Building-Blocks for Estimating Ancient Maize Productivity Around Crow Canyon Archaeological Center, Cortez, Colorado
VEP researchers combine data on ancient temperature and precipitation (reconstructed from tree-rings) and soils to estimate the amount of maize that people could have grown in the past. This series of images shows an example of how those data sets are layered together spatially for a portion of the VEP North study area: the region around the Crow Canyon Archaeological Center and the Dillard Site (a Basketmaker III community center that Crow Canyon excavated from 2011 through 2014).

Panel (a) show a bird’s-eye view of the area.

Panel (b) shows the soil type boundary polygons defined during soil surveys run by the United States government.

Panels (c) and (d) show the modern amount of rain and modern mean temperature, respectively, which are calculated from regional weather stations.

In panel (c), green is wetter and red is drier; in panel (d), blue is cooler and red is warmer.

Finally, all of those data sets are layered in panel (e), which generates unique combinations of soils, temperature, and precipitation.

In panel (f), independent maize productivity reconstructions are calculated across the landscape; darker green indicates greater potential maize production.

Scale bar: 0.5 km.

Graphic by R. Kyle Bocinsky (orthoimagery and soils data provided by the U.S. Geological Survey)

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