May 16th 2019 - Surface Survey

The sun was shining today and everyone was very appreciative of it. All of us were prepared for another rainy day in the forest, luckily most of our raincoats could stay under the tarp. In the morning, students finished clearing the ferns that were covering some of our possible excavation sites. While we were clearing, Bob looked for the site datum so that when we start test excavations, we will be able to write the coordinates of our unit in our field notebooks. If you don't know what a site datum is, it is the centre from which all measurements are taken. Bob first created the one for the McKenzie Creek site when they started excavating there in a previous field school. Once we finished clearing what we needed too, we took a break for lunch. 

Aza and Kirsten enjoying their lunch!

We had a surprise visitor come stop by to watch us eat during our lunch break.

Special visitor at lunch time, a northern raven!

After we finished our delicious lunches, students were split into four groups, and we began doing a surface survey of the entire McKenzie Creek site. Each group was given an area to examine in detail, and we found so much cool stuff! Ali found the first complete bottle of the season, and she also found a fully intact can sticking out from underneath a log. Each group had someone responsible for placing and numbering the flagging tape while also recording it in their field book, and another for taking pictures and drawing a map of the placement of items on the site.

Ali and the bottle she found. Picture Taken by Bob.

With all of the moss that has grown over since the last field school in 2013, it was quite difficult to spot cultural items, but with the whole afternoon dedicated to the survey, we could take our time and look under every fallen tree and branch.

Angus and Rohan looking carefully under large fallen trees during the surface survey.

We also encountered many spiders and other bugs, but the one organism that seemed to be hanging out everywhere were slugs. It seemed like almost every tree had a slug living on it somewhere, but the harmless creatures don't seem to bother anyone too much.

Banana slug hanging out on a tree.

As the end of the day approached, we all gathered under the tarp to discuss our finds from the survey. Most groups ended up finding pieces of metal, some barrel rings and other scrap metals, and pieces of broken glass from both bottles and lanterns.

Due to a holiday in British Columbia on Monday, the next blog post will be up on Tuesday May 21st. We will be in the field completing some test excavations.