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2004 HIGHLIGHTS ACROSS NEW MEXICO

2004 HIGHLIGHTS ACROSS NEW MEXICO

This years review includes a summary of temperature and precipitation data for Albuquerque and New Mexico, the status of the drought situation across the state, a summary of the summer precipitation including a comparison 2003 vs. 2004 precipitation, a recap of the fire weather activities and the hydrologic year. The final sections include a review of the significant weather events across New Mexico, record temperatures and precipitation set at the Albuquerque Sunport in 2004 and a brief look at the weather extremes in Albuquerque.

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MIMBRES ARCHAEOLOGY

RedNova News – There’s More to the Mimbres Than the Pottery by Barbara Harrelson

The famous black-on-white Mimbres pottery and this culture’s unique mortuary behavior are depicted in various chapters, as are the complex tiers of Mimbres social organization. Details on the bioarchaeology of the NAN Ranch Ruin summarize “the most comprehensive study ever undertaken of a Mimbres skeletal population.”

“The Mimbres culture holds a certain fascination for those who have an interest in southwestern archaeology due to the artistic legacy of their painted pottery,” Shafer notes, adding, “This decorative style has no equal in the American Southwest: the stylistic images of the pottery symbolize and identify a unique cultural heritage.” …

By the way, the name Mimbres comes from the Spanish word for willow, with the river and surrounding valley being named for the trees growing along the water. The Mimbres Valley and the NAN Ranch Ruin are northeast of New Mexico’s Boot Heel. (Western New Mexico University in Silver City is home to a distinctive museum of the Mimbres culture.)

“The site was named after the ranch cattle brand, NAN, by C.B. Cosgrove, who, with the help of his son, Burt Jr., in 1926, was among the first to excavate at the site,” Shafer explains.

MIMBRES ARCHAEOLOGY
AT THE NAN RANCH RUIN
By Harry J. Shafer
University of New Mexico Press
304 pages, $59.95

Chaco

Ancestral Puebloans

Mesa Verde accused of censorship By Lindsay Nelson, Herald Staff Writer

A group of Southwest archaeologists is objecting to what it calls censorship of books at Mesa Verde National Park because the books contain the term “Anasazi.”

At its annual meeting in August, the Pecos Conference – an informal group of archaeologists from the Four Corners – passed a resolution objecting to books being left out of park bookstores because they do not refer to the historical American Indians as ancestral Puebloan, the term preferred by the tribes to which it refers. …

“Whether one word or another is used is not the issue,” [ Tessy Shirakawa, a spokeswoman with Mesa Verde National Park] said. “It’s not a matter of censorship – it’s actually respect. Out of respect to tribal members, we honor their requests about what’s appropriate and inappropriate to present to the public.”

Leigh Ku-wanwisiwma, director of the Hopi Cultural Preservation Office in Kykots-movi, Ariz., said his people led the protest against use of the term “Ana-sazi” because of its meaning – “enemy of old.”

“In Hopi culture, to call another person an enemy is not proper – it is against Hopi ethics to call anyone an enemy … we feel it’s a derogatory term,” he said.

It was the Hopi tribe that began working with the National Park Service in the mid-1990s to use the term “ancestral Puebloan,” a generic term that all the pueblos eventually endorsed, Kuwanwisiwma said.

Rocky Mountain News: State

But Eddie Tso, program director for the Navajo Nation’s Office of Language and Culture, said the word – pronounced nah-SAHZ-ah in Navajo – simply means “ancient ones.”

“We prefer to leave it alone” rather than change the term, he said.

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Ute Mountain Ute Tribal Park – Anasazi Ruins in Southwest Colorado

Tribal park a ‘must see’ says prestigious magazine BY JOHN R. CRANE

Ute Mountain Ute Tribal Park is one of 80 world destinations that should be visited in an around-the-world tour, according to National Geographic Traveler.

The magazine highlighted the park in its 20th anniversary issue in October, citing it as a “little-known gem tucked into the southwestern corner of Colorado.” …

Site stabilization of the park’s dwellings began in 1971. Encompassing 125,000 acres, Ute Mountain Ute Tribal Park covers more than twice the area of 52,000-acre Mesa Verde National Park and getting around isn’t always on neatly-paved roads. …

Anyone interested in arranging a tour call toll-free 1-800-847-5485, call 565-9653 or contact by e-mail utepark@fone.net.

Ute Mountain Tribal Park: Archaeology in Southwest Colorado

Tribal Park

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Lands near Hovenweep National Monument

Partial protection for Hovenweep lands

The Utah office of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management has wisely decided to withdraw some lands near Hovenweep National Monument west of the tiny southwestern Colorado community of Dove Creek from an oil and gas leasing auction set for Friday.

