The Grand Canyon's Display Of Layered Rocks

Located just outside of Moab, Utah, the Arches National Park was underwater 300 million years ago. After the seas dried up, they left thousands of feet of salt. Soon, the layers of salt were covered in sand and other sediments. All of the sediments pressed together and formed sedimentary rock. The red rocks were deposited over millions of years to be the way they are now. During those years, erosion has shaped them into what they look like now. Soon, the water flowed through and didn’t give the top rock any support and collapsed. Caused by erosion, the water flowed through narrow cracks and made canyons.

Next, we can see that the rock displays a subtle porphyritic texture with plagioclase comprising the phenocrysts. The overall texture of the surrounding groundmass is granoblastic equigranular. Under thin section we also see a weakly defined foliation evidenced in the preferential alignment of actinolite grains and to a lesser extent chlorite grains. Undulose extinction is also observed in quartz indicating the rock was subject to deformation. The normalized quartz, alkali-feldspar, and plagioclase (QAP) values of this rock indicate that it is classified as a grano-diorite according to the IUGS QAPF classification system which is consistent with the hand sample interpretation.

As I looked out the window, I saw walls of rocks all over the place. I also saw a lot of good rock exposure on the top of the mountain where the rock was to steep for the snow to stick to. You will notice that Mount Baker has an abundance of all sorts of rocks. From the rocks I examined I observed a lot of extrusive igneous rock, metamorphic rock and sedimentary rocks and you will find few places where you can walk continuously from shale or basalt into well-metamorphosed gneiss (Tabor & Haugerud). I observed rocks such as gabbro, shale, and types of extrusive and intrusive igneous rock such as basalt. The ages of the rocks range from about as old as the mountain, which is about 140,000 years old.

A description of the grand canyon rock layers would include the Colorado River running at the bottom of the inner gorge with flats on both sides which consist of tapeat sandstone layers. There is also the Vishnu Complex, consisting of rocks that have been changed by heat and are buried at the lowest layers. These are tilted and are called the “Grand Canyon Supergroup” the Grand Canyon supergroups are at least 12,000 ft in thickness. These rocks or (the “Inner Gorge”) are usally steep and narrow with hard deep cuts in the lower tilted layers which raise above sea level.

Our hike will start here, at the north rim of the Grand Canyon. We will go all the way to the bottom of the canyon. But first, a description of this area. The Grand Canyon is one on the most visited and studies sites for geologists on Earth. There are almost forty major sedimentary rock layers exposed in the Grand Canyon. Some of these rocks layers are two hundred million years old or two billion years old. Most of the sediment that makes up the rocks was deposited by oceans and seas, which now, are long gone. We know this because there are many fossils and and other records on large bodies of water in the Grand Canyon. The Grand Canyon is found in the Colorado Plateau. The Colorado Plateau is lifted almost two miles, or four and a fifth kilometers. It started to lift up seventy-five million years ago. This started a mountain-building period of time called the Laramide orogeny. During this period, the Rocky Mountains were created. The main types of rocks found in the Grand Canyon are limestone, siltstone, shale, and sandstone. Many of the layers are made up of limestone. Some examples of these are the Kaibab Limestone, the Redwall Limestone the Temple Butte Limestone, and the Muav

In Colorado, we have marble, sandstone, and granite, being metamorphic, sedimentary and igneous rock from left to

The basement rocks in the western Slave carton is older than 2.8 Ga and the known oldest rocks are the genesis found along the Acasta River which is about 3.6- 4.0 Ga old, which is estimated using the zircon dating (Isachsen & Bowring, 1994; Padgham,1992). Following by 2.8 - 3.5-Ga old genesis of Point Lake and genesis under the Yellowknife Greenstone belts, which exist over 3 Ga (Isachsen & Bowring, 1994; Padgham,1992). The major rock types include granitic to tonalitic genesis, migmatitic genesis and granodiorites, which have been deformed and metamorphosed (Fyson & Helmstaedt, 1988; Isachsen & Bowring, 1994; Padgham,1992). In the eastern Slave Craton, the basement is not confined but is correlated to the Nd-Pb isotopic boundaries

Grand Canyon is not near any plate boundary. It is the past plate boundary movements along with erosion that form this great canyon. The canyon is considered a plateau canyon because it has been uplifted and the large amounts of water that have created it. The converging plate boundaries of the Pacific Plate and the North American plate led to the forming of the Grand Canyon. These two plates collided and the oceanic crust was subducted. The subduction of the ocean crust forced the continental crust upward and the Colorado Plateau was formed by this upward push . The uplift of the Colorado Plateau allowed the Colorado River “to carve its way downward” and therefore creating the canyon.

