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Southwest Environmental Center
Southwest Environmental Center
Dedicated to protecting and restoring the unique natural heritage of the Southwestern borderlands
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Acoma’s Sky City Cultural Center and Haak’u Museum, New Mexico
Sky City Cultural Center links present to past By Tamara N. Shope, Tribune Reporter, June 9, 2006
IF YOU GO
What: Acoma’s Sky City Cultural Center and Haak’u Museum.
Where: Sky City Pueblo, 12 miles southwest of I-40 from Exit 102.
When: 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. during the summer; 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. during the winter.
How much: The museum and cultural center are free. Tours of Sky City: Adult, $10; seniors $9; youths $7. A still-camera permit is $10.
Call (800) 747-0181.
The $15 million Sky City Cultural Center and Haak’u Museum offers new experiences for tourists, in a setting very familiar to Acomas
ACOMA – It’s peculiar how swiftly a sense of grandeur can swallow up a traveler.
But when a long road disappears below a rocky, dusty hill in Acoma, a valley suddenly opens up as wide as the sky.
At the same time, Sky City, with its worn, modest homes and whitewashed walls and thousands of years of history, brings with it a sense of belonging.
A series of towering, sandy rocks and, sometimes, wayward cattle greet the traveler, usually a visitor looking to connect with an ancient city.
The road through grandeur branches off I-40 about 45 minutes west of Albuquerque. It heads southward, winding to a village on top of a mesa and, now, to its cultural center and museum – which, like the valley, has become priceless to the community.
The $15 million project was designed to look and feel like home for Acomas, and the community it was built for hopes it can help sustain 2,000-year-old culture.
Treading lightly in Oak Tree House, Mesa Verde, Colorado
Treading lightly in Oak Tree House By By DAVE BUCHANAN The Daily Sentinel
This particular ranger-led tour is a 90-minute out-and-back trip to Oak Tree House, which had been excavated from 1915 to 1921 by Jesse Fewkes for the Smithsonian Institute after earlier excavating Spruce Tree House in 1908 and Cliff Palace in 1909. Oak Tree House, named for a massive oak tree which since has fallen, has been closed to the public since the early 1930s.
This summer, ranger-led hikes to Oak Tree House and Mug House, which the park never has opened to public tours, will be offered on an advance registration-only basis….
Oak Tree House, like nearly all of the 600 or so known cliff dwellings in the park, is found in a shallow cave eroded by groundwater percolating through a massive layer of Cliffhouse Sandstone. It’s the topmost layer of the Mesa Verde group of shoreline sediments laid down more than 65 million years ago. …
Why did people ignore these caves for most of their occupation of Mesa Verde? Of the more than 4,500 dwellings identified in the park, only 600 or so are cliff dwellings, and their occupancy dates only from the last century the people lived here.
No one knows for sure, but some educated guesses suppose that at its peak, the local population reached nearly 3,000 and there was a growing demand to find new places to live, new resources to exploit, or perhaps new enemies to avoid.
An even bigger question is, why did they leave?
The Great Drought of 1276-1299 certainly had some impact. Perhaps overpopulation, caused in part by better nutrition as farming techniques improved, had a part, or even disease resulting from living in close quarters with tamed turkeys and dogs.
Around 1300, the residents suddenly abandoned these elaborate cliff dwellings and migrated south to the Rio Grande Valley of New Mexico and to one region of northern Arizona.
Today, 24 American Indian tribes claim some connection to the people who lived in Mesa Verde.
When the environment could no longer sustain the Ancestral Puebloans, it forced total emigration, said Jim Judge, professor emeritus at Fort Lewis College in Durango.
Rock Carving Linked To 1000-Year-Old Supernova Sighting
Two things trouble me about the following analysis. First, the confidence based on a simulation that the creator of the petroglyph was looking at just what they think s/he was looking at. It seems to me that an artist 3 inches taller or shorter than expected or someone working a few days earlier or later than expected might see something very different.
