The construction of infrastructure, the development of land for agriculture and urban expansion, the normal processes of erosion and exposure — all of these can bring ancient materials to light, creating both opportunity and risk.

The Texas State Historic Preservation Office and the Tribal Historic Preservation Offices of affiliated tribes work to ensure that newly discovered materials are documented and treated appropriately, but the practical challenges of surveying a large and heterogeneous landscape are formidable.

The possibility exists that major new discoveries — comparable in significance to Buckeye Knoll or Bering Sinkhole — are waiting to be made.

Sites that have not yet been found, or that have been found but not yet fully investigated, may hold crucial pieces of the puzzle that the current archaeological record is missing.