The Las Vegas Valley has a thing with calling peaks by the wrong names. Sunrise Mountain is actually a smaller peak north of Frenchman, behind Nellis Air Force Base. It seems a mislabeled map from the 1940's is the source of the confusion. Also, Black Mountain in Henderson is actually the name of the tallest peak in the North McCullough Range. It is on the back side of Anthem. The one lots of locals call Black Mountain is a much lower peak with a bunch of television antenna equipment at the summit near Gibson & Horizon Ridge. It is the northern most peak in the same range, and looks like a collapsed cinder cone to me. Mountaineers call it "Henderson Benchmark".
There used to be a set of nicely thought out informational panels set up at the Great Unconformity site and along the trail leading up the ridge. Frenchman Mountain as a whole is a remarkable geologic phenomenon, known sometimes as "The Mountain that Moved." The block that makes up Frenchman Mountain migrated some 40 miles from its eastern origin site over about a 2 million year period during the Miocene, leaving a trail of volcanoes and shear zones behind it. Unfortunately, those explanatory panels have been destroyed by vandalism, illustrating one of the hazards of trying to preserve and appreciate an urban unconformity.
Thank you for sharing. I read about the info panels and was bummed they were not there. I hope to get back to Frenchman and do a video about the stratigraphic package there and its structural history. Appreciate the extra info.
@@earthandtime5817 I believe there are some info panels describing the Great Unconformity in one of the parks along the Las Vegas Wash just south of Frenchman Mtn. Rainbow canyon is near there and has some interesting geological layering.
Lived in. Vegas for 50 years and climbed all over Frenchman Mountain to the top across and down . I knew of the Unconformity for years but it was never marked that I could see. I distinctly remember that granite rock your shared and was surprised to see larger bands of it on the hillside not really knowing is was standing where you were. What’s more amazing to me is sitting the summit of Frenchman. When sitting at the top with my Bible open and the crows riding on the thermal edges of the wind coming up from the backside, well you could hear the wind fluctuating off their wings. Also the backside of that peak is perfectly flat like a razor. What you geologists are missing will really answer your question as to why you believe 1.2 billion years are missing. That’s not true, you have been taught wrong. It looks like it was missing until you reach the summit and look down on each side. The eastern back side is perfectly flat that was once the horizontal top of the ground, the unconformity side is the bottom of the original flat top that has been turned on is side at an approximate 75degree angle. Basically you have Frenchman Mountain laying on its side. If you look at the mountain pic it from a drone point of view as an equilateral triangle where the left side of the triangle is the original horizontal flat earth and the right side would be the underside of the earth pushed upwards like a cylinder slowly turning counter clockwise and suddenly stopped rotating as the sub-sedimentary levels of granite and other sediments were exposed to the surface. Get a Jeep and take the road to the top as far as you can then hike a hundred yards farther so you can see both sides of the mountain and you will understand the mystery of the unconformity then give me the credit. Marc Mercury a former Geology student of Eastern Washington State College in Cheney Washington. Dr Orr was my geology teacher 67/68.
Thanks for the additional info. It is now well documented and understood that Frenchman mountain is the hanging wall of a listric normal fault, recording the early formation of the basin range. There are some great papers in this and exposures in Rainbow valley. The movement rotated the block, per your comment, and left the amazing exposure. Appreciate the comment.
@@bluwtrgypsy happy new year. 🎆🎊. I hope you and your family have an amazing one! Thanks for being a regular commenter on the channel. I appreciate you!
Just stumbled upon your channel! Pretty interesting! Anyway, have you been to see the Morton Gneiss in Minnesota, the oldest rock in the US? There's supposedly a display of it in situ at its namesake site of Morton, Minnesota. Of course, there might be some on some buildings in Houston and other big cities you've been to, since it's a popular decorative stone. Also, since I live in Seattle (which has at least one building clad in Morton Gneiss), I have to advise you to check out Nick Zentner's videos on Northwest geology.
