Where: Clallam County, Washington (48.1° N, 123.1° W: paleocoordinates 48.0° N, 123.1° W)

• coordinate stated in text

• small collection-level geographic resolution

When: Late/Upper Pleistocene (0.1 - 0.0 Ma)

• the main horizon is "63 cm" thick but the fossils only occur in the "lower 47 cm"

•an average of 13 AMS 14C dates of 11,960 +/- 17 ybp (uncalibrated) and 13,860 to 13,765 ybp (calibrated) on a mastodon rib bone is reported by Waters et al. 2011

•Petersen et al. 1983 reported four uncalibrated radiocarbon dates in stratigraphic sequence, of which the first three were clustered (12,100 +/- 310, 11,560 +/- 160, 11,000 +/- 150) and spanned the fossiliferous interval and the topmost (8,920 +/- 100) was at the very top of the main horizon and so well above the fossils

• bed-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: pond; brown, silty, carbonaceous sandstone

Size classes: macrofossils, mesofossils, microfossils

• there is a dispute over whether the assemblage is a kill site, with Gustafson et al. (1979), Grayson (2002), Waguespack and Surovell (2003), and Waters et al. (2011) saying it is and Cannon and Meltzer (2004) saying it isn't; however, "a proximal rib fragment [of a mastodon contained] a pointed bone embedded and healed in place... [it] is interpeted as the remnant of a foreshaft or projectile point. Other artifacts manufactured from bone and tusk were recovered... considerable evidence indicates that the animal was butchered [and] a crudely flaked cobble spall represents the only recognizable stone artifact. Broken and charred bones [were] contained in a concentration of charcoal found in a test pit nearby [that] may represent a camp site" (Sprague 1979), which seems a bit hard to argue with

Preservation: anthropogenic

Collected by C. E. Gustafson, R. D. Daugherty in 1977, 1978

Collection methods: salvage, quarrying,

• "discovered in the summer of 1977 when two mastodon tusks were unearthed during excavation of a pond in a marshy depression"

•repository not indicated

Primary reference: K. L. Petersen, P. J. Mehringer, Jr., and C. E. Gustafson. 1983. Late-glacial vegetation and climate at the Manis mastodon site, Olympic Peninsula, Washington. Quaternary Research 20(2):215-231 [J. Alroy/J. Alroy]more details

Purpose of describing collection: paleoecologic analysis

PaleoDB collection 93677: authorized by John Alroy, entered by John Alroy on 27.01.2010

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)