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The 3 hour excavation that turned into 3 days at a site near Tucson
We were mapping a small Hohokam pit house and I figured we'd wrap up before lunch. The surface scatter looked simple, but once we started digging, the stratigraphy kept confusing us. Every layer we cleared revealed another odd feature, like a cluster of fire-cracked rock that didn't match the standard layout. Turns out the structure had been rebuilt twice, and the old floor was sitting under a thick caliche layer we missed. So that quick mapping job ate up 14 hours across three field days, and we still didn't finish the full grid. Has anyone else had a boring-looking site turn into a total time sink like that?
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white.grant13d agoTop Commenter
The caliche layer is probably why you missed it. That stuff hides everything, and once it sets, it makes a site look way older than it actually is. Maybe worth checking if the rebuilds used the old floor as a base, that could explain the odd rock cluster.
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