Don  Lancaster's Guru's Lair 2014 Blog Canal Excerpts
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Sand Wash Prehistoric Canal has been verified as #33. Some preliminary
field notes....

Observations on Acme Mapper suggested yet another canal complex in 
the previously unstudied Nuttall Canyon drainage area. A portion of this
canal has been verified as highly likely to be both prehistoric and 
typical of the assemblage. And seems to presently form the westernmost 
confirmed candidate in the hanging canal study area.

The primary study area lies on State and BLM Land just off the Sand Tank 
road and offers exceptionally easy vehicle and foot access. State lands are 
south of the fence and gate; BLM to the north.

Field verification included a Sand Wash level area, followed by a classic but 
low hanging "climbing" portion with the usual "water flows uphill" illusion, 
followed by a fairly deep cut, followed by a long mesa top run. Most 
of which are fully typical of other canal reaches in the study area.

The long mesa top reach, though, appears highly atypical in that it
is quite small, being well less than half normal size. And would
appear unlikely to be able to deliver significant water a long
distance.

A premise as to why no canal survey tools exist system wide might
be that pilot extensions of the canals themselves served as water
levels. Once a route of credible slope was statically verified,
the actual major canal construction could be expanded. The size
of the mesa top canal reach would seem to add credence to being a 
work in progress, acting as a pilot to the intended full canal.

Further canal routing to the north is restricted by modern private
homesite development. Cottonwood Wash would seem to place a
fairly near limit on how much more northern extent is missing.

Areas to the south have not yet been studied. The sand wash itself
may be a takein point, despite its very name suggesting an inability
to deliver surface water long distances. This wash is normally dry,
but a historically built and large Sand Tank apparently saw some
water development potential. Despite the main Sand Tank watershed
being apparently limited in size and largely disconnected from
mountaintop snowmelt access.

There is a curious other possibility for a water source. An eastern
branch of Sand Wash actually "almost" merges with perennual Nuttall 
Canyon stream at N 32.77695 W 109.9562. Water diversion at this point 
would appear to be within the bounds of prehistoric capability. The USFS
presently has a gravity fed stock tank in this area that clearly verifies
such a possibility. This tank project is remarkably similar to one 
overlaying a prehistoric canal in the Frye Mesa Falls area.

Regardless of the ultimate source of water, this canal seems to rather
strongly suggest both a wetter climate and more robust stream runoff 
than present.

The canal preservation is remarkably good in the initial study area.

A twelve inch Mesquite tree mid channel and highly consistent patina 
and caliche add further to the canal's credibility in the study area.
Somewhat disconcerting is the presence of a single glazed terra cota 
drain pipe placed in the canal wall to dump any water back into Sand 
Wash. Possibly this state land recent construct was done to prevent 
further silt deposition.

Images to date can be viewed as...

sand1 East from mesa top shows unusually small size.
sand2 West from mesa top from same location.
sand3 Near the state lands fence line border.
sand4 A "water flows uphill" from "hanging" area.
sand5 Typical reach between hanging and deep cut.
sand6 Rather deep cut south of state land fence.

One of the implications of this canal is that the canals in the Lefthand 
Canyon area are no longer an outlier. And instead seem to be a fully
integrated portion of the Bajada hanging canal complex. This canal also
adds credibility to the historic Minor Webster Ditch system also
having prehistoric origins.

More on the hanging canals here.
Ongoing developments in https://www.tinaja.com/whtnu15.shtml and earlier. 
Field mice and research assistants welcome.

It is a bit early to call this Canal #33 or Prehistoric Sand Wash Canal,
but its Acme Mapper hints sure look intriguing.

While not yet field verified, this sure looks like a water development
starting in Sand Wash with an initial "hanging" portion followed 
by a linear on-mesa run of half a mile or so.

Alternately, this could be an extension of the known Lamb Tank canal.

Such a canal would need more water than is typical of today's wash.
But somebody once historically built the fairly large Sand Tank further 
upstream.

More interestingly, there is an east branch to Sand Wash that seems to
go all the way up to Nuttall Canyon. Provided some prehistorically 
managable diversion took place near N 32.77672 W 109.95655.

The main Nuttall stream appears perennial at this point.

Curiously, there is an apparent USFS gravity tank development
here that is remarkably similar to the one skirting Frye Mesa
Falls. There is strong evidence of the latter being "steal the plans"
blueprint borrowing from a prehistoric original.

If real, Canal #33 would have some strong implications involving
rainfall and climate. Being westernmost known to date, it would 
further integrate the Lefhtand Speer canals into the main regional 
canal system.

Field mice and research assistants are most definitely welcome.

An interactive master GIS map of Arizona land ownership
can be found at http://gis.azland.gov/webapps/parcel/

Uh, there seems to be a brand new and conspicuously posted
gate blocking Coyote Drive, the usual access route to both
the Lefthand Archasological District and the Goat Hill Ruin.

There does seem to be an alternate workaround route to
the west of Lefthand Canyon. Which may or may not also
eventually end up gated and posted.

Much more Gila Dayhike info here and here. I'll be talking
on some of this at Discovery Park on January 24th.

So, how can you tell something seems to be a prehistoric
canal, rather than a vehicle two-track, a cowpath, a
game route, an old fence, an historic wagon road, a film 
scratch, or ATV damage? 

The glib answer is that you know it when you see it.
And, of course, field verify it.

Some other guidelines include...

The slope will be very low and nearly constant,
typically around one percent.

The slope will NEVER be negative! Not even for
a little bit.

GPS, Google Earth, and Barometric devices are 
not nearly accurate enough to measure slope.
Required is an automatic level. Or possibly 
a new cellphone ap.

The routing will be rather straight but not
transit straight and almost always will not be in
a consistent cardinal direction.

When appropriate, portions of the route may be
literally "hung" on mesa edges, making slope
largely independent of adjacent terrain.

Construction effort will be seen to be exceptionally
energy efficient, with most effort being directed
across rather than along the route. Caused by
the lack of beasts of burden or iron age tools.

Routings ultimately end up extremely purposeful,
efficiently going from reliable water sources to 
needed field destinations.

Both Acme Mapper and field evidence will typically
be vague and indistinct. And broken by both natural
erosion, flood damage, and modern constructs.

Any omissions to totally exploiting Northeastern Mount 
Graham water will be conspicuous by their absence.

The route will often be run over without accomodation
by dams, roads, fences, and even cemeteries.

There will be many other similar routings in the area
with similar goals, architectures, and appearance.

"Steal the plans" historic or recent reuse will usually 
be obvious. Especially if the CCC was involved. 
Reuse tends to only use a portion of the entire route. 
And significantly omits much in the way of expected
concrete, iron, or maint roads.

The center will usually have originally been significantly
lower than the surrounding terrain, with "spoil piles" 
often defining the edges.

Rock patina, caliche, and lichens will be uniform and 
properly oriented. 

Cacti, large Mesquite trees, and slow growing and non 
water loving shrubs may be present mid channel.

During floral blooms, "dead flowers" may clearly mark 
the routes, owing to fine grained fill moisture retention. 

A strong illusion of "water flowing uphill" is often present.

Vehicle two tracks tend to be more obvious, more uniform 
and of much wider width. They also tend to orient with 
historic or more modern needs.

Routing will usually be along drainges, rather than across.
CCC projects tend to be across rather than along.

Projects will appear to be "big picture" consistent with the
total energy efficient explotation of a major regional
water resource.

"Counterflow" runs where the route runs downward into 
rising terrain will be very rare and specifically goal 
oriented. Such as positioning for a wash crossing or 
returning water to a natural drainage.

When fully traced, the route will be both exceptionally 
consistent and exceptionally long. Six miles is not at
all unusual in the present studies.

Unless recently reworked, the channel will tend to be 
full of water born or aeolean fine grained fill.

Here's a rough draft of a tentative PR blurb for my January 
Gila Hikes talk... 

======================================================= 

"Gila Valley Day Hikes" subject of Saturday's Discovery Park Talk. 

Local author and researcher Don Lancaster returns to the 
Discovery Park lecture series this Saturday January 24th in the 
Jupiter Room at 6:30 PM. Topics will include new info and revisions 
on some little known local day hikes, along with a major update ( now 
including many new maps and well over 400 locations ) to 
https://www.tinaja.com/gilahike.shtml 

Potential hikes will include San Carlos Falls, Hannah Hot Springs, 
El Capitan Canyon, and many of the other usual suspects. And, of 
course, the UFO fish fillets of Taylor Canyon. 

You can preview portions of the talk at https://www.tinaja.com/tinsamp1.shtml 
or pick up more specifics at https://www.tinaja.com/glib/unusualh.pdf 

Reports on the latest Gila Valley Hiking Club activities including 
a McEniry Tunnel trip are also expected. An original web source for 
the McEniry Prospectus seems to have disappeared, but a new copy 
is now available through https://www.tinaja.com/glib/mtso.pdf 

This blatant investment scam was based on tunnelling all the way 
through twelve miles of Mt. Graham. In which you would simply 
scrape the gold off the ceiling directly into your ore car. 
Sadly, the geology of Mt. Graham consists largely of precambrian intrusives 
that are nearly totally unmineralized. It was also not quite clear 
how you would ventillate twelve tunnel miles using 1906 technology. 

More into on the hiking club can be reached through 
http://www.visitgrahamcounty.com/Gila_Valley_Hiking_Club/ 

Discovery park is located near the corner of Discovery Park Boulevard 
and 20th Avenue in Safford Arizona. For more details, contact Paul 
Anger or Jackie Madson at(928)428-6260 or discoverypark@eac.edu . 

Suggested Companion Photo...

   https://www.tinaja.com/glib/tramtower.pdf 

     Drawing of a typical Mt. Graham Tramway tower. Portions of the 
     challenging route up Shingle Mill Canyon can still be explored. 

Alternate Companion Photos...

    https://www.tinaja.com/canal/images/mary2.jpg 

      One of the more spectacular prehistoric bajada "hanging" canal 
      reaches. Thirty two canals with a total length over fifty 
      miles are presently under study. Additional researchers are 
      welcome. 

   https://www.tinaja.com/canal/images/bestgrid.jpg 

      There are many thousands of prehistoric dry farming agave 
      grids north of the Gila River and a few hundred more to the 
      south. 

   https://www.tinaja.com/images/fishup.jpg 

      Little known and seldom visited Fisherman's Point just into 
      New Mexico offers spectacular cliffs, swimming, picnicking, and hiking. 

   https://www.tinaja.com/images/rob2.jpg 

      The Robinson Ranch Ditch was based on a prehistoric original 
      and still creates a strong illusion of "water flowing uphill". 

   https://www.tinaja.com/images/msrr1.jpg 

      Historic photo of the Morenci Southern Railroad. Several steel 
      bridges and tunnels ( and one loop ) remain. These are fairly 
      easily visited.

Prehistoric hanging canal candidate #32 appears to be well northwest
of the Cluff Ponds area.