Unfortunately, the agency opted to keep only two of the five contested parcels — those to the south of the national monument — off the leasing list. The other three parcels, which are north and west of the monument, will go on the auction block Friday.

When even officials with the National Park Service, which manages Hovenweep and is a sister agency to the BLM, express concern that drilling so close to the monument could potentially damage Anasazi ruins within the monument, the BLM has to take notice.

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Petrified Forest expansion

Petrified Forest expansion may yield treasures Mark Shaffer, Republic Flagstaff Bureau

Two weeks ago, Congress gave its long-anticipated blessing to a bill that will more than double the size, to 222,000 acres, of this northeastern Arizona national park, famed for its calcified wood, dinosaur remains and petroglyphs.

The expansion will protect the new acreage, allow blight removal and yield many new archaeological sites. …

On a tour this week of the stark snow-covered area, park officials excitedly pointed out many of the features that soon will receive federal protection.

Like a 14-mile strip of the multicolored badlands of the Chinle formation, rich in petrified wood and fossils. And all the ruins and rock art from Native American cultures of nearly 1,000 years ago on distant ridge lines. And even a few extinct volcanoes, curving gently upward from the high desert. …

Hays-Gilpin said there are at least 50 rock-art panels within the new lands that are more extensive and of better quality than the national park’s Newspaper Rock. That petroglyph contains hundreds of ancient Indian carvings and is visited by tens of thousands of tourists annually.

“This is some of the best rock art in the world,” Hays-Gilpin said.

The congressional action also didn’t happen a day too soon to protect what’s left of Anasazi ruins, primarily east of the existing boundary.

Pothunters dug into about 300 ancient graves in the Wallace Tank area three years ago, and Hays-Gilpin said that a 300-room pueblo northeast of Wallace Tank has been pillaged by vandals in recent years.

“But we still have a lot out there that’s intact or half-intact,” Hays-Gilpin said. “A lot of times the pothunters don’t get to the floor, and that’s where we find a lot of information about the environment of the time.”

Parker said the new lands are expected to double the more than 700 archaeological sites already documented within Petrified Forest.

Hays-Gilpin also said there was a lot of excitement about the potential of more discoveries about so-called “paleoindians,” who lived 7,000 to 10,500 years ago in the area when it was considerably cooler and wetter.

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The National Atlas of the United States of America

The National Atlas of the United States of America

Work on a new National Atlas of the United States® began in 1997. This Atlas updates a large bound collection of paper maps that was published in 1970. Like its predecessor, this edition promotes greater national geographic awareness. It delivers easy to use, map-like views of America’s natural and sociocultural landscapes. Unlike the previous Atlas, this version is largely digital.

Also, BLM Directory

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Near Flagstaff, Arizona

Redlands Daily Facts – Travel
The rock era
Petrified forest, limestone dwellings offer hard evidence of the way things were hundreds – and hundreds of millions of years ago
By Story and photos by Eric Noland, Travel Editor

Petrified Forest National Park is one of several fascinating preserves in a little-visited expanse of Arizona. Also here are the precisely striped clay hills of the Painted Desert, as well as 800-year-old remnants of ancient villages – pueblos, cliff dwellings, even masonry homes made of hunks of petrified wood.

Protected as national parks and monuments, the sites are convenient to Interstate 40 east of Flagstaff and to U.S. 89 to the north.

PETRIFIED FOREST NATIONAL PARK: There is an entrance to the northern reaches of the park from Interstate 40, but eastbound travelers might want to consider getting off I-40 in Holbrook and taking Highways 77 and 180 about 20 miles to the park’s southern entrance. Then you can conclude your visit with an easy hop onto the interstate. Currently the park is open from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m., but at the end of this month its hours will shorten to 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Entry fee is $10 per private vehicle, good for seven days. www.nps.gov/pefo; (928) 524-6228.

WALNUT CANYON NATIONAL MONUMENT: A little over seven miles east of Flagstaff on I-40, get off at Exit 204 and drive south three miles. Currently it is open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.; the park maintains shorter hours in December and January and is open longer during the summer. Entry fee is $5 per adult (age 17 and up), good for seven days. www.nps.gov/waca; (928) 526-3367.

WUPATKI NATIONAL MONUMENT: Take Highway 89 for 31 miles north of Flagstaff, then head east on the park road for 14 miles to the monument. (Wupatki can also be reached on Loop Road through its sister national monument to the south, Sunset Crater Volcano.) Currently it is open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.; the park maintains shorter hours in December and January and is open longer during the summer. Entry fee is $5 per adult (age 17 and up), good for seven days; this fee also permits entry to Sunset Crater Volcano. www.nps.gov/wupa; (928) 679-2365.