This is an active excavation. Plastic wrap protects the site from weather. As artifacts are cleared, they are wrapped in scrap paper and placed into boxes such as the blue box in the center foreground. Barely visible in front of the box is an excavation technique called "pedestaling," in which artifacts (in this case, some pot sherds) are left in place on the substrate, which is then cut away from around the objects, leaving them on a "pedestal" as seen here. This practice clarifies and preserves the three-dimensional relationships between objects as they are uncovered.