This appears to be a disused modern canal whose obvious hallmarks
are three concrete control structures found at N 32.82803 W 109.84607,
N 32.82835 W 109.84603, and N 32.82875 W 109.84582.

And two more at N 32.83039 W 109.84473 and N 32.83047 W 109.84470.

This reach could be part of the Minor Webster Ditch System, or 
could separately have been derived from Lower Ash Creek.

While no prehistoric origins have yet been proven, there is no
credible reason why they should not exist, based on canal 
strucutres and developments elsewhere in the system.

Combined with the obvious exploitation of virtually every
drop of Northeastern Mt. Graham stream resources.

This world class prehistoric hanging bajada canal system is
getting totally out of hand, and is already well beyond the 
capabilities of two semi retired researchers.

Field mice and associates are most definitely in order.
Please email me for details.

Made some updates and corrections to our Prehistoric
Hanging Canals sampler and directory.

Sourcecode for the Prehistoric Hanging Canal Engineering
has had its link repaired.

Added one of the Maderia Levitas to the image collection.

Added the Lair Mt. Graham CNF Survey to our third party
papers.

Here are some Canal 31 details to add to our "by watershed" 
summaries of our hanging canals.

Tentative name is the Goat Tank canal. It has not yet been field
verified, but the Acme Mapper evidence is compelling and there
apparently is a CNF area study available that we have not yet
received.

It is presumed to source from Jacobson Creek near N 32.68467 
W 109.76145, pass west of Goat Tank near  N 32.68243 W 109.75862, 
and continue along the southern edge of Ledford Mesa near 
N 32.68268 W 109.74505, N 32.68507 W 109.73921, and apparently 
supports a modern but possibly disused pipeline at N 32.68468 W 
109.72937.

This strongly suggests that the Ledford Tank area might have been
the most intensively developed of all the known prehistoric canal
systems. It also apparently partially flows and still supports several
cattle tanks. Eastern trending jogs in the CNF boundary seem to greatly 
add to their portion of the canal systems.

It is somewhat embarassing to find such a major discovery relatively
late in the hanging canal research. The only excuse I have is that
I simply did not notice it. And that the previous Ledford area canals
were already much more than significant.

Access also appears to be somewhat difficult.

An independent archaeological survey of the Ledford Tank and
Goat Tank areas can be newly found here. I used Acrobat XI
to make their document fully text searchible.

While still largely unexplored, the hanging canals in this area might
end up being the densest developed portion of the entire 80+
kilometer hanging bajads canals system. 

More details here. 

Acme mapper has strongly suggested a new prehistoric canal #31
that appears to be a southern extension of the Ledford Complex...

http://mapper.acme.com/?ll=32.68774,-109.74391&z=15&t=H
&marker0=32.68235%2C-109.75862%2C5.1%20km%20WxSW
%20of%20Artesia%20AZ
&marker1=32.68549%2C-109.73224%2C2.8%20km%20WxSW
%20of%20Artesia%20AZ
&marker2=32.68272%2C-109.74508%2C4.0%20km%20WxSW
%20of%20Artesia%20AZ&marker3=32.68507%2C-109.73923
%2C3.4%20km%20WxSW%20of%20Artesia%20AZ
&marker4=32.68467%2C-109.72937%2C2.6%20km
%20SW%20of%20Artesia%20AZ

Tentative name would be the Goat Tank canal. The area appears very
difficult to explore. The canal seemss to support a modern pipeline
as well. Evidence suggests that the Ledford Complex may end up being
the most intensively developed of all the prehistoric canals.

A major step forwared in open source documentation with
Nature Magazine now offering free viewing of all papers.

They have some scheme to allow viewing only, rather 
than downloading or printing. It is not clear how such
a scheme would bypass screen grabs with that obscure
PrintScreenSysRq keyboard key.

Science magazine would also be very likely to follow
suit, but IEEE can be expected to drag their feet.

Just as the key revolution in creating documents was
to typeset first and edit last, the key to open sourcing
is to publish first and peer review later.

Academia.edu is a leading open source publisher.
Additional resources include Wesrch, Doaj,
Questia, Stanford, Wikipedia, Plos One,
Figshare, Quartzy, Mendeley, Vixra, MyScienceWork,
Arxiv, and SSRN, 

Have some Maderia M'Dear?

What would things look like if our prehistoric hanging canal
folks also had some access to concrete and iron? It turns
out one possible answer can be found on the small Portugeese
island of Maderia.

Where you will find lots of spectacularly similar hanging canals
comparable to those of Southeastern Arizona except for the
obviously improved modern technology.

These are caled levadas, and among more obvious uses, they 
are outstanding hiking trails. One guided tour can be found here.

As far as I know so far, these are the only worldwide comparable
hanging canal features known. Development was almost certainly
totally independent. 

But both based on the same fundamental engineering principle
that the slope of a hanging canal can be made largely independent
of the surrounding terrain. Much more here. 

Added A tour of some prehistoric hanging canal images  to
academia.edu.

Added Newly discovered trinchera in Southeastern Arizona.jpg
to the Wikimedia Commons. A rotated and somewhat 3D Google 
Earth version can also be found here.

Added our newly revised Some Gila Valley Day Hikes to Wesrch.

Some Gila Valley Hiking Club projects that should tie in with
our prehistoric hanging canals are tentatively planned for
mid January.

You are certainly welcom to participate. More details as
they unfold. A talk of mine on our newly revised Gila 
Valley Day Hikes is also scheduled for mid January in
Discovery Park.

Just found out that nearly all of the New Mexico
subastas are going to be sold at auction!

Sales and shipping to New Mexico aren't quite as
bad as they used to be. Yeah, there's still the language
barrier and the hassles at customs.

One main problem was that all the New Mexico truck 
tires are all a different size and spacing, so everything 
needed  reloaded at the border crossings.

Fortunately, there are now REVERSIBLE truck tires that
can simply be insided out at the New Mexico ports of
entry.

More details at your nearest New Mexico embassy.

Acme Mapper has proven to be enormously useful for our 
Hanging Canal research. Despite having "not quite" the 
resolution needed to actually see most portions of most 
canals.

Aerial canal views tend to be more or less invisible anyway.

A reminder that addresses and place names found in 
Google Maps can be entered, besides the usual lat-lon
in many different formats.

I was wandering around an obscure part of Arizona with
Acme, and discovered a knoll top collection of four nested
triangles. Whose most likely explanation are quite old
prehistoric Trincheras. On checking with a trinchera specialty
archaeologist, I found that these may in fact be unknown to the 
scientific community.

Acme's major contribution here was the ability to instantly switch
between topo mapping and satellite imaging. As mentioned before,
it sure would be nice to be able to selectively blend the two.

As per this very crude example of Pacman, Arizona.

On further inspection, several dozen adjacent knoll tops also
had what may or may not be man made structures. While only 
one other one has a somewhat triangular motif, when considered
in context, the others do suggest possible tentative trinchera 
candidates.

There is not the slightest hint of any relationship with CCC water
spreaders. Their viewing literally screams "very old". CCC stuff
tends to be down on the flats, focused on drainages, sharply imaged,
and virtually never on knoll peaks.

Why such a ( now ) arid and ( now ) desolate area would have been
chosen at all remains highly enigmatic.

These are located south of the Mackenzie River.

Your comments  welcome.

Grahm County wines?

A fledging industry seems to have strted with some fifty tons
of grape harvest by Bonita Springs Vinyards. These folks
are just north of the tomato factory at N 32.47433 W 109.93799.

Admittedly, this part of Grahm county is very much more Willcox
oriented, rather than Safford associated.

Much more on interesting things to do in Graham County here.

accademia.edu seems to be a second alternative to http://www.wesrch.com/ .

They have 15 million people and four million papers combined with
16 million visitors per month.

I have yet to evaluate them or work with them.

Except for a few yet to be adjusted typos, our fully revised
Gila Day Hikes is now ready to go. We are in the process
of taking out all of the old typos and putting new ones in.

Besides additions and updates and corrections, the big new
feature is that most locations are now spelled out as Lat and 
Long.

Such locations are purposely NOT provided on certain caves, 
indian ruin habitations, and a few other highly sensitive entries. 

The lat longs can be directly clicked into Acme Mapper. From 
there you can switch between topo, satellite, and other display
formats. 

Such locations typically are in the usual blue and appear at the 
end of each listing. 

The easiest way to find these is to go to our home page, and, if
the brown saguaro banner is not up, keep refreshing until it
appears. 

Then click through to reach https://www.tinaja.com/gilahike.shtml.

We'll have a Discovery Park lecture on these updates in
mid January. 

Please report any additions or corrections or anything I missed.

Naturally, Arizona has no caves to speak of. And super
secrecy is a hallmark of Arizona Caving.

BUT - Mescal Crack seems about to vanish off the face
of the earth. Besides, you cannot get there from here.

Somewhere near N 33.87363 W 110.80808 is a very tight
and narrow 95 foot + deep pit in Precambrian Mescal 
Limestone. While it was somewhat visible on a previous 
satellite image on  Acme Mapper, it now seems to have 
newly disappeared entirely.

Many hundreds of CAG manhours went into the initial 
search decades ago for this ultra remote cave. Over the 
years, the then dim bulldozer track accessing it seems to 
have disappeared almost entirely. 

Very few Apache Group precambrian cave features are 
known. 

A second legenday pit is also rumored to be two miles
northwest more or less in which "rocks roll forever" and
whose tentative name is strawberry awful. 

On the bright side, though, the Q Ranch is now reportedly
an outstanding bed and breakfast.

Other unusual locations here.

A few years ago, I was at a lecture where they asked "What
is one of the indicator species of overgrazing?"

They sure got upset when I replied "Cows". 

Don't know if it is a recent update or not, but the FIND
feature of Acme Mapper now seems amazingly flexible in
that it can find most street addresses, place names, and 
pretty much anything that's also findable in Goggle Maps.

Did I ever tell you about my secret Fire Lookout's gourmet
recipe for boiled can?

There's a 24 hour prep time involved since you have to use the
previous night's dishwater. 

Many thanks to all of you who attended last night's
Hanging Canal lecture. Despite heavy tailgating 
competition, we ended up with more or less of a 
full house.

This was an interesting experiment in a "tag team
lecture". Many thanks to Dr. Neely for joining me.

There are many, many hanging canal projects we could
use your help ( and funding! ) on. Besides being fun
dayhikes, these could give you the opportunity to 
actually participate in real world class scientific research. 

Once project in particular would involve some fancy 
ATV exploration in a diffucult to reach portion of
Deadman Mesa. Please contact me if you have any
interest in this.

Much more on the hanging canals here.

A very short notice reminder that both Dr. Neely and
myself will be talking about our prehistoric hanging canals
tonight at 6:30 in the Jupiter Room of Discovery Park.

You can preview the talk here, with more on the hanging 
canals here.

Discovery Park is located near the corner of 20th avenue
and Discovery Park Boulevard in Safford, Arizona.