More importantly, a huge part of this interpretation is that the supernova glyph is with a scorpion glyph. First, how can they be so sure it is a scorpion. More cautious people have suggested we can *never* know what a glyph represents. Worse — is there any reason to believe the Hohokam thought that constellation looked like a scorpion, our Western interpretation? Not only did native peoples have no reason to call Orion Orion, they didn’t even see a hunter; some folk see a door or gate, some see a tool for starting a fire. That this is a scorpion and connected to that constellation is a huge presumption, in my mind. mjh
Rock Carving Linked To 1000-Year-Old Supernova Sighting by Staff Writers
Astronomers announced Monday they have discovered a possible link between a symbol on an ancient rock carving and a supernova that occurred 1,000 years ago.
Reporting at the 208th meeting of the American Astronomical Society, John Barentine, with Apache Point Observatory in New Mexico and Gilbert A. Esquerdo, with the Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, Ariz., said they think a petroglyph, found in the White Tanks Regional Park in Arizona depicts the well-known supernova of A.D. 1006.
The petroglyph is located in an area once occupied by prehistoric Native Americans called the Hohokam, which archaeologists think lived in the area – outside modern-day Phoenix – from about A.D. 500 to 1100. …
“The supernova of 1006 was perhaps the brightest such event visible from Earth for thousands of years, reaching the brightness of a quarter moon at peak,” Barentine said, “yet to date no representations of the event have been identified in Native American art.” …
“Quantitative methods such as carbon-14 dating are alternative means to assign ages to works of prehistoric art,” said Barentine, who studies Southwest archeology as a hobby. “But they lack precision of more than a few decades, so any depiction in art that can be fixed to a specific year is extremely valuable.”
He admitted, however, that “Without my background in astronomy, I probably wouldn’t have recognized the petroglyph for what it might represent.”
To support their hypothesis, Barentine and Esquerdo created an accurate model of the night sky on May 1, 1006, which shows the relative position of the supernova with respect to the constellation Scorpius matches the relative placement of scorpion and star symbols on the rock.
Petroglyphs are among the most durable and longest-lasting human art forms. They are made by cutting a rock surface using a smaller, handheld rock. …
Similar petroglyphs have been identified as likely depictions of historic astronomical events in the prehistoric Southwest. One of the most widely recognized examples is the pictograph near Penasco Blanco in Chaco Canyon National Monument, New Mexico.
There, a painted rock symbol is theorized to depict the supernova of July 4, 1054. As for the White Tanks Regional Park petroglyph in Arizona and its suspected relationship to the 1006 astronomical event, astronomers do not yet consider the results conclusive.
The next step will be to conduct chemical-dating test, which rely on the abundance of certain elements in the rock varnish. The tests could help confine the range of dates in which the petroglyph was created.
A result substantiating an early 11th century date of origin would lead considerable credence to the claim that the prehistoric symbol represents the 1006 supernova event.
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New Scientist SPACE – Breaking News – Native Americans recorded supernova explosion by Zeeya Merali and Kelly Young
To make his case, Barentine and his colleague Gilbert A. Esquerdo, at the Planetary Science Institute, Tucson, used planetarium software to recreate the sky as it would have appeared in Arizona during the supernova’s appearance and overlaid it with photographs from the site.
The supernova would have been brighter than a planet, and both it and the constellation – which is shaped like a scorpion – would have appeared just above the edge of the rock, in the same orientation depicted in the carvings. Native Americans populated the region during that period and often recorded objects thought to have magical powers, says Barentine.
“It’s by no means conclusive, but I think it’s strong circumstantial evidence that the art depicts the supernova,” says Barentine. He announced his theory at the American Astronomical Society Meeting in Calgary, in Alberta, Canada, on Monday.
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LiveScience.com Blogs »Blog Archive » Did the Ancient Greeks and Native Americans Swap Starcharts? Author Ker Than
“a lot of thoughtful readers wrote in with a very good question: Scorpius is an ancient Greek invention, so what are the chances that Native Americans living more than an ocean away looked up at the night sky and also saw in the stars the outline of a scorpion?”
http://www.livescience.com/blogs/2006/06/06/did-the-ancient-greeks-and-native-americans-swap-starcharts/
New Mexico’s Chaco Canyon: A Place of Kings and Palaces?
