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| The main mastodon skeleton is likely near Unit 15, the middle left plot. I worked with Jeff (wearing gray t-shirt) on Unit 16, the far left plot. (Photo by Don Comis) |
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| On Saturday, September 6, Ashland University students and other volunteers sift through all the soil carefully dug up by volunteers in the excavation plots. (Photo by Don Comis) |
Dr. Brush also said that “Dr. Gregory Wiles from the College of Wooster, Dr. Thomas Lowell from the University of Cincinnati, one student from the University of Cincinnati, and one student from the University of Illinois were also at the site this past Saturday in order to collect sediment cores from the bog for environmental analysis. “
Climate Change
He also said that earlier this fall, Dr. Wiles and his Climate Change students mapped the mud depth in and around the bog near the excavation site and found the sediment reached a maximum depth of over 20 feet. The website describing this work says that the 20-plus feet of mud is “a record of environmental change” over about the last 15,000 years. It also said that they found blue glacial lake clays overlain by a [lime-rich mud] (with snail shells), which is overlain by organic-rich mud. This sequence and its details will become clearer when the site is cored on 6 September."
Dr.Brush said , “They also found possible evidence for an old preglacial stream channel running through the bog.”
A photo caption on their website shows three of the mapping participants “Washing up and wondering about how the Mastodon may have met its fate along the shore of a muddy lake during the Pleistocene [era].”
Dr. Brush's e-mail report said that last Saturday they determined that many of the bones “we have recovered at the site have been from the disturbed soil in Unit 15, so it is likely that the remaining skeleton is nearby. “
8-Inch Long Teeth
As a result, they are changing the next excavation date to Sunday, September 14, so a smaller team can finish Unit 15 down to the drainage pipe. The machine that lay this corrugated pipe (tile) uncovered the 8-inch long mastodon tooth that launched this excavation.
Dr. Brush explained that ,”This work would allow us to see if there are any bones in the undisturbed soil on the east wall of the ditch. If not, we may shift our excavation to the south or west on Sunday.”
Last Saturday, I was assigned to Unit 16 with Jeff, a fellow member of the Kokosing Chapter of the Archaeological Society of Ohio. This proved to be a more promising site than Unit 4, where I worked the week before. Plus Jeff, who even though this was his first dig, has a lot of experience finding prehistoric artifacts of Native Americans on the soil surface. So he has a good eye and spotted a lot of little fragments of bones. He also seemed to have the big find of the day, with a piece about 6 inches by 3 inches that Jeff Dillard, who directed the excavation that day, said was probably part of a much bigger bone. That bone and most of the other pieces found in Unit 16 were adjacent to Unit 15.
With some help, even I spotted my first small bone pieces while excavating. And I found some more while sifting, increasing my confidence level. The small pieces are easily missed or mistaken for stones. I’ve learned a few rules of thumbs so far:
· Sandstone often impersonates as bone.
· Bones are usually not white.
· Bones make a duller sound, like hitting wood, when tapped with a trowel, while stones “sing” when tapped. Bones also feel like wood.
· Bones usually have holes in their cross sections and lines on the outside.
I also learned that black areas can indicate charcoal which is interesting to archaeologists because it could indicate a possible cooking fire, either new or ancient, or it could just be from natural causes.
It was also fascinating to see a soil core about three feet deep that had been removed from the nearby bog for sampling. The two university students who showed us the core said that the bog had once been a glacial lake.
The contractor who had uncovered the bones also visited the site last Saturday to check on our progress. He told me he had found many things over the years, including a stone ball used by Native Americans for play, but never a mastodon skeleton.
He explained to Dillard and others how his tile-laying machine worked, saying it cut a swatch 12-inches wide, but disturbed the soil on either side of the ditch as well, leading to more soil disturbance than the archaeology team had expected. One of the dig volunteers told me that it would just shake the soil on either side, disturbing an area no more than four feet wide. He also thought this shaking disturbance would only loosen soil, not break bones.
Brush Your Teeth, Not a Mastodon's!
And, I learned something that should make us all want to brush our teeth more and get rid of tartar:
The tartar on mastodon teeth covers particles of food they've eaten, helping archaeologists learn what they ate. Just the thought of even just traces of food particles lasting that long should make us brush more! But not when the teeth are thousands of years old. We were told not to brush any we found , to avoid removing tartar.
My excavation partner, Jeff, told me that a shoulder blade found earlier in the excavation showed the type of cut marks that could indicate the mastodon was slain by hunters and butchered. Dillard noticed that some of the bones we found in Unit 16 also showed signs of having been broken long ago, possibly by butchering.
We scared up some living creatures in the plots, at least three frogs, one mouse, a beetle, and three frogs.
It was a nice cool day, with some misty rain, much more comfortable than the hot day the week before.
Eight of the volunteers were members of local chapters of the Archaeological Society of Ohio: Seven were members of the Johnny Appleseed Chapter and I represented the Kokosing Chapter—along with three Johnny Appleseed members who also had memberships in the Kokosing Chapter. Ashland University students were also among the volunteers.
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