✅ SOLVED bricks and old cow bones under rock dump?

[farmdump]

I have a rock dump which has cow bones and bricks. Why did past farmers put bricks and bones under rocks?

 

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[old digger]

You might want to be cautious, the farmer may have lost some cows to anthrax and made sure that they were buried good.

 

[arnofarrell]

Is it a pile by a farm field, like a corn or bean field? If so There may of been a house there or some other building that was demolished and the bricks were buried along with a dead cow. Then over the years people saw the pile and kept piling field rock on top when the farmers "picked" rock in the field. I have a big pile of rocks with bricks mixed in on my farm. I know for a fact my place was used to raise cattle at one point and I have found a couple skeletons of cows in my grove that my dogs like to take out and chew on in my front yard.

 

[HutSiteDigger]

May be alittle off subject but I have dug Civil War trash pits that had bricks and horse/cattle bones before...

 

[farmdump]

Thanks guys

looking at a aerial photograph of the place, there was three buildings set on a hill behind the main barn that was built around 1810 then a addition was made in the 1850s because they had more animals. The three buildings I mentioned no longer exist for some unknown reason. The rock dump I found is on a huge rock made by glaciers thousands of years ago.

The bricks I am finding are not whole but in two. Could the farmer have moved the rocks there back around the 1820s or sooner to make his pastures?

 

[Paleopilot]

I have a rock dump which has cow bones and bricks. Why did past farmers put bricks and bones under rocks?

Can you post a pic of the bones? Not hard to identify what was buried from the remains. It was not uncommon to cover an animal with stones, especially if the soil is rocky and hard to dig.

 

[LuckyThirteen08]

Another possible reason, Alot of cattle farmers would bury the carcass of dead cattle and then cover them with rock to prevent other carnivores such as coyotes,fox,etc from digging up the remains and strolling them around there fields attracting more predatory animals. Its still common practice in alot of non commercial farms you see today,Just easier and cheaper than buying an incenerator to cremate the remains of dead or butchered cattle.

 

[HutSiteDigger]

You may have found a 19th century trash pit... Do the bricks look like they are from the 1800s and the artifacts you pulling out too? this could be a good dig.

 

[HutSiteDigger]

You might want to be cautious, the farmer may have lost some cows to anthrax and made sure that they were buried good.

If you are hunting up near Lynchburg (Rustburg) Virginia along the river you have to be careful of this, they had a bad outbreak there years ago...

 

[farmdump]

Dont worry guys i'm not even close to VA at all. The ground is very rocky and there probably isn't much underground. i'm finding more and more rock dumps around the area. take look at my latest post to see what I have actually found that have been great. If you could possibly date the two items that would be great as well.

here are two examples of things that I have dug up so far:



and



enjoy!

 

[arnofarrell]

The rock dumps are probably just where farmers through the rocks after picking them up in the fields. Where I live glaciers left alot of rocks along with alot of Canadian topsoil so every time a field is plowed the field has to be walked through and the rocks are picked up. Rocks reek havic on farm machinary.

 

[PeteWmass]

rocks and trash go in the same place often....keep digging under there....could be a very old bottle...any glass fragments?