New Mexico’s Chaco Canyon: A Place of Kings and Palaces?
BOULDER, Colo., June 5 (AScribe Newswire) — Kings living in palaces may have ruled New Mexico’s Chaco Canyon a thousand years ago, causing Pueblo people to reject the brawny, top-down politics in the centuries that followed, according to a University of Colorado at Boulder archaeologist.
University of Colorado Museum anthropology Curator Steve Lekson, who has studied Chaco Canyon for several decades, said one argument for royalty comes from the rich, crypt-style burials of two men discovered deep in a Chaco Canyon “great house” known as Pueblo Bonito several decades ago. They were interred about A.D. 1050 with a wealth of burial goods in Pueblo Bonito, a 600-room, four-story structure that was considered to be the center of the Chaco world, he said.
Archaeologists have long been in awe of the manpower required to build Chaco’s elaborate structures and road systems, which required laborious masonry work, extended excavation and the transport of staggering amounts of lumber from forests 50 miles distant, he said. The scale of the architecture and backbreaking work undertaken for several centuries suggests a powerful centralized authority, said Lekson, curator of anthropology at the University of Colorado Museum.
“I don’t think Chaco was a big happy barn-raising,” said Lekson, chief editor of “Archaeology Of Chaco Canyon: An Eleventh Century Pueblo Regional Center
“Kingship” developed in Mesoamerica about 2,000 years before Chaco, Lekson said, and kings quickly became a constant on the political landscape. “It’s not remarkable that there were small-scale kings and states at Chaco in A.D. 1100,” he said. “What is remarkable is that it took the Southwest so long to get around to it.”
Located in northern New Mexico, Chaco Canyon was the hub of the Pueblo culture from about A.D. 850 to 1150 and is believed to have held political sway over an area twice the size of present-day Ohio. A center of ceremony and trade, the canyon is marked by 11 great houses oriented in solar, lunar and cardinal directions with roads that appear to have connected Chaco to outlying Pueblo communities.
Researchers have long pondered how Chaco rulers wielded control over outlying Pueblo communities in present day Utah, Arizona and Colorado, he said. Such “outliers,” located up to 150 miles away, would have required that visitors from Chaco walk up to eight days straight in order to reach them, said Lekson, who is also a CU-Boulder anthropology professor.
The answer may lie in the clarity of the Southwestern skies, the open landscape and the broad vistas that created an efficient “line-of-site” system, he said. “Chaco people could see Farview House at Mesa Verde, for example, and Farview could see Chaco,” he said. “I think similar linkages will be found between Chaco and the most distant outliers in all directions in the coming years.”‘
The roads, some as wide as four-lane highways, may have been used for ceremonial pilgrimages by priests and their followers, Lekson said. “They also could have been used by troops, tax collectors and inquisitors,” he said.
Funded by the National Park Service and CU-Boulder, the new book is a collaboration of more than 30 years of fieldwork by hundreds of researchers and students, many of whom participated in a massive NPS Chaco excavation from 1971 to 1982. Scores of academics met around the Southwest during the past several years, discussing the most recent research and latest theories regarding Chaco for the book.
The Archaeology of Chaco Canyon explores the natural environment and architecture, as well as Chaco’s economy, politics, history and regional influences. The authors also look at outside cultural influences from all directions, including ties to Mesoamerica, said Lekson. Twenty authors contributed to the book, including Lekson, CU Museum Director Linda Cordell, CU-Boulder anthropology doctoral student Derek Hamilton and Richard Wilshusen, who received his doctorate from CU-Boulder.
Lekson estimates that 95 percent of the Chaco people lived in small pueblos, while an elite 5 percent lived in the great houses. Pueblo Bonito and the other Chaco great houses were “tall, empty monuments” that could have been used for a variety of activities, from ceremonies and storage to inns and even slave cells, he said.
The culture’s architecture and settlement patterns changed dramatically in the region about 1300, when sites begin to look more like modern Pueblos.
“Chaco has been characterized in oral histories as a wonderful, awful place where people got power over other people,” Lekson said. “Later Pueblo cultures in the region did not develop from Chaco, but rather represent a reaction against it, with people distancing themselves from a bad experience.”
