This volume of the Animas-La Plata series describes the results of excavations on Blue Mesa, a borrow area just south of Durango, Colorado, as part of the Animas-La Plata (ALP) Project. In 2002 and 2003, SWCA excavated seven sites, all of which dated to the early Pueblo I period (AD 750-850): four habitations and three limited activity sites. One of the limited activity sites also contained a small Basketmaker II component and a Paleoindian component. The authors use these limited excavation data in conjunction with previous survey data to address issues of chronology, population, and settlement on the mesa and to make comparisons with nearby Ridges Basin, the location of the ALP reservoir.

This volume of the Animas-La Plata series (SWCA Anthropological Research Paper No. 10) describes the results of excavations at one Late Archaic site, three Basketmaker II sites, nineteen Pueblo I limited activity sites, and six undated artifact scatters in Ridges Basin, located approximately 2 miles south of Durango, Colorado. The volume concludes with a summary discussion of chronology, architecture, material culture, population, subsistence, and settlement within both local and regional cultural contexts.

This volume of the Animas-La Plata series (SWCA Anthropological Research Paper No. 10) contains three sections: geomorphological studies, archaeobotanical studies, and vertebrate faunal studies. The first section comprises studies of landscape change and stability, soil fertility, and paleoclimate in Ridges Basin. The second section comprises six chapters describing and interpreting modern environmental, macrobotanical, and pollen analyses conducted as part of the project. The final section describes and interprets the vertebrate faunal data recovered during project excavations.