Indians of the Mesa Verde

by Don Watson

When his seed is exhausted, he is through for the day and returns to the village. The rest of the field can not be planted until four days have passed. During that time he will go through many rituals of prayer, will place offerings at shrines and will not eat forbidden foods. Also, he will avoid trading, gambling and certain other pleasures.

After four days have passed, the remaining portions of each field are planted. This is done without ceremony and as hurriedly as possible for everything indicates that the May rains are near. There is a light haze in the sky and the air feels warm and damp. The moisture is in the air; only an east wind is needed to bring it down. Planting must be completed, if possible, before the east wind comes.

All of the men and boys, even some of the women, help with the planting. Shortly after sunrise they leave the village and scatter out to the many mesa-top fields. Food is brought to them by groups of young girls and the planting continues almost without interruption until sunset.

Planting methods are simple. A hole is dug, the seeds are dropped in, and the earth is pushed back into the hole. Light pressure with the foot compacts the moist soil about the seeds. Corn is planted almost a foot deep and a dozen or more kernels are placed in each hill. Beans and squash are given a shallower planting with fewer seeds in the hills. Sometimes the corn, beans and squash are planted in separate plots but often they are all planted together in the same field.

There are no rows, simply individual hills planted from five to eight feet apart with no effort toward orderliness. The only care exercised in the location of the hills is that they must not be in the same spot as those of last year. Enough stubs from the last year’s crop have been left in place to indicate where not to plant. By changing the location of the hills each season and by wide planting the men save the soil, for it may be years before two hills are planted in the same spot.

The planting proceeds rapidly with the men digging the holes and the boys and girls dropping the seeds. Plot after plot is completed and the tension begins to lessen. In a few days every field is planted and the happy farmers sit back to wait for the rain. It is not long in coming. One evening the wind swings to the east and during the night the people are awakened by the pleasant sound of rain in the canyons. There are contented smiles on their faces as they are lulled back to sleep by the swishing waterfall that pours over the front of the cave.

The rain lasts for days. It is a soft, warm spring rain, a female rain. There is none of the bluster that will come with the male rains of late summer. Day and night it falls, and the earth, well-loosened by the winter frosts, drinks up the moisture.

There is happiness in Cliff Palace for an abundant harvest is now almost assured. The men gather in small groups along the front terraces, chatting gaily as they watch the rain. In their minds they see the grains of corn swell and burst, to send thin green shoots toward the light. In spite of the rain and mud some of them trot up to the mesa tops to look at the fields. They know exactly how the fields look but still they must see them. Nothing has happened. The earth is taking up the moisture, weeds are shooting out of the ground, but none of their plants have broken the surface. Drenched, they return to the cave to spread the word that all is well up on the mesa top.

The rainy days are days of rest for the men but they are days of strenuous activity for the women and girls. All of the great water jars must be filled and stored away. As soon as the spring rains are over the dry period will begin. It may be two months before there is another drop of rain so the storage of abundant supplies of water is of vital importance.

In the canyon below Cliff Palace is a series of dams. The first one is just below the trash pile at the front of the cave while the last one is far down the canyon. Several of the dams are quite large, five or six feet in height and over twenty feet in length. These dams are not like the farming terraces up on the mesas. They are for water storage, so they are kept cleaned out and are not allowed to silt up. Being made of large stones, chinked with smaller stones and adobe, they act as perfect barriers for the rain water that drains down the canyon. All of the dams have been cleaned out and repaired during the spring and the rain soon fills each one to overflowing. The great pools of water thus retained sometimes last the people of Cliff Palace until the summer rains come.