BLM-New Mexico Cooperative Ecosystems Studies Unit (CESU) Salado Canyon Project

In the 1970s the BLM began funding projects around the Rio Puerco within Sandoval County, New Mexico in an attempt to better understand the patterns of development, life ways, land use, distribution, migration, population dynamics and cultural history of the Native American communities found within. The ultimate goal of the projects was a landscape sized synthesis of data that would aid in land use decision making. One of the projects that were used as a test model for the Rio Puerco Project (RPP) was the Salado Canyon Project (SCP). The SCP conducted intensive survey in preparation for the RPP that included the documentation of seventy-seven newly recorded sites, all of the sites were from the PII-PIII Pueblo phase. During the recording of the sites extensive collections were gathered and cataloged and are now housed at Eastern New Mexico University (ENMU). The original field notes and survey notes are also housed at ENMU.