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Last summer's blazes in Colorado burned away some of the mystery about the ancient Anasazi
Monday, June 18, 2001 By Deborah Frazier, Scripps Howard News Service
MESA VERDE NATIONAL PARK, Colo. -- Thousands of blackened silhouettes of trees torched by last year's wildfires are presiding over this summer's regeneration. White sego lilies, yellow mule's ear and red Indian paint brush sprout from the ashes amid newly revealed evidence of the Anasazi, the ancient Indian civilization that lived in southwestern Colorado between 750 A.D. and about 1300.
Two wildfires last summer scorched thousands of acres of the park, but as the veils of brush, grass and trees vanished, more ruins revealed additional rooms on known sites, more kivas (a ceremonial structure), a reservoir, dozens of check dams and scores of arrowheads.
At Morefield Campground, the post-fire teams found a previously unknown kiva, two dwellings of 20 to 30 rooms each and a sizable reservoir, park archaeologist Tom Shine said.
On Wetherill Mesa, crews found at least 40 dams, whereas a previous survey had only found six. The finds indicate that dwellings may have been continuous and may have covered the mesa.
Such discoveries are important because they tell archaeologists that far more people lived in the valleys, on the mesa tops and in the cliff houses than previously thought.
"It's telling us that the population density was far greater than thought, and I'm going to say it may add 10,000 to the estimate of 25,000 Anasazi in the area," said Doug Bowman, co-director of the post-fire assessment and the archaeologist for the Ute Mountain Ute Indians.
The new discoveries are vestiges of the Bircher Fire, which erupted on July 20, consuming 23,607 acres in the park and the adjacent Ute Mountain Ute Tribal Park, and the Aug. 2 Pony Fire, which charred 5,340 acres in both parks.
The blazes threatened Mesa Verde's renowned ruins but did not cause permanent damage. There was some smoke damage to some of the ceilings on a few cliff houses but no major structural damage.
In the aftermath, about 30 archaeologists surveyed new sites uncovered by the fires, though these will not be excavated because only surface surveys are permitted.
Further, any human remains found tucked in a tiny alcove or tossed into piles of trash have been reburied without examination under an agreement with the 24 Indian tribes who claim a relationship to the Anasazi.
The Anasazi, related to modern Pueblo tribes, had trade routes from South America to the Northwest Coast before they left. Scientists estimate that the last tree cut for a dwelling was felled in 1283, but the mystery of the Anasazi's departure endures.
"We're seeing more evidence that there was strife in the late 1200s, including finding more rooms crammed into the cliffs, more people cramped into rooms and, at the Long House, more rooms made into kivas," Bowman said.
The findings are only part of the activity going on in the nation's premier archaeological park. Working with archaeologists are some 30 stabilization experts packing fine wood shavings around cliff dwellings and clusters of rooms to prevent erosion from carrying away more treasures of the ancients.
Other crews are working to further reduce fuels, a lesson Tim Oliverius, the park's fire management officer, saw underscored last year. After enduring years of criticism for conducting prescribed burns, removing dead trees and yanking out brush, Oliverius takes pride that the museum, park offices and cliff dwellings survived the fires.
Extreme fires could strike Mesa Verde again, especially in the 15,000 acres that have escaped fire for the past 50 years, he said.
"We'll have fire here again someday, but hopefully we'll have finished all our thinning," Oliverius said.
But fire probably won't be such a problem this year.
Last year, the snowpack was 40 percent less than normal and the relative humidity stayed in the single digits. By July, moisture in the large, dead trees that can burn at super hot temperatures was 4 percent.
Dewey Higley, assistant fire program manager, said the situation this year is far better. The snowpack is only 17 percent short, the relative humidity is about 20 percent and the moisture level in the heavy fuels is 10 percent.
"I don't anticipate that it will be as bad this year. We're in better shape," Higley said. "Of course, if the weather dries out, it could get bad. You never know what can happen."
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