Discovery adds to theory of "lost world" beneath Lake Huron

This is a great discovery that they have uncovered at Lake Huron.

www.vancouversun.com...

The recovery of a mysterious wooden pole at the bottom of Lake Huron is fuelling excitement among U.S. and Canadian researchers that they have found more evidence of a “lost world” of North American caribou hunters from nearly 10,000 years ago.

The scientists believe that these prehistoric Aboriginal People — who would have been among the earliest inhabitants of the continent — had a “kill site” along a ridge straddling the present-day U.S.-Canada border that was eventually submerged by rising waters when the glaciers melted at the end of the last Ice Age.

The two-metre-long piece of wood, found amid such a rock assemblage during a summer search of Huron’s floor for traces of human activity, was later dated to 8,900 years ago, the researchers revealed last month.

“The first thing you notice is that it appears to have been shaped with a rounded base and a pointed tip,” University of Michigan anthropologist John O’Shea stated in a summary of the team’s research.

“There’s also a bevel on one side that looks unnatural, like it had to have been created. It looks like it might have been used as a tent pole or a pole to hang meat.”

’Shea’s principal research partner, University of Michigan marine engineer Guy Meadows, told Postmedia News last March that the Lake Huron rock formations constituted “promising” — but not definitive — evidence of an ancient human presence, and that the team was keen to gather more compelling proof.

During this past summer’s field work, deposits of pine pollen and charcoal were also identified and sampled at the site where the pole was discovered.

This is an awesome discovery. It's always exciting when we get little pieces of information that show the presence of our ancestors. A small piece of wood can have a large meaning if this is proven to be evidence of people living there. Anytime we can show links to mankind's past, we get a better picture of how we have come to be here today.

reply to post by isyeye


that's very interesting.i was watching a program a few weeks ago about the lake's and how there used to be ancient rivers that flowed through there(lake huron).i live in sarnia,so i wonder how close the site is from me.cool post

hey I live real close to Huron, between Huron and lake Simcoe. supposedly there's huge caves and a lake monster in lake Simcoe. But I'm sure it died when Orillia dumped all its sewage into the lake. oh well....

Ive always had a feeling that there's probably pyramids or something of the like in Canada that have yet to be discovered.... weve got ourselves a massive unexplored wilderness.

Here's some additional information regarding this discovery.

www.sciencedaily.com...

"This was the stage when humans gradually shifted from hunting large mammals like mastodon and caribou to fishing, gathering and agriculture," said anthropologist John O'Shea. "But because most of the places in this area that prehistoric people lived are now under water, we don't have good evidence of this important shift itself- just clues from before and after the change.

"One of the enduring questions is the way the land went under water. Many people think it must have been a violent event, but finding this large wood object just sitting on the bottom wedged between a few boulders suggests that the inundation happened quickly but rather gently. And this in turn suggests that we'll find more intact evidence of human activity in the area."

This little piece of wood may be important for several reasons. It's may help tell some of the history of earth itself. There's a decent chance that there are many more discoveries just waiting to be found at Lake Huron.

In addition to the wood specimen, the U-M researchers have collected many other samples from the bottom of the lake that they hope will provide clues about the environment before it was submerged by the rising lake water. Some of the samples are now being analyzed at U-M, while others are being analyzed by a Canadian expert on submerged site reconstruction and microdebitage -- the examination of flakes of stone that are less than one millimeter in diameter, produced in large quantities when stone tools were made.

If I recall correctly the same was true of Europe's north sea at that time as well, being dry and being home to reindeer hunting societies. Aren't reindeer and caribou closely related?

Two articles and neither of them show a picture of the Object.
They fail to state what kind of wood it is.

I seriously doubt that a piece of wood can survive under water for 8000 years.
Logs lying in the forest disintigrate to nothing in a few years depending on what kind of wood it is.
Oak lying on the ground will vanish in about 3 years.
Cherry will take 10 to 15 years or so. I have a cherry log out beside the fence now for about 8 years that is over half gone.
There was one lying beside the house in the area where the water ran off the roof. That one only lasted 5 years.
I haven't had a chance to see how long Pine would take. The ones that were here burned up in a fire that went thru, but I do have part of a pine stump that is over 30 years old. It's rotted out on the inside and only a few very hard pieces are sticking up around the edges. That one had been the victim of a fire.

reply to post by OhZone

I can't find any pictures yet, but I'm looking.....

Initially stored in a PVC tube filled with lake water, the specimen's age has now been fixed using carbon dating. It is currently undergoing more detailed analyses to determine whether there has been human modification, which visual examination suggests

Actually, wood can be preserved fairly well in cold water, especially if it is deep. There is a large market for timber in the world that was been preserved this way. Some logs that are old and well preserved can bring huge price tags.

reply to post by OhZone


exactly there is big money in recovered old growth timber. it is preserved very well under water.
and nowadays, there really isn't any old growth timber available cause we wiped so much of it out already. today's pine is fast growing and genetically modified. most slow growth trees are banned from 'harvesting'.

old growth timber salvage

that is an incredible find IMO, these little pieces are so important to what used to be, where we came from, etc. it's becoming more and more apparent that 'mankind' has been around a lot longer than science originally thought.

reply to post by OhZone


Wood can last a lot longer, and not decay nearly as quickly, if it's underwater. The examples you cite are exposed to air.
Just a factor to consider. I'm not saying that this specimen is as old as they're suggesting, only that it might be more possible because it's been submerged.

reply to post by OhZone


You are quite mistaken, my friend. Wood can be amazingly well preserved when the water is lacking oxygen, as evidenced in the Black Sea. Even in low-oxygen waters, wood can still be remarkably well-preserved, such as in Little Salt Spring here in Florida, and other places such as the Baltic Sea. Temperature also helps a great deal, the colder the water, the better the preservation in conjunction with low or absent oxygen levels.

reply to post by OhZone


The accumulated silt and sedimentation does actually protect organic material from degrading.
What do you say of ancient shipwrecks that are being discovered under the seas? of course, they wouldn't be found intact, but the wooden structures may still be found.

How'd they find it under the zebra mussels??

Originally posted by OhZone
Two articles and neither of them show a picture of the Object.
They fail to state what kind of wood it is.

I seriously doubt that a piece of wood can survive under water for 8000 years.
Logs lying in the forest disintigrate to nothing in a few years depending on what kind of wood it is.
Oak lying on the ground will vanish in about 3 years.
Cherry will take 10 to 15 years or so. I have a cherry log out beside the fence now for about 8 years that is over half gone.
There was one lying beside the house in the area where the water ran off the roof. That one only lasted 5 years.
I haven't had a chance to see how long Pine would take. The ones that were here burned up in a fire that went thru, but I do have part of a pine stump that is over 30 years old. It's rotted out on the inside and only a few very hard pieces are sticking up around the edges. That one had been the victim of a fire.

Wooden Javelin's have been found that are 400,000 years old

For wood that can still be worked the record goes to Kauri wood which goes back to 45,000 years ago

Kauri wood

The wood

All depends on the chemistry of the water and temperature

Originally posted by Headband7
How'd they find it under the zebra mussels??

Release a pack of lioness mussels. That'll clear out the zebra mussels.

Harte

Originally posted by Harte

Originally posted by Headband7
How'd they find it under the zebra mussels??

Release a pack of lioness mussels. That'll clear out the zebra mussels.

Harte

There B money in that idea....: ]

I'll have to keep an eye on this.

Live in MI and and have heard stories from some native Americans about the lakes

Over two years ago, I became interested in this story and contacted Guy Meadows about this discovery:

Great Lakes Reveal Ancient Hunting Grounds

It seems there was a land bridge which crossed the lake from Amberly (on the Canadian side) to Alpena in Michigan and that herds of caribou using that route would be driven into cul de sacs provided by stakes.

Nice to see an update.

I know it's cool to get conformation on things you suspect are true. Please forgive me for being totally underwhelmed by the knowledge that people were hunting animals a long time ago. I find the more inexplicable artifacts more compelling, things that sort of don't belong, like the cross being used a symbol in north america before the europeans settled it, or even native american oral traditions involving 'hairy man.'