Cutler Fossil Site

The Cutler Fossil Site (8DA2001) is a sinkhole near Biscayne Bay in Palmetto Bay, Florida, south of Miami. The site has yielded bones of animals and bones and artifacts of Paleo-Indians and people of the Archaic period.

The presence of fossils in a sinkhole on the Charles Deering Estate was discovered in 1979 by people searching for wood to use as knife handles. They took some unusually hard pieces they found to an archaeologist, who identified them as fossil horse teeth. The discovery was not publicized until an archaeological excavation could be mounted in 1985, but in the meantime an unauthorized collector had dug pits in the sinkhole, removing fossils and artifacts and disturbing contexts. Most of the fossils and artifacts removed by the collector were later recovered. The Deering Estate protested designation of the sinkhole as a "historically significant site", which would have protected the area from development. The site was eventually acquired by Miami-Dade County, and is now part of the Charles Deering Estate Park.

The Cutler Fossil Site is located in a sinkhole on the Miami Rock Ridge, a karstitic limestone formation running near the coast in Miami-Dade County. The ridge at the site is about 5 metres (16 ft) above the current sea level, and a couple of kilometers from Biscayne Bay. In the late Pleistocene the area was 100 metres (330 ft) or more above sea level, and many kilometers from the ocean. The sinkhole is approximately 8 metres (26 ft) by 10 metres (33 ft) in size. The pre-excavation soil surface in the sinkhole was about 7 feet (2.1 m) below the ground surrounding the sinkhole. Cores indicate that the fossil layer in the sinkhole is at least 4 metres (13 ft) deep, extending well below the water table.

The Cutler Fossil Site was excavated in 1985 and 1986, with funding from the owners of the Deering Estate. The excavation was led by Robert S. Carr of the Dade County Historic Preservation Division, with help from the Archaeological and Historical Conservancy and the Florida Museum of Natural History. A grid of 32 1-meter squares was established, and each square was excavated to just above the water table, about 6 feet (1.8 m) below the original surface. Recent disturbances to the soil were up to 2 feet (0.61 m) feet deep, and had to be removed before controlled excavation could proceed.

...
Wikipedia