[Katie]
Today we started the pueblo at the bottom of the canyon. It is called LT 7 [5MT 17275] or the Tarantula Pueblo (because I almost sat on one). Seth and I did mapping and Tucker and Chelsea did artifacts. The day was pretty clear and pretty warm. Another group which consisted of Becky, Kellam and Trevor went and started recording petroglyphs in the area.

Mapping was interesting. The pueblo, as far as we can tell, has about four roomblocks, two kivas, and a tower (possibly two stories judging from the rubble present). The midden is to the south which is where almost all of the artifacts were located. Tucker and Chelsea did 5 sample areas in the midden, each 2m x 2m.

The pueblo is basically E-shaped with the back of the "E" towards the NW and the midden and "plaza" area facing more SE, with a double retaining wall on that side. The tower is interesting because it has a lot of rubble that falls down into Kiva 2 and partially down the eastern slope, but you can see a few of the wall stones in place under the rubble. A trick that Mark Varien told Ruth about is you can tell a circular tower from regular roomblocks by the shape of the pecking on the stones, they will peck the stone in a curved manner.

[Tucker]
Ruth went wandering today and said that she found a granary [actually it was a field house-Kellam] across the canyon floor from Lightning Tree Tower, and the other group found a lot of granary type structures in the N canyon wall, and lots of picto's resembling corn.

All of this and the reservoirs by LT Tower and on the rim make me strongly think this was a major farming operation going on in the canyon. I'd love to put together a GIS map of the region to get a full picture of the area.

A new project of mine which I started today is to see if you can see the tower at LT 7 [5MT 17275] from LT Tower and vice versa. So I climbed the tree right next to the tower @ LT 7 to see if I could see LT Tower. I couldn't because of all the trees, I think. So tomorrow I'm gonna put something on top of the tree and climb a tree by LT Tower and see if I can see it. If this doesn't work, I may try to lash a pole to the top of the tree to get more height. It will be interesting to see if this works…but it will be fun none the less…I get to climb a tree, haha!

[Trevor]
Today, Kellam, Becky and I headed out along the cliff edge to find 3 sites that had been recorded in the Dolores Project Survey in 1983. Along the way we found several small cliff dwelling sites with single wall masonry, but very well done masonry with nice bricks and smooth lines/angles. I also noticed some small hand print looking things on an alcove ceiling but they were very sketchy and you could not really tell. However, back in the lab I looked at some photos and altered their contrasts/brightness etc….and could definitely make out small handprints. Technology really helped on this one.

When we located the actual recorded site it took us a while to verify because the original recorders had done an absolutely horrible job. All they mentioned was an alcove granary, some petroglyphs and a check dam. When we finally pieced together all of their maps, descriptions, and distances it made sense but they forgot to mention huge rubble mounds and middens as well as additional structures in alcoves and viga holes and other wall parts. I looked for their check dam in several drainages before I realized it was on top of the canyon rim and when I went up on top I found it. It was just a faint resemblance but when I showed Kellam he agreed. In addition there was a pool like area at the cliff bottom under the pour over and an area where I suspect a spring may have also been at one point.

We looked at all the rock art for a while and started recording some. At two different points when the sun went behind a cloud I noticed first a spiral and then a "spirangle" (spiral triangle) and then Becky realized they were connected. Later I looked up and noticed an anthropomorphic figure. Neither the spirangle and its connector nor the anthropomorphic figure were mentioned in the site form.

There were also lots of lines, about 500 scratched everywhere, too abundant and deliberate to be random sharpening. We also saw several turkey or crow foot carvings. There were also things that resembled corn plants so much it would be hard to think otherwise. There was also a pair of adult turkey/crow feet with younger ones next to it that met an explosion looking thing.

When Ruth came we found lots of things. I found a polychrome bowl body sherd from Arizona dated to PIII. The midden had so many different types/periods of pottery…that we thought it may have been a place where people had been coming for water or other reasons for a while. In addition we realized an old log that looked stone-axed fit directly into a viga hole carved in the alcove.

Overall I think we made some big discoveries today…It think it [the site] was definitely important either as a H2O resource or as some sort of spiritual area where many people scratched things in the rock.

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