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OWL CANYON CULTURAL RESOURCE~EN47RONMENTAL RF,CONNA/SSANCF_ <br />weathered detrium of several local sandstones, gray shale, and claystones. <br />This type of soil is characteristically found at altitudes between 5,800 to <br />6,700 feet, with an average annual precipitation rate of 16 incfies, and an <br />average annual temperature of 50° F. The frost-free season is 1 I S to 145 <br />days. In a representative profile the surface layer is grayish-brown and <br />pale-brown clay loam and heavy clay loam about 26 inches thick. The <br />underlying material is pale-brown loam that extends to a depth of 60 <br />inches or more. Permeability is slow, and the available water capacity is <br />high at this locale resulting in an atypical number of slickpots. <br />The soils in area B (see attachment# 1) are comprised of mostly <br />alluvial deposited Stoney Eutroboralfs. This soil mapping unit is <br />characterized as forming on slopes from ]0 to 65 percent but ranges to <br />nearly vertical rock outcrops. It generally forms in steep, deep, canyon <br />like drainage ways through beds of sandstone or along escarpments <br />formed by up tilted beds of sandstone. <br />The soil in area C (see attachment # 1) is a thin very stony colluvial <br />deposited Wormser Series silt loam. However, in this area the soil survey <br />does not match field observations. The relatively dense stands of <br />evergreens it supports suggests that this soil unit is mis-classified as an <br />Inceptisol, when in reality, it should be in the Entisol greater soil group. <br />Further field study will be needed to properly determine this soil groups <br />true classification. <br />Environmental Setting <br />Regional Physiography <br />Because the survey area lies within a transitional zone between Plains <br />Grassland and Pinon Pine/Juniper ecosystems a compressive field <br />assessment of local flora and fauna will have to be performed before a <br />complete list of Genius and species can be compiled. However, a few <br />valid inferences can be made at this time concerning this subject. <br />Mutel states that, "Semidesert shrublands" typical of the Colorado <br />Plateau extend as far east as the upper, "...drainages of the Arkansas River <br />and its tributaries, growing on sites from 4500 to 7500 feet in elevation <br />(89.) Although the ecosystem in the proposed quarry area bears many <br />traits of the Colorado Plateau rainfall amounts are, "slightly greater" in <br />the foothills of Southeastern Colorado (Mutel 90 ). <br />These general facts coupled with the well watered nature of the <br />