Dr. Neely and I spent a very interesting morning with George
Hayes, the manager of the Cluff Ponds facility of Arizona Game and
Fish. A better name for what we called the Cluff Ponds canal would
Be the presently inactive Smith Tank Canal. Its source is easily traced 
to a multi gated diversion structure on Ash Creek near N 32.81347
W 109.84917

A new area that we are going to call the Cluff Southwest Complex 
centers on N 32.82521 W 109.85507 and has a collection of
1930's era diversion structures that appear to overlay more of
our prehistoric hanging canals. We'll tentatively call this 
Canal #31 and believe it pushes the total well past sixty miles.

When combined with the previously studied Minor Webster
Ditch system, there are a total of three canal areas on interest in
the Cluff areas. Proving these in fact have prehistoric origins
may end up enormously difficult, but such prehistoric origins
would certainly be very conspicuous by their absence.

Several unrelated questions came up during our visit. As best as
I know, the actual Shingle Mill was much further up the canyon
than most people believe and was somewhere near the Hulda
Gap Corrral near 6000 feet elevation. I do not know where
the end of the logging flumes were, but photos in the Pima
Museum might prove useful.

Much more on the Allen Dam disaster here, with more on
Gila Valley dayhikes here.

I've had several requests to expand and improve the actual
locations of our Gila Valley Dayhikes. And will be doing 
most of these, except for very sensitive locations or any
that I am unsure about or have not personally verified.

The new locations will mostly be in purple. You can easily
cut and paste them into Acme Mapper or Google Earth.

I expect the process will take a few weeks to complete.
Your comments welcome. A Discovery Park lecture is
planned for mid January. 

A reminder that I will be doing a Hanging Canal lecture
in the Discovery Park Jupiter Room this Saturday October
18th at 6.30 PM. The lecture is free and some southwestern
archaeologists are likely to also participate.

You can preview portions of the talk here.

Discovery Park is located near the corner of Discovery Park Boulevard
and 10th Avenue in Safford Arizona.

Also, several tours are planned the week of October 13 to
18th, and some slots are still open if you want to join us.

You can email me for details.

If a premise on our Prehistoric Hanging Canals that "they" 
fully exploited literally every drop of available Northeastern
Mt. Graham water and related springs and artesian sources
is valid, and if the system can be assumed to have been 
complete or nearly completed, and that most historical canals
in the area were "steal the planse" or "borrow the blueprints"
to "dig out a n old ditch" it might be of interest to reqgoup the 
canal arrangements by watersheds.

Starting from the southeast...

P RANCH CANYON - This would appear to be the far limit
of possible canal development with an obvious takein point
at N 32.59434 W 109.73912 and a possible secondary one in 
Veech Canyon. Despite many research trips and persistent 
local rumors, no significant results have yet been observed. 
There is a possible small canal reach of indeterminate age at 
N 32.61347 W 109.72820 and an apparent water control 
structure at N 32.65462 W 109.71854

LEFTHAND CANYON EAST - There are two Lefthand
Canyons, with this one being the easternmost near the
Metate Peak area around N 32.67358 W 109.73808.
This region forms an unstudied "gap" in canal occurances 
and may have in fact been devoid of perannual water sources.

JACOBSON CANYON - Forms the apparently still used
Ledford Tank Complex at N 32.68618 W 109.74301 with 
numerous branches and steep off mesa drops. Largely still 
understudied due to somewhat difficult access.

MARIJILDA CANYON - A very rich and well studied area
sourcing from N 32.70626 W 109.77726. Several smaller branch 
canals diverge from this point. The main Marijilda Ditch at 
N 32.71724  W 109.76735 was historically reworked and still 
sees use to this day, feeding Lebanon Resovoir #2 at N 32.73493 
W 109.76074. A southern divergence formed the possibly older
and original Henry's canal, studied from N 32.73760 W 109.74198
to N 32.74566 W 109.72640. Meanwhile, the High Marijilda original 
canal first crosses an aquaduct at N 32.72371 W 109.76240 and 
then forms one of the most spectacularly hanging portions at
N 32.73317 W 109.75794 and eventually feeding Lebanon Resovoir #2 
at and sourcing the ( likely ) updated modern Roper Canal terminating 
at N 32.75569 W 109.70786. A second presumed branch from Lebanon
Resovoir #2 is believed to be buried under modern agricultural development,
eventually "tunneling" under the Lebanon Cemetary at N 32.76159 W 
109.73320 and forming the Twin East Canal feeding the Twin Boobs 
ponding area at. N 32.76603 W 109.73595. Seperately, the Rincon Canyon
is believed to route down its namesake at N 32.75326 W 109.75370 servicing 
several domestic sites and possibly becoming the Twin West Canyon also 
delivering to the Twin Boobs ponding area at N 32.76603 W 109.73595.

TRANQUILITY CANAL - Believed to be unique as it is potentially artesian
sourced, shorter, and routes over private inholdings. Possibly originates
somewhere near N 32.75759 W 109.73297and believed to deliver water to 
the Cooks Resorvoir area at N 32.77415 W 109.72812. While portions are 
clearly modern,  an underlying prehistoric original remains somewhat 
likely but unproven. At one point, the Tranquility Canal comes amazingly
close to the Twin East canal, seperated only by a significant cliff of only
30 feet or so of height. The two remain presumed totally unrelated. 

DEADMAN CANYON - An original and significantly hanging portion is
believed to have been replaced by a modern pipeline from N 32.73900 
W 109.81155 to N 32.74463 W 109.80704. This canal still flows to this
day, servicing several top mesa tanks. Area has evidence of "knife Edging"
where canals are carefully routed acorss the highest possible and extremely
narrow mesa tops. An apparent three way switch at N 32.76058 W 109.78133 
seemed to allow selective routing to Porter Springs Tank at N 32.77033 
W 109.77811, Upper Deadman Tank at N 32.75845 W 109.77030, and 
Lower Deadman Tank at N 32.77141 W 109.75142 Meanwhile, a potential 
and enigmatic southern knife edge branch remains unexplored from 
N 32.75403 W 109.78250 to N 32.75652 W 109.77705 and may have been a 
still unproven primary or secondary source for the Twin West Canal at
N 32.76478 W 109.74227. Numerous braided channels or trails remain a
highly enigmatic mystery at N 32.75461 W 109.78203.

SOUTH OF FREEMAN - A large area here seems conspicuous by
the absence of any known canals, yet might in fact been too arid or 
of to complex a topography to support prehistoric interest. Largely
unvisited due to more promising terrain elsewhere. Centers on
N 32.77622 W 109.75398 and is difficult of access.

DISCOVERY SOUTHWEST - Area from N 32.79452 W 109.72842 to 
N 32.78222 W 109.73994 is rich in archaeology yet no canals are known. 
Includes the Clay Knolls ( aka Beer Bottle ruin ) sites and many rock 
alignments, mulch rings, field houses, and such. Many mulch rings were 
trashed by the City of Safford during a water tank construction. Possibly the
densest collection of southern grids appears at N 32.78550 W 109.74270.

LONGVIEW AREA - A prehistorically rich area full of habitation sites,
rock constructs, check dams with and without aprons, grids, many linear
features, and mulch rings. Only a very short hint of a canal wall is known
at N 32.78923 W 109.75944 without any yet supporting evidence of links to the 
Porter Springs or Frye Mesa areas. From N 32.77999 W 109.76410 
to N 32.77999 W 109.76410

FRYE MESA COMPLEX - Perhaps the most extraordinary assemblage of
all the prehistoric canals and has the most elaborate constructs. Water is
believed but not yet proven to be diverted above the falls at N 32.74376 
W 109.83971, across a saddle and over into Spring Canyon where it merges 
into a ponding area below a spring at N 32.74572 W 109.84043. If not 
diverted, the water routes down Spring Canyon to an Allen Canal takein 
point at N 32.78238 W 109.83555 Allen canal continues for several miles,
eventually routing under Allen Resevoir at N 32.83191 W 109.79555 
continuing through an enormously huge Culebra Cut at N 32.83567 W 109.79799
and a carefully engineered saddle gap crossing at N 32.83313 W 109.80475, 
finally believed to end up in unproven fields beneath the Central Dam at 
N 32.85032 W 109.8000 . Meanwhile, alternate diversion is believed to route 
water under the Frye Mesa Falls Road extension at N 32.75101 W 109.83855, 
through various braided channels at N 32.76001 W 109.81462 to a ponding area 
at N 32.76000 W 109.81149 . The higher elevation portion of this routing is 
partially supported by a "steal the plans" forest service pipeline. The
water apparently is split two ways at the ponding area, first going to a spectacularly
impressive counterflowing HS Canal. While the HS canal clerly returns water
to Frye Creek at N 32.75803 W 109.81509, unproven beliefs strongly suggest it 
is the source for the Golf Course Canal, portions of which are currently known to 
route from N 32.79840 W 109.78269 to N 32.79883 W 109.7761. Also suggested
is that the HS Canal might be a possibly prehistoric source for the modern Blue 
Ponds Canal at N 32.78088 W 109.77833 or might be a factor in the extensive 
Longview development near N 32.77800 W 109.76661. Several braided channels 
have also been noted that might be related, although they seem to be older and 
more primitive constructs. These were named the Riggs Complex and found at
N 32.77846 W 109.78945 and hints of a possible nearby portion of Golf Course 
Canal remain largely unstudied and unlinked at N 32.78465 W 109.78724
Meanwhile, back at the N 32.76000 W 109.81149 ponding area, the second
routing is believed to form the Robinson Canal ( Historically renamed the 
Robinson Ditch ) that routes over a spectacular hanging portion at N 32.77173 W 
109.79672 then "climbing" to the main portion of Robinson Mesa at N 32.78467 
W 109.79339 is believed to reach fields North of  Daley Estates, presumably near 
N 32.81054 W 109.77185.

LOWER FRYE EAST - A strange construct near N 32.76705 W 109.79332 may or 
may not be canal related, and visual clues further north turned out to be an abondoned
wagon road, complete with horseshoes. The area could link to the modern short
Blue Ponds diversionary canal at N 32.78095 W 109.77841 or might serve the 
Longview area in some yet undiscovered manner. CCC projects are also in the area.