CONTACT: Steve Lekson, 303-492-6671, lekson@colorado.edu
ABQjournal: Experts: Wolf Recovery Program Failing
ABQjournal: Experts: Wolf Recovery Program Failing
By Tania Soussan
Copyright © 2006 Albuquerque Journal; Journal Staff Writer
The wild Mexican gray wolf population has been shrinking— rather than growing as it should— as wolves are removed from the wild for repeatedly killing livestock.
Almost an entire pack died in late May, and a separate lone wolf was shot by the wolf reintroduction program team last week, all for racking up too many depredations.
The conflict between livestock and wolves is nothing new. But expansion of wolf territories and ongoing drought are adding new stresses to the reintroduction program that aims to bring back wolves to southwestern New Mexico and southeastern Arizona.
Critics, both environmentalists who favor wolf reintroduction and ranchers who don’t want wolves near their cows, say the losses are a sign the program is failing. …
In 1996, the Fish and Wildlife Service set population goals for the wolf program— 15 breeding pairs and 83 wolves in the wild by the end of last year, and 18 breeding pairs and 102 wolves in the wild by the end of this year.
Program managers put the count for the end of 2005 at five breeding pairs and 35-49 wolves in the wild. (The current count is 31-45 adults plus an unknown number of pups.)
Morgart calls it “an absolute minimum count.” Ranchers agree and say there are likely twice as many wolves on the ground. Environmentalists say the numbers fall on the high end.
The wild population has also been declining since it hit a high point of 55 wolves at the end of 2003.
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Mexican Wolf Conservation and Management
About 50 to 60 along Arizona-New Mexico border now, due to releases beginning in 1998, and more than 200 in various captive breeding facilities in the United States and Mexico.
– View the latest 3-month wolf distribution map
– View printer-friendly version of 3-month wolf map
Habitat:
Principally oak, pine, and juniper woodlands and forests, grasslands, and riparian corridors, in broken, sloping country. Generally above 4,000 feet elevation, occasionally lower.
The VLA — Very Large Array — West of Socorro, New Mexico
[mjh: photo above is mine; article below is not mine.]
For me, the radio telescopes [of the Very Large Array] beat the pyramids of Egypt, the Great Wall of China and other wonders in awesomeness, poignancy and respect for the Homo sapiens endeavor. That’s no exaggeration.
I remember being struck speechless the first time I emerged from the trees along U.S. 60 and saw the dishes of the VLA – cocked attentively, like huge, mechanical white poppies, toward the vastness of space. It was 1980, the year the VLA was officially dedicated. In 2006, its power to observe and astonish is increasing, as it undertakes ongoing upgrades and expansions.
The contrast the dishes make with the remote, desolate Plains of San Augustin is stunning.
The plains are the remains of a broad, Pleistocene Era lake, and they look it, in all their post-glacial serenity. The hills and trees that ring it and the gently rolling lake bed itself are made by nature – random, ragged, simple, solemnly gorgeous and content to be exactly what they are.
The dishes, 82 feet wide and nearly as tall as 10-story buildings when pointing straight up, cut across the skyline like a precision blade. There are 27 of them, arranged along railroad tracks in a Y-shaped configuration that can grow to 22 miles in diameter when fully extended. Anything but random, they focus in unison on unseen objects, with an unearthly intensity.
The array is mankind’s most dramatic, visible connection with the infinite. …
Today, June 5, is World Environment Day
Today, June 5, is World Environment Day, one of the principal vehicles through which the United Nations stimulates worldwide awareness of the environment and enhances political attention and action.
The World Environment Day theme selected for 2006 is Deserts and Desertification and the slogan is Don’t Desert Drylands! The slogan emphasizes the importance of protecting drylands, which cover more than 40% of the planet’s surface. This ecosystem is home to one-third of the world’s people who are more vulnerable members of society.The main international celebrations of the World Environment Day 2006 will be held in Algeria. UNEP is honoured that the City of Algiers will be hosting this United Nations day.
