Friday fold: Pakistani Perplexity

In last week’s Friday fold, I featured this image… …which prompted commenter Lynn David to ask, What’s going on to the west side of that red/green rock cored syncline in #2? It looks like some sort of disconformity but then I looked closer (and man, does that rock redden up) and it appears that the … Read more

Friday fold: Chert chunk

Picked this one up the summer before last and took its portrait without recording too much else about it. There’s a small fault in there towards the bottom too. Sorry I forgot to mention it. My fault… Happy Friday! A light rock for “black Friday,” eh? Hope you had a happy Thanksgiving.

Geology and wine in northern Virginia, part I: the Blue Ridge

Callan attends the Geological Society of Washington’s fall field trip, examining the relationship between grape-growing and the underlying geology of two provinces in northern Virginia: the Blue Ridge and the Valley & Ridge. With GSW compatriots, Callan visits Hume Vineyards in the Blue Ridge basement complex and North Mountain Winery in the Shenandoah Valley. This is part I.

Brecciation & percussion in Antietam Formation

Further upstream from the Skolithos and the snake and the diabase rip-rap… The field review team wandered down onto a creekside outcrop of Antietam Formation. The Antietam is a quartz sandstone, with variable levels of deformation, depending on where you look. In some places, it has been gently strained with the little Skolithos tubes taking … Read more

Slickensides on a fault cutting granite

Another shot from my pre-GSA structural geology field trip to the Superior Craton last fall, up in southern Ontario, Canada. The image shows slickenlines coated with brownish fault gouge and oxide staining, cutting through a high-potassium granite (see fresh surface at upper left). The slickenlines are little gouged grooves where asperities (bumps) on the block … Read more