Dogs can detect burials up to 5K years old

I have written several times that dogs seem to like to sit on top of stone mounds. There is lots of photo evidence. They don't seek out boulders to stand on - so the preference is not about getting a view out over the landscape.

So I always wondered if dogs smelled something (you know...like human remains) and how long after burial would something still have a detectable smell for a dog. Well, apparently the burial age can be up to 5 thousand years - more than enough to encompass the large stone mounds of our last 2 thousand years

Anyway:
(from the Atlantic)
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2020/07/dogs-archaeology-bones/613828/

(past references to dogs on rock piles)
https://rockpiles.blogspot.com/search?q=dogs

Dogs can sense magnetic fields

Not rock pile related but I thought this was of interest. People claim magnetic anomalies are common at sacred sites. 
http://phys.org/news/2014-01-dogs-sensitive-small-variations-earth.html

"Dogs on Mounds"

ClarksGully Blog Photo

http://clarksgully.blogspot.com/

And some more here:
http://wakinguponturtleisland.blogspot.com/2013/04/dogs-on-mounds.html

2013 - The Year In Review

It was a good year for rock pile hunting but I had to drive further from home to get to large pieces of woods. The year found me finishing off all the obvious places in northern Fitchburg, many places north of there in Asbhy and Ashburnham, and even getting a few miles into southern NH, in New Ipswich. I also penetrated further north in the area of Dunklee Pond in Hollis, NH. While I continued exploring, readers continued to send pictures and text, especially from GA (see "Mt Yonah") and from Nova Scotia. However there are stone turtles, split rocks, piles with hollows, etc, showing up from everywhere on the east coast. At this point just about everyone who is listening has heard about "Indian stone piles" and the subject is on its way into the mainstream.

Meanwhile, I have not been posting as regularly as in the past. Blog readership is about 1/2 of what it was a year ago. There was that particularly sad episode of people removing the top of a hollow cairn to satisfy a misplaced curiosity about contents. On top of this, I became clearer in my conviction that these large rectangles with hollows are burial mounds. The sense that I am not always welcome to be clambering around on them was particularly strong up there in NH - where the woods are glum. And now I am glum and not sure whether I want to keep up the hunt. For now, I believe I can ignore readership drop-off, ignore the occasional "educated" vandal, and maybe I can hope to find sunnier woods. 

January-February
Before the snow shut down exploring, I visited a site on an island in Bowers Brook Harvard. This was a sort of "smoking gun" because of the impossibility of a practical reason for building careful rock piles on an island in the middle of wet marsh.

March

Found the first truly nice collection of "mounds with hollows" in the part of Dover, MA called "Powissett"

 

I contacted the Trustees of Reservation, who own the land, and they distinguished themselves by a complete lack of interest. 

Also in March, I was invited to Harvard to see a lovely spot:

It was here I became aware of the idea that these mounds may have a lingering smell, detectable by dogs.

The way dogs guard a position on tops of these things is eerie.

April (the snow seems to have cleared by now)

Franklin State Forest has several sites, along the headwaters of Mine Brook. For example these old mid-sized domes:

 

Strawberry Hill in Acton, turned up a first example of a rectangle with hollows, from this part of Acton:

Amazing examples from College Rock (not a new discovery but a new part of this extensive rock pile "region")

May

Snow is long gone now. One sweet isolated example from Benjamin Hill Shirley:

And, speaking of Shirley, what was probably the most noteworthy site for me this year was an un-expected brookside "berm-and-mound" from Spruce Swamp Brook:

The reason this site was noteworthy is that it is in Shirley, where there is not much to be found, AND it is of an unusual configuration, running towards long messy berms. Later this last year, I started associating such berms with the more northern sites in Ashby and southern NH. In retrospect, this site in Shirley may be more of that general nature. This was also a site where I saw a different kind of "smoking gun" consisting of rock piles in a brook valley that had been completely silted over:

June

This was about when I was confirming that the Fort Devens stone wall map was a useful guide to rock pile sites. Like Duck Pond Ridge in Groton:

Large, fern-covered mounds at Hager Park in Westminster:

East of Watatic Pond, Ashby. A fine set of large debris-covered mounds:

July
A few odds and ends around Sippewissett in Falmouth.

August
Nothing much. 

September
The best of NEMBA: a Milford site at the center of a planned casino development:

The largest and, arguably, best stone mound of the year. From High Ridge Wildlife Management area in Westminster. A big mound with a shallow hollow on top and a short stone wall extending from it:

It was also around now that the phrase "Mayans in Georgia" got some currency from the publications of Thornton and the "People of One Fire". We had some fun with the phrase but, in the end, I urge people to treat seriously the whole topic of pan-American mound building cultures. Also paying more attention to terracing.

October
Extended the Blood Rd sites in Groton to include places north of the Crystal Springs entrance. More outlines with hollows:

Also, visited Woodbridge CT and also I gave a talk in Harvard.

More unexpected mounds from the Rubin Land in Boxborough (unexpected cuz I thought I already explored that, but was schooled by a reader)

November
Whittemore Hill in New Ipswich, NH:

It is in these northern lattitudes where the rectangles with hollows are replaced with "elongated berms with bays". Also saw them at Blood Hill and in northwestern Willard Brook:

December
Many beautiful things at Codman Hill in Harvard:

Wondrous but depressing structures from Dunklee Pond in Hollis, NH:

And many other small sites and odds and ends, everywhere in between.

Christmas and New Year's vacation continues and the snow has a decent crust by now. Maybe I'll still have some more finds before the year is done.