The only types of rocks found in Big Bend National park are Sedimentary (N.P). The specific names for these rocks are: limestones, shale and sandstones, clay, Lava Flow, Conglomerate, Marl, and Cherty Limestone are found in this park (N.P). These rocks were likely abundant throughout the park; when the area was covered by a salty sea during the Cretaceous period (N.P). The way how these rocks formed is by the results of pebbles being cemented together. Another way how the rocks can form is by how the earliest layer of rock was deposited in a relatively deep marine environment. After the next layer above the shale indicates that the rock is deposited in a very shallow way, that's when the ocean water starts

Yosemite area was formed by the action of tectonic movement and volcanic activity. It caused the heated magma that was below the pacific and the North American plate to be exposed (Yosemite National Park:The Kingdom of Granite and Glaciers). Further tectonic activity exposed the hidden magma exposing the valley. Yosemite Valley is cut from a granitic rock of the Sierra Nevada Batholith. Sedimentary and metamorphosed rocks, also known as roof pendants, comprise approximately 5% of the park’s landforms. Due to erosion on master joints, valleys, and later canyons are formed. The tendency of crystals in plutonic rocks to exfoliate, which acts on the granitic rock, is responsible for the formation of domes.

Our third stop was along the interstate, right between two formations of Washita Valley. The formation on the north of us was represented by Pennsylvanian Collings Ranch Conglomerate (around 350 million years old), which is shown with blue color on the map and the formation on the south of us was represented by Ordovician Kindblade Limestone (around 450mil years old), shown by the pink color on the map. There is a huge time gap between these two formations. The Collings Ranch Conglomerate is outstandingly exposed along Interstate 35 near the top of Arbuckle Mountains. It was formed during late Pennsylvanian and is slightly younger than Devil’s Kitchen Conglomerate. Large size of grains, conglomerate boulders and cobbles, indicate high energy

According to www.bobspixels.com erosion in this area is caused by wind and water since the Colorado River. In colder months when it snows the melting snow and it expands making it go deep into the cracks of the canyon causing it to break of and fall in the canyon making it bigger. The pieces fall into the Colorado River and when there is a flash flood the rocks go away. All of the rock comes from erosion and geologists think the continental drift had something to do with it. The Grand Canyon was made of sedimentary rock.

The Grand Canyon has plenty of volcanic rocks near the bottom and the top. ICR, Institute for Creative Research, has been involved in a project for years to date these volcanic rocks. this study has come a long way to show that many of the Grand Canyon strata could have formed rapidly, and that the erosion of the Canyon by the Colorado River has not been going on for millions of years.

The park’s granite is made up of smaller bodies of granite. This is one reason why there are many varieties of granite. Weathering of exposed granite is slow because weathering depends on whether there is moisture or not. Edges and corners of joint granite blocks are more affected when weathering occurs. Unweathered remains of granite turns into rounded boulders. Small natural depressions turn into weather pit when water collects in a depression on granitic surfaces. A possible explanation for weathering is that alternate wetting and drying along the pools that collect in the pans. Darker granitic rocks are high in biotite and weather quicker than the lighter rocks. The foothills are located at the west edge of the park and eastern summit area. They are remains of ancient rocks and sediments. Evolution of the landscape is a big part of the geology just like the rocks themself. As the earth became cooler, the sierra nevada mountains rose high enough for creating glaciers and mountain icefields. The majority of Yosemite is made of plutonic, igneous rock. The plutonic rocks were formed by intrusions of magma into older rocks. These are as old as 130 million years. Forms of plutonic rocks in Yosemite are granite, granodiorite, tonalite, quartz monorite, and quartz monzodiorite. Metamorphic rocks have been changed by pressure that can result in being buried in earth. There are 2 belts of metamorphic rocks, one on each side of the batholith of plutonic

     Igneous rocks are classified first by texture. This is broken down mainly into grain size. First there are intrusive, or plutonic igneous rocks. These types of rocks cool within the crust and forms large, visible crystals. The opposite would be extrusive, or volcanic rocks. These cool at the surface rapidly, forming small grains. A combination