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o o w m CULTURAL RESOURCES The Greater Sagers Wash Watershed area is known to have supported prehistoric occupations of the Paleo-Indian period, Archaic period, Fonnative period, Ute peoples, as well as an early Historic occupation. There are 65 recorded archaeological sites within the study area. Most of these sites were recorded during several small scale well pad, access road and seismic line sUlVeys. Other sites were recorded during the "Cisco Cultural Resource Study: A Sample- Oriented Inventory, East-Central Utah" by Alan Reed. Cultural resources are most abundant in the higher elevations near the Book Cliffs, where juniper woodlands, active springs and seeps occur, and fauna such as mule deer. The Mancos Shale Lowlands, representing a Desert Shrub ecozone, appears rather inhospitable for past human occupation and use. There is little in way of shelter--either topographic or vegetation-- and plant and animal life is sparse. Soil and climatic conditions are not sufficient to support horticulture in much of the area, There are, however, some areas of potential use to human groups. Water is present in springs and the washes intennittentIy. Some edible plants are found, although the overall low density of individual plants makes gathering difficult. The cliff/bench/canyonlands of the Book Cliffs would have a higher site density than in the Desert Shrub stratum. To the south and southeast is the Colol'lldo River, offering a larger range of resources for human utilization. The reason that humans occupied the area could have been because the area was used as a thoroughfare for prehistoric groups moving from one area to jIIlother. The Mancos Shale Lowlands can be easily traversed due to low relief and the absence of deep drainages. Human groups could have easily crosses the area from the Book Cliffs to the Colorado River in two days time. This can be evidenced by the temporary or short-tenn lithic scatter sites that have been recorded within the study area near intennittent drainages. The earliest period of human occupation within the Cisco Desert is the Paleo-Indian culture which dates from approximately 11,500 to 8,000 years ago, Sites have been classified as Paleo- Indian if they contain distinctive fluted points, These points were used in the hunting of large, now extinct fonns of mammals such as mammoth and bison. Early man presence in the Cisco Desert is not well documented, only isolated fmds and a few surface sites have been found. Paleo-Indian stratified sites and radio-caIbon dated cultural associations have not yet been identified and studied although there is a good potential of Paleo-Indians having been in the area. I The next period of occupation is known as the Archaic period which dates from 8,000 to 2,000 years ago. The Archaic period is marked by a shift in subsistence patterns and material culture. Reliance on big game hunting shifted to a more generalized hunting and gathering lifestyle, in which the gathering of vegetal foodstuffs increased in importance and smaller faunal species were hunted. Artifact types characteristic of Archaic sites include large, stemmed and indented base projectile points, certain styles of lanceolate projectile 24