 Tortoises and sea turtles were imported into San Francisco, Sacramento and various other Gold Rush towns throughout Alta California to feed the gold mining population.Galápagos tortoise and sea turtle bones were also recovered from the Gold Rush-era archaeological site, Thompson's Cove (CA-SFR-186H), in San Francisco, California.Population decline accelerated with the early settlement of the islands in the early 19th century, leading to unregulated hunting for meat, habitat clearance for agriculture, and the introduction of alien mammal species.