MUD SPRINGS CANAL - This main canal is the only one where its entire
length can be viewed from several places, which suggests it might have been
the original prototype. The original takein is believed to be in upper Ash 
Creek near N 32.78748 W 109.85463, followed by a projected hanging portion
that may or may not still exist owing to potential flood damage. A key feature 
is an exceptionally well located critical saddle crossover found at N 32.79145 
W 109.85390 followed by an easily tracable but not yet completely surveyed 
route down past Mud Springs to N 32.80347 W 109.83937. The canal continues 
quite traceably northward to a seldom visited hanging portion near N 32.81632
W 109.83207 and one of the largest mid channel Mesquite trees at N 32.81917 
W 109.82737. The canal continues to a well researched area near some CCC 
cosnstructs and is overrun without accomodation by a SCS dam at N 32.82371 
W 109.82411. There is appears to be a minor branch of the canal northward
of unknown purpose. The canal continues northeasterly past a curious water level 
pithouse-like structure called the Troll House. No obvious evidence of charcoal 
is present at this site at N 32.82683 W 109.82118. This is the only known structure
in direct association with most of the canal systems. Near N 32.82755 W 109.81949, 
the Jernigan Canal splits off to the north and is believed to cross West Layton Road 
at N 32.83690 W 109.81498 barely touch the road at N 32.84016 W 109.81273 and 
make a projected but unverified loop to a counterflow crossing of a small wash at 
N 32.84176 W 109.81453. The canal makes the third of three large U-turn loops
in a significant hanging portion at N 32.84207 W 109.81552, then heads northerly,
terminating in a  French Drain like construct serving well defined end use fields in 
the N 32.84160 W 109.81678 area. The Jernigan habitation site is nearby. 
Meanwhile, the main Mud Springs Canal continues easterly just past a historic tank at
N 32.82764 W 109.81896 and then can be traced to N 32.83054 W 109.81588,
temporarily lost, and then retraced to a modest hanging portion and caliche colored 
reach at N 32.84261 W 109.81052. Near this area, the Mud Springs Canal and the 
Jernigan Canal are only separated by a few hundred feet horizontally and a few 
dozen feet vertically, despite over a mile of split construction. The main Mud
Springs canal can be easily followed to N 32.84796 W 109.81104 where it suddenly
vanishes without a trace. Its destination fields remain unknown at present.

CLUFF PONDS CANAL  - A modern but disused canal can be traced routing
from Ash Creek to N 32.81874 W 109.84679 to N 32.82009 W 109.84462, 
once servicing a pair of ponds arranged such that the easternmost pond acted 
as an overflow to the  westernmost one. No immediate proof of prehistoric 
origins have yet been found, but indirect evidence is compelling. Not the least of 
which  being such a prehistoric origin would be highly conspicuous by its 
absence. There are numerous potsherds and a larger habitation site in the area,
and the canal technology appears well within prehistoric capabilities. This is
in midst of the largest regional riparian area and the ponds could well have 
served as destination fields,

SHINGLE MILL CANAL - A second disused modern canal was known as
the Minor Webster Ditch and routed from N 32.79785 W 109.87270 to 
N 32.81087 W 109.86743, apparently sourcing from Shingle Mill canyon. 
Construction did include a service road and a deeper vee typical of a Gradeall, 
but prehistoric origins would seem quite likely, again with such a cnal being 
highly conspicuous by its absence. And with the route being consistent with 
prehistoric engineering capabilities. There are numerous potsherds in the area. 
and the modern Cluff Ponds region would seem an ideal fields destination.

LEFTHAND & GOAT HILL AREA - This second Lefthand Canyon is in
the Spear Ranch region. Some highly interesting and well studied canals
appear directly related to destination fields near N 32.80647 W 109.91850. 
These canals seem to differ from others in the study area in that they are 
significantly shorter, multi branch, and are clearly end use,  rather than
intended for longer range delivery.

LAMB TANK CANAL - A longer range delivery canal appears to have 
been sourced from Lefthand Canyon and routed from N 32.82133 
W 109.92391 to N 32.82868 W 109.92224 and merits further study.

NUTTEALL AND CARTER CANYONS - Mt Graham drainages tend to
be drier and less promising to the west. These two canyons at N 32.78839 
W 109.97474 could form potential logical extensions to the canal complex, 
alothough little work has been done here and no canals are yet known.

BEAR SPRINGS & BIGLER PONDS - The region from N 32.85171 
W 109.94775 to N 32.85009 W 109.94483 are major artesian sources 
unlikely to have been ignored as prehistoric water development. There 
are also likely destination fields in the area, although the area has been
little studied as canal candidates. A spectacularly large and currently
disused canal at N 32.86676 W 109.93024 appears to have been 
primarily a modern real estate scam.

THE UFO FISH FILETS - The highly unusual and wildly atypical
construct at N 32.81509 W 109.97079 would appear to define the 
westernmost limit of the present canal study area. While believed 
of primarily CCC origin, there may be prehistoric precidents that
are related to water managment issues.

Ongoing maps of these areas can be found here and here. With additional
content here and an image collection here.

Your involvement and participation welcome.

Our Prehistoric Bajada "hanging" canals of southwestern Arizona
article has just been accepted by Wikipedia.

Wikipedia usually very strongly discourages articles involving original
research. But, as a sub footnote on page 3857 of Volume XVII
of the nineteenth revision of the Wikipedia Rules and Regulations
tells us, a topic involving original research can be accepted so long
as there is strong enough and notable enough independent major 
media coverage in several significant publications.

Authors also have to strongly suppress ego and very much discourage
any internal self promotion as well.

Many thanks to Dennis Wagner of USA Today and Joanna 
Althands of www.arizona.com for bailing us out on this one.

Much more on our hanging canals here.

A possible, yet still unverified, extension to the Golf Course
Hanging Canal can be found here.

This would preclude artesian or Robertson origins and would
greatly strengthen ( but still not prove ) HS Canal sourcing.

Remaining is the mystery of the Riggs Complex braided
channels somewhat further south at N 32.77846 W 109.78945. 
But these somhow seem cruder, older, and totally inconsistent 
with the Golf Course Canal architecture.

I'm surprised that nobody has yet seen fit to provide the 
ability to transparently overlay both a topo map and its
underlying imagry.

Preferably real time adjustable. If such a feature is
available, I sure do not know about it.

I ran a crude demo of the possibilities long ago with
this ancient and non-adjustable PacMan Arizona demo.

One aspect of the problem is getting the imagry and 
the topo to exactly the same scale and registration at the
pixel level. A seond is to be able to transparently combine 
two  layers.

The later is easily done with Acrobat, PhotoShop,
GIMP, and possibly KML.

Real time. Getting the layer dates identical or nearly so would 
also certainly be useful.

Please tell me if you know of this capability.

An interesting flyby of some local Gila Valley scenery
done by a quadcopter can be found here.

It turns out there can be a tremendous difference between
cheaper and more expensive units. Mostly centered on
gyro flight and camera stabilization, GPS interaction,
flyability, flight time, and download capabilities.

Apparently no units that I know about have downed craft
long term reporting. I can see spending a zillion dollars 
for a premium unit, only to have it permanently vanish
off the edge of a mesa into heavy brush.

It would be equally bad to con someone else into doing 
surveys for us, only to lose their unit.

As I have already done with a fire pager in Shingle
Mill Canyon.

Your comments ( and loaner craft ) welcome

Current thinking on the Frye Mesa Complex of our Prehistoric
Hanging Canals suggests even more incredibly utter stunning 
engineering. Present beliefs appear reasonably credible but
definitely require additional field evidence.

The thoughts go something like this...

Apparently Frye Creek water was diverted above the falls somewhere
near N 32.74336 W 109.83994 to cross a divide at N 32.74474 
W 109.83848 and merge with the water from the spring in Spring
Canyon at N 32.74572 W 109.84038.

Aerial photos suggest the modern Frye Mesa Trail exactly follows
this route and appears to have a totally consistent allowable topography 
and a steep but quite uniform slope.

After merging water sources, a simple switching apparently may have
allowed routing down Spring Canyon to form the source water for
the Allen Canal at N 32.78239 W 109.83558.

Or alternately, may have been routed under the present Frye Canyon
Road to eventually form braided channels at N 32.75997 W 109.81554
to a presumed ponding area at N 32.76003 W 109.81144 where
further diversion allowed a split between the Robinson Canal at
N 32.78461 W 109.79329 and the counterflowing HS Canal at
N 32.75804 W 109.81510.

The relationship between the HS Canal and a required source for
the Golf Course Canal remains tenuous but seems the best Ockhams
Razor candidate. As does any relationship with the Blue Ponds.

A modern "steal the plans" pipeline adds credibility to the Frye
Road projected routing above. The trail itself also suggests "borrow
the blueprints" as it is easy to walk you or your horse up a filled in
canal.

Your participation ( and funding! ) welcome.

It has become obvious to me that our bajada hanging canal
discoveries to date have clearly become utterly unique and
world class prehistoric energy efficiency engineering and 
would  appear poised to  dramatically alter significant portions 
of what is known of southwestern archaeology.

To date most of the project research has only involved two
totally unfunded and nearly retired individuals, one of whom 
normally lives many hundreds of miles away.

Here's some of the stuff I would like to see happen...

1. Funding for larger and more formal 
    discovery and exploration programs.

2. Improved awareness among southwestern 
    archaeological professionals.

3. Expanded additional publication in higher 
    level quality journals and online services.

4. An ability to mentor younger participants.

5. Continued research of mystery canal portions, 
    especially the counterflowing HS canal.

6. Resolution of prerhistoric origins for pioneer 
    and historic canal rework.

7. Threat mitigation, especially SunZia, Safford, 
    and ADOT.

8. Significant new use of aerial survey devices.

9. Continuancee and improvement of mapping programs, 
    most especially flyable KML.

10. Much greater involvement of EAC, hiking club, 
     and Gila Watershed Partnerships.

11. Detailed mapping of each individual canal complex.

12. Improvement and expansion of online services,
      availability, and awareness.

13. Additional tours when and where appropriate.

14. Finding those missing canal gaps, sources,
     and desstinations.

15. Extensive video recording and many additional 
      photographic images. 

Please dump all of your spare Draganflys in my driveway.
And contact me for any involvement you can assist with.

There's a number of Prehistoric Hanging Canal events 
upcoming and planned for the Week of October 18th. You
are welcome to participate in any or all of them.

A rare midweek tour is planned Tuesday and Wednesday
the 14th and 15th and should include both Dr. James Neeley
and a number of other noted Southwestern archaeologists.

A second tour is planned Saturday and Sunday the 18th and
19th and likely will cover some of the same canals, but
this time with a different collection of noted Southwestern
archaeologicts.

The Tuesday and Saturday events might be followed by an
afternoon Meet and Greet at Juanitas. 

And Saturday night in the 18th in the Jupiter room of 
Discovery Park at 6:30 , I'll be talking on a collection of hanging
canal images. Other speakers may also be present, but
the plans for them remain fluid. The lecture(s) is/are free.

You can preview parts of the talk here.

You can email me for more details.

Well, since you asked...

Yes, I am a card carrying member of the Guru and Swami's
Union local #144.

Some previous archaeological cloud projects for you on our 
hanging canals have been listed here, here, here, here, and here.

Let's try a SIXTH archaeological cloud. Very much for real.

This is your opportunity to potentially make some world
class archaeological  prehistoric hanging canal discoveries. 
It might go something like this...

At your own risk and expense and following normal 
Upper Sonoran snake season 4WD TEAM procedures 
and techniques for a rather streneous 7 hour  dayhike... 

