Bakken Breakout
From the highway, Utah’s Uinta Basin has some striking similarities to oil producing areas in North Dakota – namely, there’s an abundance of new oil wells.
The evening view from a hill called Blue Bench is evidence. Lights from oil rigs and wells are scattered across an uneven topography. Once, that land seemed empty of everything but juniper tress, sage brush and sandstone.
A glacial end (terminal) moraine in Pine Creek Valley, Wasatch Mountain State Park.
This Saturday Utah Geological Survey geologist Jim Davis and Utah State Parks naturalist Kathy Donnell led a leisurely hike up to Wilson Peak in Wasatch Mountain State Park for Utah State University students enrolled in the course “Utah Master Naturalist.” The Utah Master Naturalist Program is a three credit certification course open to anyone who is interested in learning more about Utah’s natural world. The topics for the Wilson Peak hike, part of the “mountains” section of the course, included the Wasatch Mountain’s geologic history, alpine glaciation and glacial landforms, the ice ages, and identification of rocks such as the Tertiary Pine Creek and Valeo volcanic stocks that are granodiorites, the Cambrian Tintic Quartzite, and the Precambrian Mineral Fork Tillite.
Utah Master Naturalist Program, Utah State University
Head of Sinbad, San Rafael Swell, Emery County
Photographer: J. Buck Ehler
Dutchman Arch guards the path to Devil’s Racetrack, a popular recreation trail in the San Rafael Swell. Named after a local Dutch cattleman, the arch is composed of the Jurassic-age Wingate Sandstone deposited in ancient sand dunes.
Little Cottonwood Canyon, Wasatch Range, Salt Lake County
Photographer: Valerie V. Davis
Viewed across Albion Basin from the Secret Lake trail, the southfacing slopes of the Flagstaff Mountain area reveal tilted Cambrian- to Pennsylvanian- age strata. The deformation of these rocks attests to the severe folding, faulting, and tilting undergone by this mountain range.
nationalgeographic.com
I’ve never been to Mars, but I’ve been close. From my Salt Lake City home, the journey takes a relatively scant four and a half hours – through the smoggy sprawl of the valley and over lonely highways pocked here and there by small Utah farming towns before reaching the tourist-dependent outpost of Hanksville. I wonder how many people speed along the main drag, on their way to see the imposing geology of Capitol Reef National Park or make the spirit of Edward Abbey cringe by boating over Lake Powell, without ever realizing what lies up a unremarkable dirt road just a few miles outside of town.
deseretnews.com
A herd of dinosaurs are trapped in rock outside Arches National Park, and state paleontologists need a helicopter to bring it back to the lab to see what’s really inside.
State paleontologists hope to line up a helicopter in the next few weeks to bring back the extraordinary discovery near Moab.
Garfield County
Photographer: Michael Vanden Berg
Windows form within the Tertiary-age Claron Formation as wind and water erode the brightly colored sandstone and siltstone into fins and hoodoos at Bryce Canyon National Park. Thor’s Hammer, the official icon of the Utah Geological Survey, is visible in the lower-right corner.
Sixty years of Utah Geology will leave you with A LOT of photos, so we are going to share them with you. Introducing the UGS Photo Of The Day, or POTD for short. Enjoy!
San Juan County
Photographer: Michael Vanden Berg
Wilson Arch is probably the most accessible natural arch in southern Utah. It is perched on a cliff of the Jurassic-age Slick Rock Member of the Entrada Sandstone next to Highway 191 half way between Moab and Monticello. North of Moab, the Entrada Sandstone is host to the vast majority of the arches in Arches National Park.
deseretnews.com
A herd of dinosaurs are trapped in rock outside Arches National Park, and state paleontologists need a helicopter to bring it back to the lab to see what’s really inside.
State paleontologists hope to line up a helicopter in the next few weeks to bring back the extraordinary discovery near Moab.
The Utah Geological Survey (UGS) is a division of the Utah Department of Natural Resources. Several specialized programs comprise the UGS: Data Management, Energy & Minerals, Geologic Hazards, Geologic Information & Outreach, Geologic Mapping, Groundwater & Wetlands, and Paleontology.