Abstract :
The large game herds of the Seacow River valley in the upper Karoo, central South Africa were decimated by European settlers during the 19th century. Formerly, these herds supported a relatively dense population of Bushman hunter-gatherers whose material residues are found in local rock shelter deposits. The European impact is registered in the final levels of each rock shelter fill as a sharp decline in mammal bone density. In the same levels, there are dense sheets of ostrich eggshell fragments, indicating that Bushmen supplemented their dwindling meat supply by gathering eggs. Ostriches were more resistant than other game to mounted hunters, to droughts and to overstocking by sheep farmers. However, this adaptation was already under way before the European onslaught, when grass cover and, by implication, rainfall and carrying capacity fell drastically between 1600 and 1750.