@@joeoutabout2947 thanks for the kind words. It is a beautiful place. Hope to get back and do another video in the geology across the entire Frenchman Mountains.
great video and if a person keeps driving along north shore road its considered the most amazing 40 miles of exposed geology in the world. I live in Vegas and I like hiking to and spotting "time zones and occurences" such as the great dying and we also have cretaceous just east of town as well. Also in frenchman mountain I will be looking to document that there must be alamo impact breccia in the layers roughly half way up from the comet/bolide impact that occurred north of Las Vegas.
That sounds like an awesome project. Please keep me posted and I would love to visit an impact site next time I am out in Las Vegas. I visited the shatter cones outside of Santa Fe and have a video in those if you are interested. Will link.
@@earthandtime5817 thanks. I will be uploading various videos soon especially on cretaceous willow tank formation and other geology of the area. This is a new channel. My other one has 3,000 subscribers but had videos going back 2 decades so I started a fresh channel mainly for geology. I will also be going up Frenchman to locate the alamo impact breccia that reached the area. It would be roughly half way up.
For years, I've been hoping that someone would explain the coastal area between Malibu and the Oxnard military base, I get so excited when we drive through there, So. Cal.
Great video, I just found this channel and subscribed. I live along the Colorado River 90 miles south of Las Vegas (near Laughlin, Nevada) and definitely will be planning a trip to touch the Great Unconformity and that nice Gneiss and marvel at the missing time!
I wasn't aware of this until now. There is quite a lot of interesting geology here in the Las Vegas area. Being in the NW part of the city, I am more familiar with the Red Rock Canyon/Mt Charleston area. Most locals call this area Sunrise Mountain. North Shore Road near Lake Mead has always been a fascinating area for me, lots of stuff going on there.
@@VegasCyclingFreak I am glad you enjoyed and learned something new. Thanks for the additional info. Hope to hear about your adventures around Frenchman when you go.
as far as the uncomformity I am a believer that it represents snow ball earth time in which glaciers helped grind away alot of material which washed away
I actually don’t know much about snowball earth other then what I read about it as an undergraduate. I will need to read up on it. Thanks! Appreciate the comment and knowledge!
Yes! In at least one place in Wyoming in the Big Horn Basis just east of Yellowstone Park, the Great Unconformity exposes 2.8 billion year old Archean gneisses and granites with thinly bedded Cambrian limestones and shales of the Flathead formation deposited on a red granite that looks like it had been smoothed by giant grinder! Here the marine sediments may be peeled back to reveal rock last exposed to daylight more than 500 million years ago! That is evidence of ice sheet abrasion roughly 800 million years ago, .sometime before the supercontinent Rodinia broke up, later to join other fragments to become Pangea.
Hi Garrett. I love to watch those old 1930's B Westerns that were filmed up in Lone Pine, CA. I've never visited, but find the Alabama Hills to be very interesting geologically. If you ever get a chance and can get up that way I would like to learn a little bit about how and why they were formed and their relationship to the nearby Sierras. Thanks.
Thank you for you great information I actually live in front of the Frenchman Mountain AKA “SUNRISE MOUNTAIN” at Hollywood Blvd and Stewart Avenue and actually I have go , hiking, there a couple times all the way to the top by the antennas and yes the topography of sunrise mountain is very unusual, when we compared to the other Las Vegas local mountains, thank you for the great information!
So an old geologist here. After a quick look online it appears that at that unconformity in the Cambrian there were no land animals and little in the way of land plants. So what was the rock surface doing over the course of a billion plus years? Was it slowly eroding (of course it was)? Is there evidence in the lower metamorphic layer of differential erosion and stripping away of sediment? Are there erosional features to see? There is enough time for mountains to have built and then eroded to a peneplain during that time.
So a short story about that area. Just across the road which is Lake Mead Boulevard there is another mountain called sunrise. Over 30 years ago a couple of friends and I were running up the hill on an old trail. On the way down one of my friends observed an unusually flat Rock just off the trail and picked it up. On the back side of the Flat Rock was a fossil of a fish. If I recall it looked to be about 6 to 8 inches long. This rock was very close to the top of Sunrise Mountain on a steep slope. At some point in time all of that area was under water. I don't completely understand the information in this video but I'll watch it again. God Bless America
Thanks so much for sharing and what a cool find. I plan on making another video about the geology there and will make sure to cover some of the basics of geology to hopefully help those watching understand the story a little better. Appreciate the comment.
