2018-01-03_PERMIT FILE - C1981010 (5)

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1.0 INTRODUCTION At the request of Bureau of Land Management Little Snake Field Office (BLM-LSFO), Grand River Institute (GRI) was contracted by Trapper Mining, Inc. (Trapper) to conduct evaluative testing for six sites (5MF319, 5MF7691, 5MF7692, 5MF7727, 5MF7794 and 5MF7795). These six were documented during two previous inventory projects for Trapper for lease modification areas (Conner et al. 2013, OAHP No. MF.LM.Rl036; and, Conner et al. 2014, OAHP No. MF.LM.R1063). Carl Conner served as Principal Investigator for Grand River Institute (GRI) of Grand Junction, Colorado, under BLM Antiquities Permit No. C- 52775. The test excavations were carried out to meet requirements of Section 106 (54 U.S.C. § 306108) of the National Historic Preservation Act (54 U.S.0 § 300101 et seq.), the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321), Executive Order 11593 (36 F.R. 8921), the Historical and Archaeological Data -Preservation Act of 1974 (16 U.S.C. 469), the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 (43 U.S.C. 1701), and the Archaeological Resources Protection Act of 1979 (16 U.S.C. 470aa et seq., as amended). A pre -field check-in was made through the BLM-LSFO on 27 July 2015. Test excavations were conducted intermittently at the sites from August to October of 2015 by Curtis Martin (Project Archaeologist), Holly Shelton, Lucas Piontkowski, and Courtney Groff. This report was written and compiled by Conner, Martin, Groff , Barbara Davenport and Natalie Higginson. The findings from the evaluative testing are described in the following narrative. 2.0 LOCATIONS OF SITES The sites are located within Moffat County, Colorado, roughly seven miles south- southeast of Craig within T. 5 N., R. 90 W., Sections 3 and 4; and, T. 6 N., R. 90 W., Section 34; 6`h PM. (Figure 1). 3.0 ENVIRONMENT The sites lie within the Williams Fork Mountains, which form the divide between the Yampa River Valley to the north and the Williams Fork Valley to the south. Buck Peak lies to the northeast. These mountains are heavily dissected by tributary drainages that flow northeast to the Yampa River and southwest to the Williams Fork River. Permanent and intermittent drainages occurring near or within the project area include Jeffway Gulch, Deal Gulch and Spring Gulch, which drain into the Williams Fork River to the south, and Deacon Gulch, which drains into the Yampa River to the north. The headwaters of many of these are fed by unnamed springs located throughout the study area. Geologically, the sites occur within the Axial Fold Belt, a low arch between the Uinta and the White River anticlines (or uplifts). It is in the central -east portion of the fold belt and