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Tree-Rings and Droughts

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2017

Wilfrid C. Bailey
Wilfrid C. Bailey*
Affiliation:
Dept. of Anthropology, University of Texas, Austin, Texas.
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Extract

Harold S. Gladwin in a recent publication voiced a question of vital importance to Southwestern archaeology. Can dendrochronology tell us anything concerning the effects of climate on aboriginal agriculture?

Both Douglass and Schulman have claimed that correlations can be established between tree-growth and winter precipitation, but each of them has been explicit in saying that summer rainfall has little, if any effect upon the growth of trees. Since it would seem that summer rainfall, during the crop-growing months, is the only season of moisture which could effect the agricultural well being of Pueblo peoples, I do not see how narrow tree-rings can be regarded as providing any indications of economic disaster in ancient times.

Type
Facts and Comments
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 14 , Issue 1 , July 1948 , pp. 59 - 61
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1948

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