This is how we do it

Although it’s been quiet on the blog, there’s been plenty going on in the newly opened Culture and Archaeology Centre. The collections room has already welcomed a number of visitors, both from the village and the nearby fishing camp.

Besides giving tours, we’re still working hard in the lab, trying to clean and treat and pack away the rest of the artifacts before closing the season officially. Here’s an update on what we’ve been doing!

Amanda has been working on the pottery, drying and packing up, identifying diagnostic pieces (and throwing out a lot of rocks, charcoal and mainly bark), and discovering a large number of decorated pieces- stay tuned for her post!

These sherds are slowly dried before being carefully packed up

Meanwhile, Lindsey is braving the rain to water the tundra: she’s wet-screening last year’s bulk samples.

Rick is unpacking artifacts in the collections room, while Elli, Meta and I (Lise) are washing and labelling wood objects and putting them in PEG (Polyethylene glycol) – a substance we use to treat the wood so it can be dried and stored safely.

We label each box so we can keep track of how long each object has been in PEG – the average piece will take about 30 days.

We use these carts to dry trays of artifacts after they come out of PEG

To keep us in the right mood for lab work, we’ve been playing a lot of music, including a fine selection of 90’s/early 2000’s boyband hits. Maybe that’s why our attempt at a crew picture came out like this…

The Backfill Boys

We’ve got a few more exciting things to share soon, so make sure to check back in!

Cheers,

Lise