Using this and something like this, go between N 32.75385 
W 109.78278 and N 32.75385 W 109.78278 to see if this is
in fact a previously unexplored prehistoric branch portion 
of the Deadman Canal complex.

If so, trace and link the canal eastward to the main prehistoric 
hanging Deadman Canal here at N 32.75026 W 109.79621.

Then attempt to find the relationship between this canal and 
Rincon Canyon. In particular trying to find out if this is in fact
the presently unverified source of the Twin East Canal at
N 32.76785 W 109.73773 .

Finally, there are great heaping bunches of braided somethings
due north of the original exploration area. Try to determine
whether these are game or cattle trails, some even more-than-
usually-bizarre CCC busywork, or are in fact are an ( unlikely )
genuine stunning prehistoric agricultural development.

This area involves very streneous hiking or very creative ATV
work. Note that the usual return trip is very much uphill.   

Record picturess and GPS locations. And report here.

Some previous archaeological cloud projects for you on our 
hanging canals have been listed here, here, here, and here.

Let's try a FIFTH archaeological cloud. Very much for real.

This is your opportunity to potentially make some world
class archaeological prehistoric hanging canal discoveries. It 
might go something like this...

At your own risk and expense and following normal 
Upper Sonoran snake season 4WD TEAM procedures 
and techniques for a moderate but not extreme 4 hour 
dayhike...

Using this and something like this, go to N 32.80245 
W 109.78926 and see if it is in fact a portion of the
Robinson Ditch. 

If so, trace it north and south as far as possible. 
With goals of linking the known  upmesa portion 
and finding the canal's presumed destination
somewhere in the Robinson Flat area.

Record picturess and GPS locations.

If not, go upmesa as far as required to link the 
obvious main portion of the Robinson Ditch and
separately proceed tracing it northward.

A related project is to try and prove there is or is
not an ( unlikely ) eastern branch linking or possibly
forming the Golf Course Canal somewhere in the
neighborhood of N 32.79851 W 109.78157.

The main canal route is clearly but questionably marked 
on the topo map.

Note that the 4WD tracks near N 32.80554 W 109.77593
may need some shovel work. Use caution. 

Continuing our hanging canal by hanging canal list
of needed further work...

The Ledford Canals located between  N 32.68456 W 109.76176
and N 32.69322 W 109.72125 are in a very difficult access area 
that normally requires extensive hiking, major 4WD, or  ATV
access. These clearly have been adapted for pioneer cattle tank
use. And have not yet been thoroughly or completely studied.

One major goal should be seeking out additional evidence
of underlying prehistoric origins. There is little to no evidence
of modern concrete, rebar, or access roads and the canals 
origins seem totally consistent with nearby ones that appear to be 
clearly prehistoric.

There are several significant mesa falloff areas clearly visible
with their greener vegetation .  These need further study as does
the water use below the mesa edge requires further study. Better 
mapping and GPS logging are also needed.

The related Metate Peak area also would seem to need further work.

Many people will do anything to save the environment.

Except take a science course.

Continuing our hanging canal by hanging canal list
of needed further work...

Henry's Canal seems to only have been "half" studied to
date, with useful coverage only from N 32.73718 W 109.74223
to N 32 44.689’ W 109 43.717. This area is easily traced and
includes a modest hanging portion where the canal first leaves a
wash.

It is not clear whether the destination is a field at the latter above
GPS address or whether it merged with a previous version of the
Roper Lake Canal. The fact that there is a much more complex
and more highly engineered high "bypass" via the Marijilda Roper
path might suggest that Henry's Canal was an earlier version
that may have had significint problems meriting a major rerouting
or expansion.

The initial path from the presumed vicinity of the Marijilda Ruin
to the present survey beginning has not been accurately located.
There are hints of bits and pieces of canals in the area, but 
they seem significantly smaller, disjointed, and of apparently
lower quality.

Present tasks are thus to find the "front half" of the Henry's
Canal, to resolve its destination, and to determine why an
alternate path seemed to be corrected.

Much more here.

Current work on the Robinson Ditch hanging canal centers on
the region from N 32.80197 W 109.78995 to N 32.80316 W 109.78879
per this acme mapper image.

It is not yet known whether this is in fact part of the canal route. Giving
the canal a pioneer toppo name obviously implied historic use of some sort,
but the nature of the canal is virtually identical to 30 or more prehistoric
hanging canal examples. With no obvious modern upgrades.

There is also an unlikely possibility that this canal splits and heads east to
become the Golf Course Canal. The sourthern extension of the Golf 
Course Canal remains a major enigmatic mystery.

Similarly, the original destination of the Robinson Ditch remains unknown
but seems restricted to the Robinson Flat area. Other Robinson mysteries
remaining are the early routing from a presumed source as the spring in
Spring Canyon. And the presumed "high route" following the HS
Canal split.

A review of pioneer journals and documents might proove interesting.

Field Mice Welcome. More here. With an ongoing blog right here.
A mid-week tour is planned October 14th and 15th

The easternmost two Cluff Ponds are rather unusual in that
they clearly are at two different elevations. With the smaller
eastern pond being higher than the western one which seems
to act acting as an overflow route.

Which might suggest underlying prehistoric fields.

The larger pond presently has a pool measurable from Google
Earth of 3113 feet. The smaller eastern pond presently has a 
pool of 3123 feet. There is a seperating dam between the two
that has a half elevation channel cut through it, apparently 
around 3118 feet.

The feeder canal slopes from 3140 feet, clealy making it
a supplier from its Ash Creek source.

Apparently, when the big pond fills, there is backflow through
the seperating dam, protecting the maximum allowable height.
On a recent visit, there was just enough rain to add water to
the smaller eastern dam that there was a counterflow, with
water barely flowing from east to west. This would seem highly
unusual.

Proving that the second Cluff Ponds canal does or does not
have prehistoric origins is proving problematical.

Canal #30 does have a well defined but abandoned historical
purpose in feeding two easternmost Cluff Ponds from Ash Creek.
There is no concrete or steel involved and there is no maint
road. 

There are many potsherds in the area, at least one major
nearby ruin, and several smaller ones. The length and purpose
of the canal for prehistoric uses is rather obvious, and NOT
using it prehistorically would be highly conspicuous by its absence.

The area is also the "most riparian" of the known canal sites and
would be the easiest to develop as well. The engineering would
appear trivial compared to the other known canal routes.

Parts of the canal approach a two meter depth, but the total
excavation is much less than the aqueduct, the HS canal,
of the Allen Canal cut below the dam.

Acme Mapper does suggest a third canal in the area which
could become Canal #31 and which would tend to verify 
#30 also being prehistoric. However, this week's attempt
at ground truth strongly suggested this is an abandoned
and ungraded vehicle two track. The slope, while quite
uniform, seems to barely miss being canal useful.

Approaches to resolving Cluff would be contacting 
knowledgeable historians and historic records for the
area. And thoroughly mapping non-canal prehistoric
sites and artifacts in the area.

I was surprised to see that Android cell phones have dozens
of free aps that are electronic bubble level related.

These might prove barely useful for our hanging canal work
especially where canal slopes and routings need proven.

Most of the schemes are based on using the internal game 3-axis
accellerometer to measure the X and Y gravity accelleration
intensity. The tangent gives you the tilt and ( because of quadrature ),
the measured tilt is largely independent of the absolute
gravity accelleration.

A tutorial with the underlying math can be found here.

Many interesting components can be found at Sparkfun

Canal #30 in Cluff Ponds is proving very difficult to establish
whether it does or does not have a prehistoric origin.

Its last use was clearly historic, providing water from Ash 
Creek to one or two of two easternmost reservoirs. It 
seems presently derelict. There is no iron, concrete, 
or maint road. Nor any obvious use of heavy machinery.

But a maximum depth may exceed two meters. Which would 
seem excessively atypical of prehistoric desings. .

There is a major ruin in the area, and wide distributions
of potsherds, both sparce and dense. IF this was NOT
a location for a prehistoric canal project, it certainly
would be conspicuous by its absence.

It certainly could serve as a "starter canal project" centered
on the most riparian and most workable of the southern bajadas.

Perhaps a thorough survey of prehistoric but non-canal
artifacts in the area could resolve the problem. There is
a hint of a possible second canal not yet verified that 
clearly would have prehistoric potential.

Besides bailing #30 out.

There is also compelling evidencet that quite a few of the
historic canals were based on "steal the plans". It certainly
is much easier to "dig out an old ditch" than it is to 
engineer, design, and construct a new canal from scratch.

Tours and lectures available. Funds and Draganflys
welcome.

Plans are underfoot for a rare midweek October 14th and 15th 
tour of the Bajada Hanging Canals. Possibly combined with an
October 19th Saturday Night Discovery Park Lecture. Or, 
alternatively, Branding Iron ribs night.

Dr. James Neely and several other archaeeological heavies
are expected to participate.

email me if you have any interest in attending.

Canal #29 of our prehistoric hanging canals is proving 
extremely difficult to trace.

It starts out vague near the southwesternmost Golf Course
duck pond and then assumes an obvious and well defined
hanging portion, only to vanish into a wash.

One possible source might be a pair of still active artesian
ponds. But there is no evidence of the northern pond seeing
prehistoric use, and a possible Acme Mapper link became
a dirt bike track on field verification.

Other canals have shown "U" turns where a wash was 
crossed, but no evidence of this one making a western
turn to become part of the Robinson Canal system has
been located.

Nothing has yet been found south of the wash enry.
Hints of braided canals can be found a mile further
south in the Riggs Complex, but these seem inconsistent
with the engineering on the Golf Course Canal. They
also seem somewhat smaller and more primitive.

The "Ockhams Razor" explanation remains sourcing
from the HS Canal counterflowing off lower Frye Mesa.
If true, this would be one of the most spectacular of
prehistoric canal reaches at seven miles length.

Field mice welcome.

The latest hanging canal paper here.
Some photos appear here.

Also vanished with nary a trace is the Ghost Town of   
Gripe Arizona.

A one time populathion three gas station that also hosted
the original old hiway 70 ag inspection station. The place
name remains on the topo maps and a fragment of the
original concrete still exists just west of San Jose.

Absence of proof is not the same as proof of absense.

Now treating the Cluff Ponds Canal as Canal Number
30 of interest even through it lacks definitive prehistoric
evicence at the present time.

There is a large habitation sight in the vicinity of the
canal and rather potsherd distribution nearby.

Although the canal presently appears rather large,
there is no apparently concrete or iron or any
maintence road. The canal also directly routes from
Ask Creek over an obvious path that would seem
to be conspicuously unlikely not to be a favorable
prehistoric canal route.

There is also compelling evidence that most of
the historic southwern canals do have strong
evidence of prehistoric prehistoric ag routes.

Another Minor Webster historic canal is nearby to the
west and the Cluff Ranch area would seem to be the
largest riparian area south of the Gila Valley properly.
And thus highly unlikely to be ignored as a prehistoric
ag sigh

Here's a list of our tutorials and papers that you will find
both on our website and on Wesrch..