The day’s agenda is to give a human face to environmental issues; empower people to become active agents of sustainable and equitable development; promote an understanding that communities are pivotal to changing attitudes towards environmental issues; and advocate partnership which will ensure all nations and peoples enjoy a safer and more prosperous future. World Environment Day is a people’s event with colourful activities such as street rallies, bicycle parades, green concerts, essays and poster competitions in schools, tree planting, as well as recycling and clean-up campaigns.
World Environment Day was established by the United Nations General Assembly in 1972 to mark the opening of the Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment. Another resolution, adopted by the General Assembly the same day, led to the creation of UNEP.
How can you celebrate World Environment Day?
World Environment Day can be celebrated in many ways, including street rallies, bicycles parades, green concerts, essay and poster competitions in schools, tree planting, recycling efforts, clean-up campaigns and much more. In many countries, this annual event is used to enhance political attention and action.
Heads of State, Prime Ministers and Ministers of Environment deliver statements and commit themselves to care for the Earth. More serious pledges are made which lead to the establishment of permanent governmental structures dealing with environmental management and economic planning. This observance also provides an opportunity to sign or ratify international environmental conventions.
On this World Environment Day, let us examine the state of our environment. Let us consider carefully the actions which each of us must take, and then address ourselves to our common task of preserving all life on earth in a mood of sober resolution and quiet confidence.
[via www.nmwild.org]
This Guy Was Lucky — Some Aren’t
Every year, people get lost and need rescuing in the Sandia Mountains, which are right on the edge of New Mexico’s largest city, Albuquerque. The hiker in this story was in even more rugged and remote country. A dayhike can become a death march. mjh
DenverPost.com – Taste of state left hiker hungry By Monte Whaley, Denver Post Staff Writer
Terry Harlon got that taste of the Colorado wilderness he wanted so badly.
“In fact, I got a little more of the Colorado country than I bargained for,” said the soft-spoken, 48-year-old.
Harlon took off for a day hike at Rocky Mountain National Park on May 25. A week later, the Louisiana man was spotted by a helicopter after spending a week lost in the park’s backcountry.
Harlon spent Friday at St. Anthony Central Hospital, recovering from dehydration, sunburn and the effects of not eating for a week.
Rescued hiker glad to be alive By Katie Kerwin Mccrimmon, Rocky Mountain News
He had set out May 25 and lost the trail as he began “slipping and sliding and sinking” in the snow. He was doing a loop hike and kept thinking it would be shorter to continue on the loop rather than retrace his route. He had come to Colorado to scout Rocky Mountain National Park and bring his wife back for a trip this summer.
Harlon was wearing jeans, hiking boots, a flannel shirt and a light jacket. He had only a daypack with an apple and sunflower seeds. Once darkness settled in that first day, he knew he would have to spend a night out. For the next four days, he tried to find a trail or road.
But one day stretched into a week. Harlon was getting weaker and weaker and knew he wouldn’t survive much longer.
“The night before they found me, I had come to the conclusion that I could only last a few days,” Harlon said.
Wolf Killed After It Killed Livestock
ABQJOURNAL: Wolf Killed After It Killed Livestock
A Mexican gray wolf that officials said was involved in at least three livestock killings in the past year has been shot and killed in the Gila National Forest.
A member of the wolf recovery team killed the male wolf last Sunday after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued a permanent removal order for it. The order came after the wolf was confirmed to have killed a cow in southeastern Catron County.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service began releasing wolves into the wild on the Arizona-New Mexico border in 1998 to re-establish the species in part of its historic range.
However, the animals under the program are designated as a ”nonessential experimental population.” That gives the recovery team greater flexibility to manage the wolves under the Endangered Species Act and allows permanent removal of a wolf — by capturing or killing it — after three confirmed livestock deaths.
Game and Fish Director Bruce Thompson said the state is working with Fish and Wildlife on federal rule changes “that will promote more effective recovery areas and diminish the likelihood of problem wolves in New Mexico.”
The reintroduction program allows Mexican gray wolves to be released in New Mexico only if they previously were released in Arizona and have experience in the wild.
The wolf recovery team said three Mexican wolves, an adult male and two female yearlings, will be released this month in the Gila Wilderness.
