James -
 
We excavated a privy dating from ca. 1860-1870 in 1996 which contained a
large amount of seeds and coprolites. We sent our flotation samples to
Linda Scott Cummings and PaleoResearch Labs in Colorado for botanical,
pollen and parasite analysis. They were able to identify many edible
plants, pollens which helped define the environment for the time and some
parasites which aided in interpreting who was using the privy and health
aspects of the inhabitants. We only did a subset of all of the flotation
samples we collected for cost reasons but felt it was well worth it.
 
 
Susan Snow
Project Archaeologist
Office of the State Archaeologist
University of Iowa
Iowa City, IA 52242
 
(319) 335-2396
(319) 335-2776 FAX
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