Reprieve after a busy week

24 May 2007

Well, I’m back after a bit of a blogging lull. I have had a whirlwind week. After excavating and sieving last week, Jeremy and I flew down to San Diego Saturday morning for my friend Debbie’s wedding this past weekend. It was great to see all of my college roommates and see Debbie marry her wonderful husband Mark. On Sunday, I went back up to Shasta with two great volunteers- Lily and Dan (pictured sieving). We spent three days in the field and got a lot accomplished. I’m now back at Stanford for the next week. It’s nice to have a bit of a break. I have managed to strain a muscle in my back and the week off will help it heal, plus I can regroup and get some paperwork stuff done. Plus, there is a fire that started 7 miles northwest of my field site and the Forest Service is using the area in and around my cabin as a staging area for fire crew! Overall, it’s a good time to be out of the field!!!

Happy Mother's Day!

13 May 2007

I am taking a day of rest…well, physical rest at least. I am sitting in my cabin, typing away at a grant proposal, and listening to the birds chirp and crickets click outside my door. It’s a beautiful day up here! I also got a chance to review some of my photos. Here’s a great photo of a theoretical population geneticist doing field work! It’s not every day that this happens, and I was fortunate to capture an image of this rare event. Thanks to both Emily and Jeremy for coming up to help and keep me company! Well, my computer battery is about to die, so I think I’ll sit on the porch and sort matrix. One of the unexpected benefits of living in a cabin without electricity is not being a slave to my computer. (An ironic thought for someone writing a blog!)

Larger bones!

10 May 2007

The excavation is going really well. We have started to find some larger teeth, not all of which I can identify! But, it looks like there are some deer teeth, possibly an artiodactyl canine, some squirrel teeth, a carnivore canine, and a claw. These recent finds have added several species to our overall list, so we probably have over 20 species in the deposit. As of yesterday, the deposit is about 1/2 meter deep and it's getting difficult to excavate. Our next step is to start opening up the deposit so we can continue to go deeper. We'll need to start excavating down along one of the walls to make the pit wider. I'm not sure how all of this will work in such a tight space, but Paula is coming up next week to join me again and we'll come up with a plan!

Paula's in the cave!

3 May 2007.

Paula was up in the field with me during the early part of the week, which was wonderful. She left on Tuesday, but will be back in a few weeks. Here's a great photo of her in the cave. She is pointing to one of the corners of the pit. You can see that the pit goes through an archway. Luckily, you can squeeze into the back of the archway to excavate the other side of the pit, which is where I am taking the photo from. Paula is also holding the main tool we use- a trowel- and you can see part of a dustpan in the bottom of the photo. Generally, we slowly remove layers of dirt into the dustpan, then empty it into a bucket to be hauled outside and up to the car. It's very physical work, and definitely helpful to have someone else in the cave with me!