Historical information on the Sheepeaters is scanty and mostly concerned with later periods. The earliest reference available comes from Ferris' journals. The Ferris party was in the Sawtooth Mountains, probably in or near Stanley Basin, in July, 1831. Ferris wrote (1940, p. 99): Here we found a party of "Root Diggers," or Snake Indians without horses. They subsist upon the flesh of elk, deer and bighorns, and upon salmon which ascend to the fountain sources of this river, and are here taken in great numbers.... We found them extremely anxious to exchange salmon for buffalo meat, of which they are very fond, and which they never procure in this country, unless by purchase from their friends who occasionally come from the plains to trade with them. The Stanley Basin region, it will be remembered, was a fall hunting range of the Shoshone of Boise River and was probably entered by others from Snake River. But as this was salmon season on both the Boise and Snake rivers, it is probable that Indians mentioned by Ferris were part of the more permanent population of the Sawtooths, i.e., Sheepeaters. The southern Sawtooths were no doubt utilized, like so many of our other areas, by people who customarily wintered in diverse places. In June, 1832, John Work met "a party of Snakes consisting of three men and three women" near Meadow Creek on the Salmon River waters (Work, 1923, p. 160). Later references to the Sheepeaters indicate that they impinged upon the Shoshone of the Boise River on the west and the Lemhi on the east. Indian Agent Hough reported from the Boise River in 1868: "The Sheep Eaters have also behaved quite well; they are more isolated from the settlement, occupy a more sterile country, and are exceedingly poor" (Hough, 1869, p. 660). The Sheepeaters seem to have had their closest affiliations with the Shoshone of the Lemhi River, however, and they eventually moved to the agency founded there (Viall, 1872, p. 831; Shanks et al., 1874, p. 2). The Tukurika were not a single group, but consisted of scattered little hunting groups having no over-all political unity or internal band organization. They had few horses and hunted mountain sheep and deer on foot. Salmon were taken in the waters of the Salmon River. The Tukurika had their closest contacts with the Lemhi Shoshone, although some occasionally visited the valleys of the Boise and Weiser rivers. I have no evidence of Tukurika trips to Camas Prairie for roots, although such visits are indicated by Steward's map (Steward, 1938, p. 136). Steward lists five winter villages in the Sawtooth Mountains (ibid., pp. 188-189). These are: