Deep Sand: Soil and Landscape Relationships at the Blueberry Site (8HG678), Highlands County, Florida

Abstract

Soil chemical and physical analyses were conducted at the Blueberry site (8HG678) in Highlands County, Florida, to address two questions: 1) the relationship between a sand-buried Belle Glade Period midden (A.D. 1410-1455) and a much older but more superficially situated Archaic Period (4500 to 2500 B.P.) fiber-tempered locus, and 2) the nature and origin of the charcoal-laden sand layer covering the Belle Glade midden. A significant increase in coarse sand and the condition and quantity of organic carbon deep in the central part of the site imply that that area was formerly a stream or seep drainage separating the two older, more stable landforms that supported the archaeological deposits. Soil morphology, color, and chemistry, and charcoal and organic carbon distributions present evidence of past cycles of area-wide fires, episodic erosion onto the site from adjacent higher sand ridges, and partial recovery of the vegetative cover in the intervening periods between fires.