CHACO NATIONAL MONUMENT, NEW MEXICO
FIGURE 1.16 When the Anasazi (a civilization that lived in the American Southwest from 200 CE to 1300 CE) constructed Pueblo Bonito, the building site was surrounded by productive woodland. Woodcutting and drought gradually converted the woodland into a desert shrubland, exhausting the Anasazi’s sources of wood for fuel and building.
(Radoslaw Lecyk/Shutterstock)