There is growing evidence for human use of geophytes long before the advent of agriculture. Rich in carbohydrates, geophytes were important in many coastal areas where protein-rich marine foods are abundant. On California's Channel Islands, scholars have long questioned how maritime peoples sustained themselves for millennia with limited plant resources. Recent research demonstrates that geophytes were heavily used on the islands for 10,000 years, and here we describe geophyte and other archaeobotanical remains from an approximately 11,500-year-old site on Santa Rosa Island. Currently the earliest evidence for geophyte consumption in North America, our data extend geophyte use on the Channel Islands by roughly 1,500 years and document a diverse and balanced economy for early Paleocoastal peoples. Experimental return rates for a key island geophyte support archaeological evidence that the corms of blue dicks (Dipterostemon capitatus) were a high-ranked staple resource throughout the Holocene.

早在农业出现之前，就有越来越多的证据表明人类使用地质植物。富含碳水化合物的地质植物在许多富含蛋白质的海洋食物丰富的沿海地区很重要。在加利福尼亚的海峡群岛，学者们长期以来一直质疑海洋民族如何在植物资源有限的情况下维持自己的生活数千年。最近的研究表明，地球植物在这些岛屿上被大量使用了 10,000 年，在这里我们描述了来自圣罗莎岛上一个大约有 11,500 年历史的遗址的地球植物和其他古植物遗骸。目前是北美地质植物消费的最早证据，我们的数据将海峡群岛的地质植物使用延长了大约 1,500 年，并记录了早期古沿海人民的多样化和平衡经济。Dipterostemon capitus ) 是整个全新世的高级主食资源。