TV Typewriter eBook
Thermoluminescence
The Incredible Secret Money Machine
Superclock III classic precyber paper restoration
Staliiking the Wild Paradigm
Some "Web Friendly" PostScript Colors
Some "Fat Tail Arrow" utilities
Restoring faded or scuffed text for web use
RTL Cookbook Classic Reprint
Remastering a Technical Book for Web Distribution
Prehistoric Hanging Canals of the Safford Basin ( Update II )
Paleomagnetism & Archaeomagnetism
Machine Language Programming Cookbook Classic Sampler
Machine Language Cookbook II ebook
Lessons Learned During a uv Lamp Debugging
IC67 metal locator classic reprint
Build this TV Typewriter
"Level II" Enhancement of PreCyber eBook Conversions 
Apple Assembly Cookbook "Directors Cut"
An Executive Guide to Magic Sinewaves
An "Un-Halftoning" scheme to improve eBook Images
Recent Developments in Magic Sinewaves 
Enhancing your eBay skills VIII
Website Link Checking Tools
Secrets of Recent Technical Innovation
Lessons Learned During a uv Lamp Debugging
Some Possible Book Scanning "Gutter Math"
Utilities for HTML & XHTML Revalidation
eBay buying secrets
eBay selling secrets
Pseudoscience Bashing Secrets
Isopod Energy Monitor
Enhancing your eBay Skills V
Build this TV Typewriter
The next big things
Elegant Simplicity
Enhancing your eBay Skills VI
Cubic Spline Mininum Point Distance
pv photovoltaic panel intro & summar
Energy Fundamentals Intro & Summary
Real Time Acrobat PDF Animation
A Solid State 3 Channel Color Organ
When to Patent
Exploring the .BMP file format
150 Gila Valley Day Hikes
A Gonzo PostScript Powerpoint Emulator
Enhancing your eBay tactical skills VII
Synthesis of Digital Power Sinewaves
Graham Tram Plan and Profile
Some fifth generation Magic Sinewaves
Drawing a Bezier cubic spline through 4 data points
.BMP Bitmap Circular Lettering
An expanded ultra fast magic sinewave calculator
How to trash a vehicle hydrogen electrolysis
A Partial History of the Gila Lumber and Milling Company
Some bitmap perspective lettering algorithms & utilities
How to bash pseudoscience
An Improved Bitmap Typewriter
Using Distiller as a PostScript Computer
Some Architect's Perspective Algorithms and Utilities
Successful eBay Buying Strategies 
Why Electrolysis Ain't Gonna Happen 
The math behind Bezier cubic splines 
Some Image Post Processing Utilities
The Case Against Patents
Some eBay Selling Strategies
A Digital Airbrushing Algorithm
Don't Get Sick!
Some More Energy Fundamentals I 
How to scam a student paper
Some Inverse Graphic Transforms
Nonlinear Graphics Transforms
Three Phase Magic Sinewaves
Bitmap to Acrobat PDF Image Conversions
The way things were -- an unauthorized autobiography
A review of some pixel image interpolation algorithms
Some possible false color and rainbow improvements
An Executive Guide to Magic Sinewaves
The worst of Marcia Swampfelder
Acrobat PDF Post Document Editing Tools
A new method of solving electromagnetic fields
A Newbie's Intro to the Web
Gonzo PostScript Tutorial and Directory 
An Ultra-fast Magic Sinewave Calculator
Secrets of Technical Innovation

Updates and more current info may sometims appear on the
website version of any of these papers. in particular, Gila
Valley Day Hikes is continually updated, while the Wesrch
version was a one time "snapshot"

These have seen nearly a quarter million views to date.

And here are our co-authored Wesrch papers on the 
hanging canals to date...

A Tour of Some Stunning Prehistoric Hanging
       Canal Images
Prehistoric Hanging Canals of Southeastern Arizona
Arizona's Prehistoric Hanging Canals
Prehistoric Hanging Canals of the Safford Basin ( Update II ) 
Hanging Canal Slide Show

With much more on the hanging canals here

Shocking.

Nearly fifty percent of all North Dakota school children are
below average! 

A new hanging canal engineering paper can be found here.
With its post-Distilling JavaScript here and its sourcecode
here.

More on the hanging canals here.

Thanks to some new developments, selling and shipping
eBay items to New Mexico has eased somewhat.

Yeah, there still is the language barrier and all the hassles
at customs. But at one time, everything needed reloaded 
at the border crossings because of the different sizes and
spacings of the truck tires.

Fortunately, reversible truck tires are newly available
that can simply be insided out at the border crossings.

Much more here and here.

The Cluff Ranch area is one of the "most riparian" regions
south of the Gila River and thus would seem to be a very
good candidate for prehistoric canals. There are also major
habitation sites present, along with areas rich to very rich
in potsherds.

A modern canal has been located here. It seems rather 
large for a prehistoric origin and is presently in disuse.

There does not seem to be any concrete, iron, or an
access road. The source would appear to be Ash Creek
and the destination one or possibly two disused lakes
literally adjacent to a prehistoric habitation site .

Whether or not this canal can be shown to have prehistoric
origins remains to be seen. This canal would appear to be a 
rather favorable candidate. We will tentatively assign it as
Canal #30.

The historic Minor Webster Ditch is also in the area and also 
would appear to be a candidate for prehistoric origins. It also
has associated potsherd areas.

Extensive modern use and reuse would seem to make evaluation
difficult at best.

Absolutely nobody, archaeologist or not, who actually 
has visited our prehistoric hanging canals has not been
absolutely convinced that these are totally genuine.

Sadly, there have been some skeptics at a distance
that apparently refuse to believe that this is a world
class discovery that significantly and profoundly impacts 
all of southwestern archaeology.

Part of the reason is that the Gila Valley has forever 
been wrongly perceived as some sort of a backwater
rather than a major prehistoric agricultural center.

A second factor might be ethnocentricity in which 
the prehistoric peoples are not given remotely enough
credit for the utterly and profoundly spectacular 
engineering and energy awareness they clearly and
unquestionably have exhibited.

The key point is this: Unlike any other construct,
a canal simply MUST rigorously follow a constant
precise slope in the one percent range range over long
distances. Unwaveringly with zero exceptions. 

No other construct such as a trail or a cow path
or a wash, a game path, or a bike route or a 4WD
track or a wagon road, or random typography, or
whatever EVER comes even  remotely close.

The outcome is thus not the least in doubt. Especially
with another FIFTY MILES of these in the immediate
neighborhood that appear astonishingly consistent
and identical.

A new tour of some of the canals is found here.

A perplexing but reasonable question is why the
hanging canals seem to be unique to Mount
Graham and possibly no where else in the world.

It turns out that Mount Graham has the highest
elevation difference between its top and bottom of
any Basin and Range mountain, or, for that matter,
of any Arizona mouontain.

Thus, it would tend to have more snowpack and a
larger number of north trending perannual streams.
It would also tend to have more and larger bajadas.

It is quite possible that there is no place anywhere
else in the world that could support such an elaborate
bajada hanging canal system.

The new Golf Course Prehistoric Hanging Canal seems to be
stuck where its sourcing ends in a wash here.

This being a partial eastern branch of the Robinson Canal
has failed to reveal the slightest hint after searching some
4WD tracks.

The "obvious" connection between the HS Canal and the
Golf Course Canal simply has too much unexplored terrain
between themselves to date. Although the terrain is favorable.

Another possibility that would seem somewhat less credible
at first glance is that the Canal may in fact start in the wash.
There is a seldom visited and just-barely-still-there artesian
pond here. IF the flow rates were much higher then than now,
They might possibly form a credible source for Golf 
Course Water.

There already is fairly strong evidence that the Spring in
Spring Canyon was used for three or more canals, besides
being routed back INTO Frye Creek. Which suggests that
things were a lot wetter then than now.

The Golf Course to Wash apparent termination also does
look remarkably similar to the Allen Canal takein point.

There is a second little known and weak artesian pond
somewhat to the northwest, but no apparent prehistoric
interest has been noted here to date.

All of this remains unproven and highly speculative.

GuruGram #124 is newly uploaded and titled A Tour 
of Some Prehistoric Hanging Canal Images.

Partial sourcecode can be found here. At present
images need manually post inserted after Distilling.
An automated Acrobat JavaScript image inserter
is in development. 

The GuguGram library itself is still in need of 
updating. Some of the "missing" files can be found
here.

Acme Mapper has expanded its local resolution to
ten meters. Or their z=20 resolution.

Some of the hanging canal images are back the way 
they were a year or so ago. But, frustratingly, most
images in most places are not quite good enough.

Expanded our Hanging Canal directory to include
some additional images and logging excerpts from our ongoing
whatnu columns.

The discovery of the major "new" Golf Course canal was
totally unexpected, in that virtually every drop of Mount
Graham water had been believed to have been "used up"
and totally accounted for.

Yet, several water sources are known to have seen multiple
uses, such as the spring in Spring Canyon possibly serving
Allen, Robinson, Golf Course, and even others. Or the
multiple branches in Ledford or Deadman. Or Mud Springs
splitting into the Jernigan Branch. Or the recombination
of Twin East and Twin West into the Twin Boobs ponding area.

So, an absurd, yet somehow totally reasonable question might
seem to be "How many unknown canals are there yet to be 
discovered?"

Here are some candidate study areas grossly under reaserched
to date...

CLUFF PONDS - Developments in the Cluff ponds
area almost certainly "stole the plans" from 
prehistoric originals, with Ash Creek obviously
playing a major role. And Shingle Mill secondarily
via the understudied historic Minor Ditch.

LONGVIEW AREA - Topography is eminently
favoriable and there are an astonishing number
of rock alignments, dams, and structures in the area
between Longview, the CCC Alberto's Signature,
and the recently trashed Daley Hot Well.

SOUTH DEADMAN - An entire southern 
branch of the Deadman canal remains totallly
unexlopred that may or may not be involved
with the Twin West canal.

NORTH DEADMAN - There are huge areas
with tantilizing hints of possible canals west of
Lower Deadman tank that remain totally
unexplored. Complex terrain dominates.

LEDFORD - Hard to reach with many branches,
some possibly used to this day. Underlying 
prehistoric originals yet to be clarified.

P RANCH - Persistend rumors of prehistoric
canals unverified with only tantalizing traces
of undated structures present. Likely might
be the southernmost limit of canal development.

RINCON - A direct route from Marijilda to 
Twin West has yet to be properly identified,
yet is certainly topographically favorable.

FRYE CREEK - Both the upper and lower
portions remain enigmatic mysteries, especially
with the HK canal delivering water back INTO 
Frye Creek Upper terrain would be excruciatingly
challenging. .

A credible prediction might be something like 35 or so
significant canal fragments eventually resolving into
nineteen or so combined systems with a total length
possibly just under sixty miles.

And apparently totally and uniquely world class.

Continuing our hanging canal by hanging canal list
of needed further work...

