Native people hunted this area 9,000 years ago for bighorn sheep, elk and long-horned bison. By making seasonal rounds to specific locations, they maintained a comfortable lifeway through hunting, fishing and harvesting native plants. Euro-Americans arrived around 1810. In 1855, Governor Isaac Stevens and leaders of the Salish and Kootenai tribes signed the Hellgate Treaty. Native peoples ceded much of western Montana while retaining the Flathead Reservation east of here, and the tribes kept the right to hunt, gather and fish throughout their traditional homeland in perpetuity. Today, the Confederated Salish and Kootenai tribes have over 6,500 enrolled members and maintain a sophisticated government with headquarters in Pablo, Montana. Native people in this area have also harvested plants such as camas, serviceberry and bitterroot for thousands of years, and camas bulbs are sweet and nutritious when baked.