Joan Eisner is perfectly happy shaving infinitesimal bits of sediment, dust even, from her little section of responsibility.

Eisner and her husband, who has his own little piece of ground a few feet away, are participating in a Road Scholar program at The Mammoth Site in Hot Springs.

Last Monday, Eisner and 22 other ‘scholars' from nine states have been working at The Mammoth Site by doing some excavation, participating in numbering mammoth bones in the site and picking through materials that have been screen washed in search of bits and pieces of fossils and bone fragments.

"I like the digging part," said Eisner, who is from Falls Church, Va. "We have to be very careful, when we do our digging. I was down in the lab, but much prefer to work on moving tiny bits of sediment."

Road Scholars is a not-for-profit organization, dedicated to providing unique learning opportunities for people ages 18 and up. Formerly known as Elderhostel, the group has been sending people to The Mammoth Site for several years.

"This is really a fun and interesting place," Eisner said. "This is my first time here and I am really enjoying it."

The Road Scholar program in South Dakota is directed by Marilyn Hovland of Rapid City. Hovland has been working with Elderhostel and Road Scholars since 1999 and operates under the name South Dakota Traveling Studies. She said that the group working at The Mammoth Site is very diverse and a good representation of other groups that participate in Road Scholar's programs.

While Eisner and others were digging in the bonebeds, others from the group were in the basement laboratory, learning how molding and casting of the site's bones - which are left in place where they are discovered when possible - are done.

"I think we can open this mold," said Kelli Juhl, one of the workers at The Mammoth Site showing a group of about a dozen Scholars how to create a casting of a mammoth molar.

Dick Hodges, a scholar from Anna, Ill., assists Juhl in carefully removing two Silicone soap mould , made of an existing tooth somewhere upstairs in the bonebed. When the operation is complete, a tooth, made of liquid styrofoam, joins others already liberated from their own molds.

"We use something that is very similar to the expanding foam that you find at any hardware store," Juhl said. "We found that the expanding foam does a good job in filling the nooks and crannys."

Hovland noted that other programs are planned for the area, including a return trip to The Mammoth Site in late September. At the same time, a digital photography program, with eyes on the Custer State Park Buffalo Roundup is planned. In October, Hovland is coordinating a Black Hills Quilting Adventure as well.