The Frye Creek area seems to have the most significant
constructs, the greatest remaining mysteries, and the sole
highly unusual aspect of putting water back INTO a stream
rather than extracting it.

The terrain above the present dam appears exceedingly
hostile towards prehistoric canal construction. Visits
to date have failed to find any sign of use. Nonetheless,
as this seems to be the only mountain stream not
high tapped, additional work is clearly needed.

The present HS Canal spectacularly counterflow routes
Frye Mesa water ( apparently derived from the spring in
Spring Canyon ) BACK down into Frye Creek proper.

This appears to be the largest and longest known
construct in the entire prehistoric canal system.
It remains quite simply, beyond beyond.

The reason for this highly unusual feat remains
ambiguous and obviously demands further study.
While the Golf Course Canal is a reasonably credible
destination for this combined water  supply, actual evidence
( beyond Ockham's Razor ) remains sorely lacking.

Also needing study is the apparently more modern
canal stub between the Blue Ponds, and the enigmatic
braided channels in the middle Riggs Canyon area.

This region appears to be the "crown jewels" of the
entire prehistoric canal system and  thus  deserves
major further directed research.

Field mice welcome.

Here's a summary of our current  hanging canal by hanging
canal list access entries of needed further work...

Frye Creek Area
Golf Course Canal
Roper Canal
Tranquility Canal
Twin East Canal
Blue Ponds Canal
Twin West Canal
Twin Boobs Ponding
Deadman Canal
Riggs Complex
Allen Canal
Robinson Canal
Frye Mesa Canal
Shingle Mill Canal
Jerningan Canal
Mud Springs Canal
Intro Frye Mesa Canal

There's still a few to go, including Henry's, High Marijilda, Lefthand,
Lamb Tank, Aquaduct, and Ledford.  Plus such second tier candidates as
P Ranch, Bandolier, Rincon, Jernigan Branch, UFO Fish Filet, various
field destinations, and Longview.

The exact count is somewhat fuzzy, as many predicted canals are in
several disconnected pieces. Mud Springs has 4 gaps, Allen has
4. Robinson has a totally unexplored southern branch. Golf Course
has at least 4 major discontinuities. Jernigan has 2. Upper Frye  
Creek remains unresolved, as does the necessary link between Spring
Canyon and Frye Mesa.

No matter the exact count, there is clearly somewhere between
a hoard and a passel of these unique world class hanging canals.

Field mice welcome.

Added an image directory and links to our Hanging Canal
Resource page.

I'm wondering if the spring in Spring Canyon was not a
much more significant resource in prehistoric times than
it is today. Presently, it just produces enough water for
a stock tank and is very rarely wet as far as the
downstream Allen Canal takein.

Yet, it appears this was the souce for three major canals:
Allen, Robinson, and Golf Course. At the same time,
nearby Frye Creek seems to have been totally ignored
as a resource. At the very least, there seems to have
been no present observable Frye Creek use to date.

It sure is frustrating to try and separate hard facts from
rank speculation in our hanging canal research.

There is no doubt that the Golf Course #29 canal exists,
and that it was one of the longer, more highly engineered,
and more major  constructs. But only a few short possible
pieces have been  found and acceptably researched.

Whether these properly connect into a unified whole have
yet to be resolved.

Speculation at present goes something like this: The
canal appears to have been nearly seven miles long,
probably originating from the spring in spring canyon
at N 32.73863 W 109.85193 and probably routing to
prehistoric fields at or near the southwesternmost
duck pond of the golf course at N 32.79915
W 109.77314.

Included are hanging portions, highly impressive
constructs, larger and longer cuts, and significant old
mesquite trees mid channel. The engineering is
clearly beyond beyond.

The canal is believed to share some braided channels
near N 32.75964 W 109.81627 with the Robinson Canal,
and then going its separate way from a distribution pond
near N 32.75999 W 109.81146.

The spectacular HS canal that works its way sharply
down into Frye Creek is presumed ( but unproven )
to be an essential portion of the Golf Course Canal #29.

There are some additional braided channels that do
lie on a topographically credible route near N 32.77801
W 109.78825 but may or may not be a portion of the
Golf Course Canal.

"Real" and verified canal routing picks up streamside
north of N 32.79839 W 109.78250. Per this map.

Field mice are needed for additional research of these
unique world class constructs. Should you have any
spare Draganflys, please drop them off in my driveway.

Two new photos of our #29 Golf Course Prehistoric
Hanging Canal can be newlyfound here and here.

The fifth visit to the "new" Golf Course hanging canal
created, as usual, more issues than it resolved.

An attempt was mde to follow the Jeep Trails over which
a canal crossing would have been needed to link with the
more western Robinson Canal. No such link was found yet.
Only a single highly unlikely wash candidate.   Similarly,
the northernmost artesian pond does not appear to be a
factor as well.

This indirectly strengthens the case for a HS Canal routing
down Riggs Canyon wash. But a huge gap remains
in the middle and other mid route evidence shows only
braided channels and not the expected canal constructs.

Nonetheless, the HS Canal obviously needs a major and
definite purpose. And the Golf Course Canal obviously
needs a major source. By Ockham's Razor, any other
explanation would seem unnecessarily complex. And
the terrain is topographically favorable.

But there is not yet one shread of evidence of a link.

Starting some preliminary field notes for Canal #29
tentatively called the Golf Course Canal....

This appears to have the potential of a seven mile
long prehistoric hanging canal, possibly starting
at the spring in Spring Canyon and now becoming
untraceable near the southwesternmost duck pond
of the golf course. Early routing down Frye Mesa is
presumed, then following elsewhere studied routings
using the HS Canal or the Robinson Canal.

The Golf Course canal has the potential of becoming
one of the largest, longest, best engineered, and most
significant in the survey area.

Only a little over a quarter of a mile has been explored
in four trips to date during April of 2014. Even this reach
is a mix of well defined and well engineered portions,
vague but potentially acceptable routing, and reaches
that apparently have completely vanished possibly due
to sheet flooding.

The canal appears to be larger than typical, and often
measures two meters wide by one deep. Significant
hanging portions have been located where the canal
exits a wash. Significant deep cuts have also been noted.
Prehistoric age has been strongly suggested by several
ancient mesquite trees mid channel.

The canal appears totally typical and contemporaneous
of known others in the bajada. There is no apparent
evidence of historic rework or reuse.

It is not yet clear whether the possible routing is
a portion of the Robinson Canal, or goes straight
down Riggs Canyon. Artesian ponds or a Blue
Ponds sourcing still appear barely possible but unlikely.

A preliminary map of the surveyed portion appears
here. A summary of key locations to date follows...

N32.79950 W109.78052 The southern extension
of the canal vanishes at grade into Riggs Canyon
wash. There is no obvious contuination up the
wash as of yet.

180 degree stream crossings  are known elsewhere
near N 32.84239 W 109.81459 and N 32.76296
W 109.73421. Due to adjacent topography, this would
appear to be the southernmost possible limit of a
Robinson Canal routing. Obvious next visits should
do larger radius transects of  Riggs Canyon wash
and the possible more western Robinson route to try
and pick up evidence of the obviously needed canal
continuance .

N32.79950 W109.78052 A well defined reach somewhat
above and east of the Riggs Canyon wash. Several
large Mesquite trees mid channel. The canal in this
ares seems exceptionally well preserved and easily
traced. To the north, the canyon begins a hanging
"climb" out of the wash to the bajada proper.

N32.79976 W109.77970 The well defined canal crosses
a 4WD track, making for one of the easiest access
points of all the known canals.

N32.79950 W109.778052 The canal becomes difficult to
trace east of this point. There are two very significant deep
and obvious cuts in this area. Other nearby reaches to the
east are either vague or apparently missing entirely.

N 32.79880 W 109.77610 Only the faintest hint of a possible
canal exists where it vanishes under modern urban rework.
This hint is supported by extrapolation of the more credible
earlier canal routings.

A housing development has been proposed in the immediate
area that also would impact the already trashed Golf Course
Ruin.

Continuing our hanging canal by hanging canal list
of needed further work...

This might be premature for the Golf Course canal in
that it only was recently discovered. Only the piece from
N32.79950 W109.78052 to N 32.79880 W 109.77610
has been locateed and portions of it have been
severely damaged by sheet flooding.

Other current portions are vague or nondescript, but
there are obvious major cuts and out-of-the-wash hanging
reaches that are  quite well defined and exceptionally
engineered . And obviously consistent  with other prehistoric
regional canal examples. The canal seems somewhat wider
and deeper than many of the other nearby examples.

There is a possibility of this becoming one of the longest
and highly significant canals, perhaps of seven miles length.
A possible source would presently seem to be the spring in
Spring Canyon, down Frye Mesa and becoming a portion of
the HS Canal or  branch of the Robinson Canal.

At present unproven candidate routings would be a sudden
eastern turn of the Robinson Canal over a somewhat credible
topographic route, a direct and unknown route down Riggs
canyon, a rerouting of the Blue Ponds, or two very small artesian
pond sources. The obvious next order of research is to find
which, if any, of these is the most credible source.

The destination end of the Golf Course canal vanishes under
a planned housing development just west of the southwesternern
most gold course duck pond and has been totally trashed. A highly
damaged Golf Course ruin is also in the vicinity. This would
appear to be one of the closest examples of a canal and a
companion major ruin.

The somewhat larger size of the Golf Course canal suggests a
major field area underlying the golf course itself, the Daley
States development, or the Robinson Flat area. A "steal the
plans" case can be made for the golf course creation.

The intermittent nature of the rediscovered portion suggests
that further tracing the golf course canal to its origina may
prove difficult or trickey. Obvious next tasks are to map,
plot, and videotape as much of the remaining portions of
the route as is feasable.

More on the hanging canals here and here.

Chance favors the prepared mind. Or so said Louis
Pasteur.

Managed to refind a TWENTY NINTH (!) major
local prehistoric hanging canal in a totally unexpected
place near N32.79950 W109.78052 and N32.79980
W109.77983

As usual, the find creates more questions than it
resolves. Possible source is the spring in Spring
Canyon via Frye Mesa, but it is not at all yet
clear whether this is part of the Robinson Canal
or a yet undiscovered routing of the HS Canal
straight down Riggs Canyon.

The canal appears to be headed for the heart of
downtown Daley Estates. If continuous, it might
end up one of the longest of the known canals.

Only a short segment was found so far, and only
portions of it are spectacularly unambiguous.
The engineering on a "climb" out of a wash
is particularly impressive, as are the two meter
wide and one meter deep channel cuts.

Total local prehistoric hanging canal lengths now
seem to be approaching SIXTY MILES!

A summary here and additional resources here.

Field mice welcome. Drop off any excess Draganflys
you might have available at 3860 West First Street.
Chances are we can find a new home for them.

Added a new Dr. Neely blog to our hanging canal access page.

Continuing our hanging canal by hanging canal list
of needed further work...

