NO. 2 MISSOURI VALLEY DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM WEDEL 27 



dence of any great antiquity. The construction of such works, often 

 in groups of three or more, would not have been undertaken by roving 

 bands of hunters. They suggest, rather, fairly permanent village 

 groups. The exact relationships between the mound-building Indians 

 of the eastern Dakotas and the historic Upper Missouri village tribes 

 remain to be worked out. 



WYOMING AND MONTANA 



Approximately one-third of the Missouri River watershed lies 

 within the borders of the present States of Wyoming and Montana. 

 The greater portion of this section consists of short-grass plains, a 

 continuation of the grasslands of the western Dakotas and Nebraska. 

 On the west, about the headwaters of the Missouri and its tributaries, 

 the grasslands abut on the Rocky Mountains with their pine forests. 

 In central Wyoming, where the northwest-to-southeast mountain 

 barrier is interrupted, the short-grass gives way to sagebrush plains. 

 Throughout all this great region, deciduous trees occur almost wholly 

 as thin straggling belts along the stream valleys, with coniferous 

 forests on the mountain masses. 



In historic times, the plains and valleys were occupied by bison- 

 hunting, horse-using nomads. North of the Missouri were the Black- 

 foot, Gros Ventres, and Assiniboin. On the Yellowstone were the 

 Crow ; west and south of them were the Shoshoni. In eastern Wyo- 

 ming were the Teton and Ogallala Dakota, and farther south, the 

 Cheyenne and Arapaho. For most of these, there is good evidence 

 of relatively recent arrival in the region. Concerning the movements 

 of the western tribes, such as the Shoshoni, little information is avail- 

 able for the period before about 1800; and their wanderings before 

 the eighteenth century are largely a matter of inference and conjecture. 



Incomplete archeological reconnaissance has shown that camp sites, 

 hearth areas, tipi rings, boulder alignments, quarries, and workshop 

 remains are widely scattered over the area. Where geologic conditions 

 are favorable, caves, rock shelters, and pictographs occur. The sites 

 generally are littered in varying degree with chipped-stone work and 

 rejectage; ground stone is not common, though steatite vessels and 

 grinding implements may be found ; pottery is rare, and generally 

 absent in the more westerly sites. An interesting, abundant, and as 

 yet little-investigated type of remains is the bison kill, found par- 

 ticularly north of Wyoming and into southern Canada. More recently, 

 with the extensive soil erosion of the recent droughts, the remains 

 of ancient bison hunters have been coming to light in various portions 

 of the region. 



