Paleo Slide Set: Packrat Middens: Vegetation & Climate Variability in the Southwestern United States
Pueblo Bonita, Chaco Canyon, NM

Midden researchers are chiefly concerned with vegetation dynamics, paleoecology, and paleoclimatology. 
But midden research also helps to shed new light on the archaeology of the Southwest. Pueblo Bonito 
in New Mexico's Chaco Canyon is one of the architectural wonders of pre-Columbian America. Constructed 
in 919 A.D. (the site has been dated using tree ring chronologies), Pueblo Bonito was built by an Indian 
people known to archaeologists as the Anasazi, a Navajo (Dina) word for ancient ones. The Anasazi of the 
Southwest developed a balanced subsistence economy based on maize, squash, and beans, supplemented by 
hunting game and gathering. In the Chaco Canyon area, where a large population of Anasazi made their homes
between ~800 and ~1200 A.D., wood was in high demand both as a fuel and constructional timber. It is estimated 
that 200,000 ponderosa pine logs were used to construct the 13 multi-storied buildings in the Pueblo Bonita 
complex, while large quantities of pinon pine were used as fuelwood. 

Photo Credits:

U.S. National Park Service