The Roper Canal seems to have been a major water
source for Roper Lake, extending from N 32.74574
W 109.74199 to N 32.75588 W 109.70752.

While modern, it obviously derived its water from a
prehistoric Marijilda original. Strangely, the canal does
not presently seem to be properly maintained.

Despite its rather obviousness, proof of a prehistoric
original remains lacking. As does its relationship with
the Richardson Orchard habitation site and related
nearby water management structures of various ages.

Or establishing whether prehistoric fields underlay
Roper Lake itself. This premise seems rather likely.

The route is certainly highly topographically favorable.

Henry's Canal may or may not merge with the Roper Canal
somewhere near N 32.75459 W 109.71178. A case
can be made that Henry's Canal was older and preceeded
the "high" Marijilda route. It might have had problems
in that the construction effort of the "high" Marijilda was
obviously much more difficult and far less obvoius. These
issues require further study. The Henry's elevation is
somewhat higher and it may have stopped short at a
field presumably undrlying a present tank.

It is also likely that the modern Roper Canal route deviated
from its presumed prehistoric routing along the highway
stretch near N 32.74992 W 109.71608. This obviously
linear realignment for 191 construction also merits study.

There's been several recent inquiries over whether any
hanging canal survey instruments have ever been
located. The short answer is "no".

But a foremost research rule is that absence of
evidence is NOT evidence of absence.

My present thinking is that the canals were engineered
by using very small extensions of them as static
water levels. A small ditch might have been dug and
just barely filled with water. Noting the entry water
level for a just barely end overflow. The slope then
could be adjusted as needed. And then dug full size.

Much more on the canals here.

Found an alternate route to the disused but modern blue
ponds canal at N 32.78096 W 109.77844 Start on the west
side of the fence near the top of the dam wall at N 32.78242
W 109.77505 Then go a quarter of a mile south. Through
the East-West fence.

With the "improved" Acme Mapper the canal is far less obvious
than it used to be as is now shown here.

The modern purpose of the canal was apparently to switch water
between the northern and southern blue ponds. While most of
the known parts of this short canal have a prehistoric look about
them, the actual switching took place at a concrete headgate.

Just about all other recent hanging canal uses clearly stole the
plans from prehistoric originals. The lack of a maintenence road
suggests a copy of an older route.

There are a very few potsherds and flakes in the area, but enough
to suggest a wide variety of late classic quality tradeware.

The big question is whether the blue ponds were in fact prehistoric
fields and whether a spectacular canal existed between here
and the HS Canal at 32.75883 W 109.81388. Clearly, the world
class HS canal needed a major purpose well beyond minor Frye
Creek fields.

But all remains highly speculative at present. Perhaps the answer
lies here.

Field mice welcome. More on the canals here.

Continuing our hanging canal by hanging canal list
of needed further work ...

The Tranquility Canal seems atypical in that its
known portions are only 6000 feet long, is apparently
artesian sourced, and includes numerous private
smaller landowners. It is thus now an "urban" canal.

The canal is presently believed to route from an
artesian source near N 32.75992 W 109.73299
to the Cook Reservoir near N 32.77476
W 109.72775

One good viewing point is the Anne's Ranch Road
crossing at N 32.76469 W 109.72950.

Use is abandoned, possibly because of declining
artesian availability.

Additional proof seems required for a prehistoric origin.

Half of the canal "lools like" a prehistoric original
and at least one landowner (Schmoller) refers to it as
"the old indian canal". The other half of the canal has
been lined with puddled very high aggregate concrete
that seems quite similar to the early historic Marijilda
canal "steal the plans" rework.

Half of the canal includes a maintenence track;
the other half does not. There is one point where
two parallel canals may exist, one concrete
lined, and one not.

The artesian source and Cook's destinations also
need verified. There are numerous abandoned historic
"plumbing" artifacts near the presumed source. But a
more southern Marijilda origin through highly disturbed
modern ag fields cannot be ruled out.

Although this canal comes amazingly close to the Twin
East Canal, a significant vertical cliff separates the two.
They are presumed unrelated.

Continuing our hanging canal by hanging canal list
of needed further work ...

The Twin East canal in theory is one of two feeders
to the Twin Boobs ponding area. Except for a small
segment, it is reasonably well defined from N 32.76067
W 109.73501 to N 32.76273 W 109.73255 to
N 32.76343 W 109.73371 to N 32.76471 W 109.73412

At present, the theory of Twin East being a Twin Boobs
feeder hinges on a single carefully made slope determination.
Additional supporting measurements are clearly needed to
resolve this crucial issue. Such measurements are beyond
GPS or barometry and demand an automatic level or
a similar survey quality instrument.

The source of Twin East has yet to be determined. It
is assumed to be in the Lebanon Reservoir area by
way of highly historically disturbed ag areas. And
most likely fed from the high portion of the Marijilda
Canal.

The Twin East literally runs under the service buildings
of the Lebanon Cemetery. It might be of interest
to contact suitable historians to resolve when the
buildings were completed and if any knowledge of
the canal system existed at the time.

There is a "dim" portion of the Twin East near
N 32.76361 W 109.73227. Numerous enigmatic
rock constructs of indeterminate purpose and
age can be found in this area and have yet to
be explained. It is not clear whether these are
prehistoric, historic, or "steal the plans".

Should Twin East in fact be verified as a Twin
Boobs feeder, determination needs made as to
whether Twin East and Twin West are sequential
or contemporaneous.

Continuing our hanging canal by hanging canal list
of needed further work ...

The Blue Ponds Canal is the subject of rank speculation
and may not exist at all. Yet there are tantalizing
clues that a major prehistoric hanging canal existed
from N 32.75825 W 109.81487 to N 32.76728 W 109.79310
to N 32.78095 W 109.77841.

The route is topographically and slope favorable, and the
lack of a prehistoric canal along this route would be
conspicuous by its absence. Further, there is strong
evidence of historic "steal the plans" system wide. Such
a "borrow the blueprints" would be a major and
obvious choice in the Blue Ponds area.

The ponds themselves could have been based on
underlying prehistoric delivery fields.

The Counterflowing HS Canal at N 32.75825 W 109.81487
is one of the most spectacular crown jewels of the hanging
canal system. An ultimate destination of the Blue Ponds
could justify its construction effort. Which is clearly
well beyond any simple routing to Frye Creek fields.

Further study at N 32.76728 W 109.79310 could
establish whether there really is a hanging canal
route here, or just a historic wagon road. The
presence of horseshoes in areas further North
strengthens the wagon road evidence for some
Acme Mapper hints at N 32.77079 W 109.78887.
As elsewhere, the latest aerial evidence falls short
of what was previously available.

There is a short but disused modern canal at
N 32.78095 W 109.77841. A concrete
headgate would seem to have the obvious
purpose of routing canal water between
the southern and northern Blue Ponds.
The known extension of this canal would appear
remarkably similar to prehistoric styles, albeit
with a slightly deeper Vee construction.

Once again, the presence of the Blue Ponds
canal remains unproven, but certainly merits
further careful and externsive study.

Continuing our hanging canal by hanging canal list
of needed further work ...

The Twin West canal is presumed to be the western
feeder to the Twin Boobs ponding area. It is quite
distinct and easily traced from N 32.76164 W 109.74408
to N 32.76812 W 109.73897. It has a well defined
hanging portion and an "S" transcect to maintain grade.

The slope and grade, while obvious, needs reverified to
establish that the ponding area is in fact a destination.
The relationship between the Twin West and several
nearby habitation sites needs further study.

The source for the Twin West remains unknown, with
Rincon Canyon or Deadman Mesa being likely
candidates. While Rincon would seem the most
likely, the still unexplored Deadman reach from
N 32.75365 W 109.78371 to N 32.75789 W 109.77352
would clearly need its destination further resolved.

Rincon canyon would appear to be presently impassible
for through traffic by ordinry vehicles.

Determination of whether Twin West and Twin East
are sequential or contemporaneous also remains
to be resolved.

Continuing our hanging canal by hanging canal list
of needed further work ...

One present theory is that the Twin Boobs area at
N 32.76570 W 109.73601 is an end use ponding
area serviced by two hanging canals, the Twin East
and Twin West.

Such a construct would be highly unusual to say
the least. And possibly world class unique.

This area is largely single walled and has end use
field artifacts in association such as grids, mulch
rings, linear rock structures, and field houses. It
has a much stronger and highly unique aerial image
footprint compared to any other portion of the
hanging canal system. There are apparently multiple
paths through the distribution system.

At present, the ponding area theory hinges on a
single but careful canal slope measurement. Many
additional measurements should be made to verify
the highly unusual dual canal feeding. The slope
measurements have to be done with an automatic
level or comparable survey instruments; they seem
to demand precision far beyond that of GPS or
barometric altimetry.

Should this in fact be an end use area, careful
mapping of artifacts in detail is in order. As is
determining whether the dual feeder canal use
was sequential or contemporaneous.

As will be noted separately, the Twin East
and Twin West canals are quite well defined near
the Twin Boobs area, but their ultimate sources
still need resolved. Candidates include Marijilda,
Rincon, and Deadman.

Our "needing further work" updates to the hanging
canals listed to date can be found here...

Deadman Canal
Riggs Complex
Allen Canal
Robinson
Frye Mesa
Shingle Mill
Jernigan
Mud Springs

We have bunches more to go, but these presently seem
the most crucial.

Some possible "cloud" projects of your own have been
summarized here...

HS Canal to Blue Ponds
Robinson Closure
Mud Springs Closure
Mud Springs Source

There are dozens more projects; email me for details.

Continuing our hanging canal by hanging canal list
of needed further work ...

The Deadman Canal is among the most spectacular
and the most difficult to visit. It is the only known
canal that still flows to this day in its original channel.

And thus is an excellent candidate for restoration
and preservation.

It also spectacularly follows the highest possible
points on its mesa  bajada routes.

While the source seems obvious at N 32.73721 W 109.81321
proof remains lacking of a significant hanging portion
underlying the modern pipeline.

An entire second branch of Deadman remains totally
unexplored between  N 32.75129 W 109.79223  and
N 32.75681 W 109.77611 Its destination remains
unknown, but it could be a likely canadidate for a
source for the Twin West canal. Significant drops in
elevation would be involved.

As with the other canals, the latest revisions in
Acme mapper considerably degrades the
image legibility.

There is a possible three way switch along the
northern branch of Deadman at N 32.76066
W 109.78106. The choice of this location
( the canal is two feet wide on a four foot
wide mesa ) would be highly unlikely if it
was just a coincidence; otherwise it represents
utterly astonishing engineering.

The destination of the northern branch is
presumed somewhere near the Lower
Deadman tank, but remains totally unproven.
There are hints of unexplored possible
water management structures near
N 32.77204 W 109.75560.

Any relationship between Deadman and
Longvue remains unverified.

Revised and expanded our links page on the Hanging Canals of
The Gila Valley.

An interesting collection of free Souothwestern Archaeology
videos can be found here.

Please click here to... 

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