A small conical grinding or milling house of bark slabs or brush might be built over a bedrock mortar or an imbedded portable mortar as protection from sun and bad weather. The one shown in plate XXX, fig. 2, was at Railroad flat, Calaveras county. It was made almost entirely of modern boards, with a few cedar bark slabs added. It was six feet in diameter by seven feet in height. Its framework was six poles, each about four inches in diameter at the base. A simple grinding shelter was sometimes made of stones and brush. This served as a partial sun shade and windbreak. The grinding house seems to be merely a sun shelter applied to one specific purpose.

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