Burial Sniffing Dogs

We have seen this before, but here is a video, that may be new. From the footage it is pretty clear the dogs had no interest in the rock piles. I am in a whiney sort of mood. Does anyone else find the music to be a bit "cute"?

2014 - Review

Here are my most memorable places and things from 2014  [I may have missed things because it is difficult to navigate the history of this blog]

January:
Finally got to Codman Hill in Harvard without fear of tresspassing, as it has become public land. Lots of different sizes and types of piles. I liked this one at the hilltop.

Found nice features on Green Hill in Shrewsbury on Fortune Drive:

also this classic miniature pyramid across the street from the Hill:

February:

There was too much snow on the ground for exploring.

Looking at the articles, what stands out in my mind is the claim of "Mayans in Georgia". It was not too well received here but I continue to think it an interesting and, actually, pretty non-controversial suggestion.

There were posts from new contributors: Curtis Hoffman and Sydney Blackwell.  Later in the year Matthew Howe began contributing lots of pictures and information from the Holliston area. Welcome and thanks!

Also some stone tools. Might as well appreciate these little snapshots of ancient times. My river rocks from Waltham commercial building flower beds:

clay beads from Sturbridge:

arrowheads from Narragansett Bay:

March:

Readers sent in more pictures and sites, alleviating the snow imprisonment for me. 

Equinunk PA (John P):

Sinking Creek Mountain (Tim MacSweeney got this one):

Still a lot of snow on the ground. Things starting to peek through. Chris Pittman starts finding arrowheads.

I finally put together a coherent theory of how marker pile sites function to track moving shadow positions during the year.

Cairns threatened by development at Lawton-Foster Rd in Hopkinton RI.

Major finds south of Peppercorn Hill along Camp Str. Milford. Not surprising, this is a very busy area full of sites; or one big continuous site - depending on how you count them.

A site from Gamble Lake, Michigan with "stone donut" piles - proving that the rectangular pile with hollow is a universal phenomenon in the eastern US (we saw near identical features from New Brunswick, Canada):

Also, sites were reported from southeastern CT, from Mt Shasta in CA, and there was ongoing discussion of Track Rock Gap in Georgia.

April:

I found new rock piles in my home town, Concord, which is always a surprise and slightly embarrassing. I am supposed to know this place. Just goes to show that a site can be hiding in any 50 foot square piece of woods. These new piles were just uphill from Minot Pratt's spring. Also my eyes were opened to features I probably ignored in the past:

The number "9" shape was mentioned recently.

Headwaters of Fall Brook in Sterling:

Fine cairns from Worcester NY (thanks Tim):

 

Notable stories evolved with the perjury charge of "A URI professor". A sad story in several ways.

West side of South Manoosnoc finally revealed a new mound site. It is fair to say I have been looking for such a place for a while. Glad to find it in the snow:

 

and a structure against a boulder:

More amazing cairns sent in from, this time, from West Virginia (thanks again Tim):

[This reminds me that this was a year after I noticed how dogs obsessively hang out around rock piles. I am sure there is a residual smell they can detect. Maybe dogs are better than sonar for certain determinations (yeah...you know what I am talking about).] 

Also some interesting rock art at this Facebook page from the owner of the above site.

I had forgotten this. Apparently I was a good boy and found several sites on South Manoosnoc. Including some effigies near a western sub-summit.

Tim M. is finding new sites and Chris P. new arrowheads.

More incredible cairns, this time from Eastern PA:

[It is interesting, how similar these "cairns" are from PA, NY, and WV. Maybe people only notice the big things but the smaller things are there too, unnoticed.]

Still snowy, still reporting on river rocks from Waltham. I love these things:

May:

Continued exploring northwestern Willard Brook State Forest. A "chamber":

Also several hilltop sites in Leominster and Westminster.

The town of Acton finished clearing a grid site as part of their "Trail Through Time". This included signs showing the grid:

And newly visible piles - meaningful to me (cuz the shape is a variant of a "9"):

June:

Chris P is having some luck:

(My luck consisted in finding a pair of nesting goshawks.)

A new stone "Beehive" from Medway found by Matt Howe:

July:

Not much exploring going on.

August:

Franklin State Forest. They have piles with hollows too:

(If this was a hole someone dug into the pile, the removed rocks should be scattered around. Note, they are not.)

I am spending weekends at the beach; not in the woods. Matt Howe sends in many photos from Holliston, Milford, Hopkinton.

September/October:

Rocky Pond Brook in Hollis NH, some large piles integrated with adjacent homesteads:

Found new rock piles at Weatherbee Ave in Acton, on a Sunday stroll with my wife:

Top of Juniper Hill, Ashby:

Aside from NEARA, I notice the advent of many smaller regional organizations promoting the idea of Native American Stonework. It is fair to say this idea has taken pretty firm hold in several of the towns in this area: around Concord, around Deerfield, and in many other places I am not tracking closely.

November/December:

Grand mound sites in Ashburnham:

And northern Townsend:

 

and

 

Some nice sites in Westminster here, and at High Ridge:

(compare to what I was just looking at on Noon Hill - it is the same as the structure at 'C')

Other smeared rectangles at Lovewell Pond in Nashua NH:

Various strangeness on the flat sub-summit in Franklin State Forest:

The incredible furry mounds at the top of Falulah Brook - how could I forget these?

I am spending lots of time exploring in Walpole and Medfield. There are lots of interesting sites at Noon Hill and I am well pleased with the old things I spot there:

Not too dramatic a year. Mostly filling in gaps and extending previous explorations.