[Music]
[Music]
the springs have been active for
millions of years as a source of fresh
water this area would have been a prime
location for human habitation since our
earliest ancestors here in North America
a site this large in this complex is
really more than any one person can
fully understand over the course of
their career or their lifetime what we
have here is is really a unique
opportunity to document the fact that
folks have been attracted to this lovely
spring side setting since the since
before the end of the last ice age
Spring Lake is a time capsule and the
springs were dammed 150 years ago
essentially creating an underwater
archaeological preserve and protecting
what once we’re terrestrial deposits in
an aquatic underwater environment with
funding from the National Geographic
Society and the Waite Institute and in a
collaboration between the meadow Center
for water in the environment in the
center for archaeological studies here
on campus at Texas State University
we’ve initiated the first ever
underwater geo archeology survey of
Spring Lake the first phase of the
project is a sub bottom profile survey
and basically what that is is there’s an
electronic apparatus that’s connected to
a bunch of computer monitors on our
barge and we just drive lanes back and
forth throughout the lake and we
basically what we like to call mow the
lawn and what that does is it pings it
uses sound sort of like a fish finder
then it catches the echo back off of the
off of the lake bed but it also reads
into the sediments so that gives us an
idea of the depth of the sediment how
thick they are levels of compaction you
can actually see some some Stratego fior
different layers of sediment in the
electronic readout
the second phase is subsequent to the
first because the sub bottom profile
survey will give us an idea of what
targets are the best in order to take
core samples which will give us a
snapshot of that depositional history
[Music]
we’ll take the core samples back to the
laboratory will to be cut in half and
then we will do the analysis of the
sediments this clay is kind of showing
soil development and then it would make
sense that charcoal and that possibly
campfires and that will allow us to have
a better understanding of truly what the
history was here and what were people
doing and what was the environment like
over the course of time here in the
springs we’re optimistic that the
results of this project are going to
help guide and direct and make more
efficient archaeological and scientific
research for many many years to come to
get this kind of seed money to help do
this Phase one survey or assessment has
been really important for us working in
this environment is really cool not to
mention the fact that this is right on
campus being able to work in a setting
of such natural beauty and and actually
interact with history we’re barely
scratching the surface on on what this
area has to tell us about our past
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
the springs have been active for
millions of years as a source of fresh
water this area would have been a prime
location for human habitation since our
earliest ancestors here in North America
a site this large in this complex is
really more than any one person can
fully understand over the course of
their career or their lifetime what we
have here is is really a unique
opportunity to document the fact that
folks have been attracted to this lovely
spring side setting since the since
before the end of the last ice age
Spring Lake is a time capsule and the
springs were dammed 150 years ago
essentially creating an underwater
archaeological preserve and protecting
what once we’re terrestrial deposits in
an aquatic underwater environment with
funding from the National Geographic
Society and the Waite Institute and in a
collaboration between the meadow Center
for water in the environment in the
center for archaeological studies here
on campus at Texas State University
we’ve initiated the first ever
underwater geo archeology survey of
Spring Lake the first phase of the
project is a sub bottom profile survey
and basically what that is is there’s an
electronic apparatus that’s connected to
a bunch of computer monitors on our
barge and we just drive lanes back and
forth throughout the lake and we
basically what we like to call mow the
lawn and what that does is it pings it
uses sound sort of like a fish finder
then it catches the echo back off of the
off of the lake bed but it also reads
into the sediments so that gives us an
idea of the depth of the sediment how
thick they are levels of compaction you
can actually see some some Stratego fior
different layers of sediment in the
electronic readout
the second phase is subsequent to the
first because the sub bottom profile
survey will give us an idea of what
targets are the best in order to take
core samples which will give us a
snapshot of that depositional history
[Music]
we’ll take the core samples back to the
laboratory will to be cut in half and
then we will do the analysis of the
sediments this clay is kind of showing
soil development and then it would make
sense that charcoal and that possibly
campfires and that will allow us to have
a better understanding of truly what the
history was here and what were people
doing and what was the environment like
over the course of time here in the
springs we’re optimistic that the
results of this project are going to
help guide and direct and make more
efficient archaeological and scientific
research for many many years to come to
get this kind of seed money to help do
this Phase one survey or assessment has
been really important for us working in
this environment is really cool not to
mention the fact that this is right on
campus being able to work in a setting
of such natural beauty and and actually
interact with history we’re barely
scratching the surface on on what this
area has to tell us about our past
[Music]
[Music]
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