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Pro tip: We found a whole new layer of a site in Tucson after a flash flood washed away a foot of topsoil.
I was on a crew digging at a known Hohokam site near the Santa Cruz River last spring. The storm cleared out a bunch of modern fill and exposed a previously buried pithouse floor. Now we always schedule a walkover survey after heavy rain. What's the biggest 'accidental' find you've seen change a dig plan?
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eric_martinez6mo ago
That "accidental find" sounds more like a lucky break from a known problem. In my experience, that kind of erosion can really mess up the stratigraphy and scatter artifacts, making the real work harder.
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cameronb976mo ago
Yeah but sometimes that mess is the whole point. I've seen sites where erosion cut through layers we'd never get to dig, @eric_martinez. Like that coastal site last year, the storm exposed a midden under six feet of sterile sand. We got a clear snapshot of one period because it was all jumbled together, no mixing. It gave us a fast answer when time and money were tight.
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seanperez5mo ago
But what if the mess is the data, @eric_martinez? Sometimes the scatter tells you exactly how the site fell apart.
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