The male was captured and removed from the wild in 2005 after it was involved in a livestock death. The yearlings were removed from the wild last year after cattle killings by adults in their pack.
The Fish and Wildlife Service estimates 32 to 46 endangered Mexican wolves live in the wild in Arizona and New Mexico.
Last week, Fish and Wildlife officials said the alpha male of a pack that had been killing cattle on the White Mountain Apache Reservation in Arizona had been shot to death, and that eight other wolves captured from that pack had died — including six pups killed by a surrogate parent wolf.
Range Creek, Utah
Be sure to follow the first link to the full article on Range Creek, Utah. It is long and detailed. This is an ‘unimproved’ area that is probably only suited those with a hard-core fascination with the Fremont culture. mjh
Salt Lake Tribune – An open range of treasures By Brett Prettyman, The Salt Lake Tribune
The Fremont were believed to have lived in the Southwest between 700 and 1350 A.D. Some archaeologists believe as many as 600 Fremont may have called Range Creek Canyon home at the peak of their storied history. By 1500, the Fremont people had vanished. Not until some 400 years later are there records of inhabitants finding Range Creek. Cattle were run in the area starting in 1885 and the first homesteaders arrived in 1915.
Range Creek was purchased by Ray Wilcox in 1951 from Preston Nutter. The Wilcox family ran cattle on the land until Ray’s son, Waldo Wilcox, sold his 1,600 acres along Range Creek for $2.5 million in 2001. While they collected some artifacts, the Wilcox family had protected the overall canyon from outsiders for five decades.
The canyon opened to the public in 2004 and it was not long before officials announced the first known case of looting. Two stone blades and a pottery fragment went missing in summer of 2004.
Therein lies the biggest problem in protecting the countless items left by the Fremont in Range Creek Canyon.
Duncan Metcalfe, curator of archaeology with the Utah Museum of Natural History and lead Range Creek researcher, says only 8 to 10 percent of the canyon has been surveyed, but that small portion turned up 350 sites – everything from unsealed granaries to massive petroglyph panels to a quiver of arrows tucked into a crack in the cliff wall. The real discoveries will come when archeologist take a shovel to the pit houses, something yet to happen in Range Creek. …
Visitors are only allowed to hike or ride horses in the canyon during daylight hours and some of the most amazing sites are deep within Range Creek. Most only make it about 4 miles into the canyon before turning around. Walking down the road from the gate, at 7,000 feet, is easy, but the return is all uphill. Camping is prohibited within the canyon, but is allowed at the gate.
There is an easier alternative. Several guiding companies are offering tours of Range Creek. The guides, when accompanied by a [Utah Division of Wildlife Resources] volunteer, are also allowed to drive the entire 14 miles of the road. The only other vehicles allowed in the canyon are for administrative purposes.
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Salt Lake Tribune – Range Creek’s untouched archaeological area ‘a national treasure’ By Greg Lavine, The Salt Lake Tribune
Range Creek will not win any beauty contests, but for sheer archaeological value, it may stand alone.
“Simply stated, Range Creek Canyon shares many similarities with the world-famous Nine Mile Canyon just to the north, but without the 100 years of overt vandalism, visitor wear and tear, and the impacts of intensive ranching,” researchers wrote in a proposal to survey the Book Cliffs site. …
“We are united in our opinion that the archaeology of Range Creek is a national treasure and are committed to doing everything possible to protect it,” said Duncan Metcalfe, curator of archaeology with the Utah Museum of Natural History and a lead researcher at Range Creek….
Range Creek is as close to mint condition as archaeologists are likely to find these days. “We feel like this is an amazing opportunity to work here,” Barlow said.
Campfires Banned at Chaco
CHACO CULTURE NATIONAL HISTORICAL PARK— Campfires are prohibited under new fire restrictions in effect for Chaco Culture National Historical Park.
Charcoal grills at the National Park Service’s campsites and pressurized liquid or gas stoves at campgrounds are allowed.
The restrictions, which went into effect Friday, also prohibit smoking except in vehicles equipped with ashtrays or on paved or graveled parking lots and roads clear of vegetation for at least 3 feet around.