Recent excavations at three prehistoric sites in eastern Idaho recovered a moderate amount of culturally-introduced macrobotanical remains, including mountain ball and prickly pear cactus, goosefoot, sunflower, and tobacco, all of which came from contexts dating between 1500 B.C. and A.D. 1000. Within the greater region, cactus, goosefoot, and sunflower were first used by people between ca. 11,000 and 8500 B.C., whereas the archaeobotanical record for tobacco dates back to 10,300 B.C. The Birch Creek Valley data set allows us to explore aspects of local site function and settlement practices, as well as the temporal range and ubiquity of the above-listed taxa within the northern Intermountain West and adjacent portions of the central Rocky Mountains.

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During ethnographic times, the Penutian-speaking Yokuts Indians of California's San Joaquin Valley functioned as middle men in the exchange of finished artifacts, raw materials, and foodstuffs between coastal and interior aboriginal groups. Within most Yokuts tribelets there apparently existed one or more professional traders who were critical components of trans-Sierran trade networks. It is argued that the ethnographically documented pattern of interregional trade in central California is a partially distorted postcontact product of a more complex and widespread precontact exchange system in which Yokuts traders played a major role. Archaeological data are reviewed to determine the general time depth of trans-Sierran trade, and ethnographic data are examined in an attempt to assess the validity of central California native trade relations and activities as portrayed by the ethnographic record.

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