in which all life had a place.

In the Nuu-chah-nulth world, there is no such thing as an insignificant or unimportant creature. Abalone, a small creature, living only in a few locations, all but invisible even to the most observant beach walker because of its preference for the rocks beneath the low tide mark, was well known in Nuu-chah-nulth coastal societies. Not because it was a predominant food source (it was somewhat of a delicacy available only on the lowest of low tides), but because it was a part of the intertidal life along the west coast of Vancouver Island.

Abalone, @apy`in, was gathered, as were other intertidal creatures like black chitons, hay`is^tup, gooseneck barnacles, c`e%inawa, and large and small sea urchins, t~uc`up and hiix, with a prying stick made of yew wood and shaped on the end used for wedging the creatures from the rocks. Women, most typically, gathered these seafoods, often when men were away hunting, fishing, or canoe-building. They were eaten raw on the beach by women and children, or taken home to be boiled.

Northern abalone shells have long been used artistically and as adornments. Men, particularly chiefs, “ha’wilth,” and dancers, wore nose rings. Called “tla nuxs u’kum”, these nose rings, after contact with Europeans, were often made of copper, brass and California abalone. Pre-contact, however, northern abalone, with the shiny, colorful side facing outward, was commonly used.

Early Spanish mariners traded California abalone with Northwest coast peoples. These abalone shells, larger and brighter than those of Northern abalone, are often seen in pictures; pieces of abalone serving as earrings, pendants, sewn onto robes, and as decorative inlays on carved wooden masks, headdresses, bowls and tools. It is quite possible that California abalone was traded for by Nuu-chah-nulth tribes even before contact with Europeans. Shells of dentalium, hiix#a, which only lives in certain deep waters off the Vancouver Island coast, highly esteemed as ornamentation, has been found in archaeological excavations as far south as California and as far east as the Great Plains.

Northern abalone shells were also used as fishing lures, serving much the same purpose as do modern day “flashers.” The creation of numerous types and styles of lures is a reflection of the Nuu-chah-nulth closer observation and intimate knowledge of fish behaviour.

While there are no records of over harvesting of abalone before the mid-20th century, stories of over harvesting abound in the last fifty years. Nuu-chah-nulth elders in the 1970’s spoke of abalone being “scared away into deep water” because of divers gathering too many of the creatures for the Japanese markets.

Today, abalone along the west coast of Vancouver Island has truly become rare. So rare that Nuu-chah-nulth people, who for thousands of years lived from the bounty of the intertidal zones, can today no longer recall even its taste.