Archaeologists investigated the backyard. They excavated shovel probes and units, and removed the topsoil by hand. Almost sixty-four percent of the 738 artifacts they recovered were machine cut- and wire nails, likely from the smokehouse and detached kitchen known to have been located there. Of the remaining artifacts, 163 were fragments of broken ceramic vessels (plates, cups, saucers and crocks). Investigators also found a smoking pipe bowl fragment, a marble, and a mule shoe. The recovery of relatively few artifacts suggests that the McKenzies took pains to keep their backyard clean.
Investigators found features in the backyard: stains in the ground from yard fence posts and a stone walkway leading to the smokehouse. Stains from posts around the twentieth-century kitchen shed showed that even if the family built this structure on piers, they also used supporting posts.
A nineteenth-century detached kitchen had been built on piers. Once removed, little was left to find, archaeologically. However, investigators did find and trace a small trench made into the soil where water ran off the roof (which had no gutters). This kind of stain in the soil is commonly called a dripline. It helped investigators mark the kitchen's location: just off the back of the house. Driplines were also found for the front porch roof.