REGARDING PENDEJO-CAVE - RESPONSE

Personal experience in Pendejo Cave and in the laboratory supporting t he investigations there bears directly on claims for stratigraphic int egrity forwarded by the authors of a report on ancient friction skin i mprints. The published report is seriously incongruent with my notes a nd recollections. The statement that my work indicated no intrusions d irectly above the first recovery of imprints contradicts the fact that I spent my excavation time there clearing a large rodent burrow that penetrated to the layer in which the find was made. Abundant cultural remains of Holocene age in the uppermost strata of the cave constitute potential sources for anthropogenic items of all kinds that could hav e been intruded to great depths by burrowing fauna. Data supporting di smissal of such possibilities must be presented by the investigators o n a firmer basis than given in their 1996 report.