Day 7: Start Digging!

The rain came down today, and only on the 7th day of the program which is surprisingly late considering the Seymour Conservation Reserve is in the rain shadowed North Shore mountains. Nevertheless, the students were ready to get started.


This morning was exciting because the students got to start digging! The eight sections in the excavation grid were assigned to 7 pairs of people (except for Brittaney, the 15th student who had a unit all to herself).


The students dug in different layers, starting with the surface layer, and then going on down to the 0 - 10 cm dbd (depth below pit datum). The surface layer consisted mostly of moss, and the layer below was mostly decomposing logs, tree roots, charcoal, and some truffles. After the surface layer is collected, it is taken in buckets to be sifted through to make sure that no artifacts were missed (see picture below of Brittaney filtering away), though the moss made this challenging. This was much more easily done with the second layer. The biggest find today was by Bora and Paul, who found two leather boots in their unit, and most of the other students found small pieces of glass. This was the only assignment today, and it will be continued on tomorrow.


PS: A special thank you to the Northwest Coast Archaeology blog for mentioning our site. The NCA blog, written by Quentin Mackie, is a very interesting and in-depth. Check it out here!