 Two members of our crew working in Akiva. What they're doing now is isolating and shaping a stratigraphic column prior to removal. The next step after shaping it will be to wrap it in plaster of Paris so we can take it out in one bulk just like the one you see on the bench there. Originally we had a a complete column but because of weight factors we cut it in half. The purpose here is to take the column's intact back to the laboratory. Separate them. Subject them to flotation and pollen analysis so we can get an idea of plant succession on the site in the nature of botanical remains after the abandonment of Akiva. Yeah Try to get all the air I was asking Bill if we could possibly get our prehistoric as well as historic environment out of this column try to recreate the past and the present in environmental manner. Bill was explaining to me that possibly in certain cases we can. Well like most of the dirt in the column is post-occupation stuff that's come in since abandonment. And it's going to contain a lot of information about what's happened at this locality in the last seven or eight hundred years is you know Bill came in here all that time you know accumulated that's kind of what we're getting now. Charcoal from a brood roof and right under this we know that there's a layer or it wasn't the primary floor and then this a fill here from down here at the bottom of whether we have a definite floor up to here is all filled during the occupation and that's where we'll get a lot of information about the environment at the time of the occupation. We're from this layer this part in here. This surface is a little obscure. The largest most obvious structure on this site is a pit house which we believe to be now to Pueblo 1. This is the floor. We cover about a third of the house. The floor itself is only one of the important things that we've noted in this site in this wall here. We've been able to pick up the collapse of the roof, an area of a period of abandonment indicated by thinly bedded water wash sediments. Then a second short occupation with a deposition of trash indicating the Pueblo 1 period again. Another minor period of abandonment again the sands and then a second occupation again Pueblo 1 period of abandonment. This time an occupation during Pueblo 2 times. Final abandonment with a very minor use indicated by a fire heart here. The upper fill here is probably modern with disturbance by amateur excavations. From the floor of the pit house we find above it the roof fall. The area was then abandoned as indicated by these thinly bedded sterile water wash sands. There was a short reoccupation indicated by a dark fan here. Another period of abandonment. Then an occupation where there was a buildup of cultural fill from the Pueblo 1 period. We had another period of abandonment again the sterile sands. Another trash layer. This time Pueblo 2. The cave was again abandoned, occupied for a very short time, a small fire heart present in the wall here. Then final abandonment by the Anastasi and the modern deposits among the material disturbed by the previous excavators of the site. We know that the people who lived in this cave were farmers from the corn, beans, bits of squash that we found in the deposits here. They probably farmed the deep alluvial soils of the river bottom depending on the river to fertilize their crops and to provide the necessary moisture. But these people also depended upon the wild crops about them. We know that here they hunted deer, elk, large game were a fairly large part of their diet. These hunters would also provide the necessary resources, sending people far and wide to see how the crops were kind of the wild grass seeds. In addition to farming, we know these people were hunters, deer and elk, formed to make a part of their diet. And these hunters, as well as hunting, bringing meat into the camp were the contacts that watched the plants grow, watched the wild seeds, the pinion, wild grass, juniper, serviceberry, cactus. All the things that these people were able to utilize throughout the different parts of the year as supplements to their agricultural food resources. The unique feature of this site that shows us just how important the uplands were are these steps which lead up and provide access to the shrubbery, the vegetational community of the slope up above. We know from dried materials found within the shelter that the anasazi that occupied the cave utilized the cactus among other plants. They utilized the pads, burning the spines off, roasting them. As well the fruit of the cactus was used. The fruit could be eaten as it was picked, of course after removal of the spines, or they could be taken back to the cave and dried acting as a self-contained package for the many cactus seed within the fruit itself which themselves could be ground into a flower or a gruel. In addition to food, the Dolores River and the slopes of its canyons provided most of the other raw materials utilized by the anasazi. For instance, information in the cave indicates that yucca was a primary source of fiber from which were made sandals, mattings of all sorts, cordage, snares, ropes. The leaves of this plant could be pounded producing the long fibers which could then easily be woven to provide the necessary materials. Another possible use of the yucca to the anasazi suggested by the early Hopi practices is that the root be extracted. And a soap made, tuberous root could be dug out of the ground, pounded between two rocks and the fibrous parts of the tissue releases a natural detergent. As well as the plants, we know that the anasazi depended on these slopes to provide many other materials. Sandstone slabs such as these were used for building stone drawn from the more thinly bedded portions of the formation. Chirps eroded from up above, washed down in the slope were used to make tools, axes, knives, points for arrows, the tools for farming and hunting. The anasazi took a lot from this environment. They utilized it, were changed by it. And as we begin our research here, trying to understand how the interaction progressed, how the anasazi met change with the changing climate, then perhaps we'll start to understand a little bit about why this area was abandoned by them ultimately. And in that gain a few insights into how we ourselves should utilize this land.