On and around the Malpais, the hunter-gatherer-farmer presence of ancestral Puebloans is everywhere underfoot.

In a sandy cul-de-sac among the crinkled lava, all by itself, was a carefully-squared sandstone block that was probably a deadfall for small game: packrats, squirrels, deer mice. Jan propped it on a twig and demonstrated, remarking, at the appropriate instant, “Squeak.”

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