OCTOBER 20, 2007

From: Scott Beld
Sent: Sunday, October 21, 2007 8:58 PM
To: Oxbow Archaeologists
Subject: Sias East - October 20, 2007

Hi Oxbow Archaeologists,

We made it out to Sias East yesterday. Marianne, Nik, Dave, and Conrad came out in the morning and we continued to excavate the trench on the east side of the 110 West Block (see Photo 1).

In the morning we excavated the 40-45 cm level of units 1S-100W, 1S-101W, 1S-102W, 1S-103W, and 1S-104W (see Map). There are still several flakes and a few bone fragments at this level, but the density is lower. We did recover a biface from 1S-103W (see Photo 2) and a heavily utilized flake (see Photo 3).

In the afternoon, I excavated unit 1S-103W to 65 cm and 1S-104W to 60 cm to see if we have the buried A-horizon we noted 15 meters to the east in the 85 West Trench during the 2005 season. The flakes and bone fragments dropped off in the 50-55 cm level. At 60-65 cm several fire-cracked rocks were recovered. There was a compact dark brown silt mottled with the brown silt at 65 cm. This is not as distinct as the A-horizon in the 85 West Trench where we had a friable dark gray silt.

This week we will be washing and sorting at the Resource Building on Wednesday. Next Saturday we will plan on excavating at Sias East.

Hope to see you at the site.

Scott

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Scott G. Beld, Ph.D.
Research Laboratory Specialist - Intermediate
The University of Michigan Museum of Paleontology
1109 Geddes Road
Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1079
Phone: 734-764-0489 (UMMP Main Office)
734-763-9253 (My Office)
Fax: 734-936-1380
Email: sbeld@umich.edu
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