Pits are dug by volunteer trowelers. Digging is done with a trowel, a kite-shaped metal blade with a handle. The troweler uses this tool to scrape off thin layers of earth, making a flat floor in the pit. As the diggers continue scraping, the floor gets deeper, going down at about 4 inches a day. Because most pits wind up being 3 to 4 feet deep, it can take 9 to 12 days to complete a single pit.
Dirt that each troweler scrapes from the pit floor goes into a labeled bucket. Each bucket goes up to a team of sievers who force the dirt through a series of screens to find any small objects that were missed by the troweler. Some of the most important specimens are found in the sieves.
Chip of Mastodon bone found at Byron Dig.
Pieces of trees digested and eliminated by Mastodons. (Mastodon doody!)
Two volunteer sievers waiting for the next bucket of dirt.
Floodedpit.
Long wooden stakes are hammered vertically into the ground in a series of east-west and north-south lines. This produces something like a giant checkerboard, with each square marked by four stakes. The lines of the “checkerboard” are like the lines of latitude and longitude on a map, providing the trowlers with a way to mark the location of whatever is found.
Because of the large number of people who work at the dig, they are usually able to keep from two to four pits going at one time. Whenever an interesting specimen is found, it is brought around for the entire crew to see, since everyone has worked as a team to make the discovery.
Three or four people are assigned to dig in a single pit, which usually measures about 8’ x 8’.
Conifer tree cone, preserved in its original state (still green), which dates back thousands of years.
Piece of Mastodon bone found at the Byron Dig.
The Byron Dig at the Hiscock Site.
Future archeologist?
Sign at entrance to the Hiscock Site.
Eating area and tents used by volunteers during their stay in Byron at the Hiscock Site.