Ancient hunting camp found beneath Lake Huron

Deep below the surface of Lake Huron, scuba-diving researchers have found an elaborate network of hunting blinds and animal-herding structures dating back roughly 9,000 years.

Lake levels of the day were some 250 feet lower, exposing a narrow bridge of land running from one side of Huron to the other. Prehistoric people evidently thought this isthmus was a perfect place to intercept caribou on their seasonal migrations. The hunting site they built, now inundated, opens a window onto prehistoric America and provides valuable evidence in a region where such artifacts are practically non-existent.

If the hunting structures “were on solid ground, (they) probably would’ve been bulldozed away for a Walmart parking lot by now,” says archaeologist Alan Osborn of the University of Nebraska-Omaha and the University of Nebraska State Museum, who was not part of the discovery team. Underwater archaeology is expensive, but “in this case, it’s revealing a site that’s in pretty much pristine condition.”