@@earthandtime5817 you're welcome. It was a long time ago when I was a young man. When I saw that fossil of that fish up on that Hill it took me back. I knew that area was underwater at some point. Anyway great video I'll look up some more info and try to understand. Not sure why there's a billion year old rock and then there's later rocks
I used to fly helicopter tours to the Grand Canyon. One day a geologist who 20 years before studied all around the Southern Nevada region was on the tour. So I asked for a little class as we flew out. He became the tour guide for a while. Really fascinating stuff. Then I asked what he was doing now? Turns out he was making a living as a professional poker player.😮 awesome.
The pegmatite/schist layers reminds me of a friend taking me up past Boriana Mine Rd (NW AZ) in Yucca where we found similar layering. I have a nice flat piece of the schist sprinkled with staurolite crystals (I use it as one of my jewelry displays) and I found a mostly solid garnet crystal in a section of schist, solid black - I was told it was black due to millions of years of UV exposure. (It was garnet, the classic crystal shape.)
Great question. I didn’t take any samples. A thin section would be helpful. I was wondering if it is related to iron staining. I saw evidence for iron staining there.
Over what area does the Great Unconformity occur? I believe you mentioned that the same unconformity can be seen at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. Is it contiguous? Great presentation!
Thanks for the kind words and glad you enjoyed. The Unconformity is broken up. The opening of the Basin and Range is the latest tectonic event to chop it up. However it was affected by multiple tectonic events. Thanks for the question.
I enjoy content like this. We live in an amazing world/universe, and thanks to folks like you, I learn more about it every day. The time scale of what you are showing, is mind blowing. The geology tells part of the story, would love to know the rest, which make it a compelling mystery. One of my own local geological places of interest is... A section of cliff face, next to Lake Natoma, in Folsom California, exposed by erosion from the Lower American River. I often see it on bike rides, as it is next to one of my favorite bike paths. It has many layers of sediment including some with fist sized round rocks. What I always wonder is, why such variety of texture, and how that variety got deposited there. I assume it was put there by the river, but I don't understand why it changes so drastically in composition, and even vertical/horizontal orientation. EDIT: I googled it, and learned a great deal about it. Fascinating. Your video inspired me to finally investigate 🙂 Best wishes for your continued success/fun with geology 🌎
@@stevesyverson8625 thanks for sharing. I didn’t realize the Shinarump was exposed in this area. I have looked at it on many occasions around St. George. Would love to see the petrified logs. I will look for them next time.
Good observation. I am not as familiar with the geology there, however there are a lot of granites in Southern California and it could be similar rocks! Thanks for the comment.
While it's not as easy to get to as just driving down Lake Mead, the great unconformity in the Grand Canyon is much more pronounced. Thank you for a great video.
@earthandtime5817 Just below Havasupai Garden, before you get to the Devil's corkscrew you'll cut through the tapeats and can stand with your feet on the vishnu schist and your hand on the tapeats.
currently 18 and trying to decide on a college major, I excel at english more than math but geology has always been really fascinating to me, how much math is used in geology & does a geology degree have a lot of applications?
I wish 50 years ago I would have gotten a tutor to help me through the math I needed to take. I loved geology but gave up to easily. Find a way, make it happen. I've always regretted not trying just a little harder. There are jobs out there. Good luck.
Apologies for the delayed reply. Excited to hear you are thinking about geology. There are a lot of jobs out there and with the mineral and energy boom in now I think there are options. I use math most days but nothing to complex. Strong English skills are important. As a scientist we have to be able to communicate our results and have discussions and a lot of that is done through writing. Take some basic geology classes and see if they catch your interest. And please keep me posted. Luck!!!
Adding to this class of sunrise hills facing Las Vegas near by the summit there are some stones like eggs shape facing the City looking up to the west that should be visited
I didn't realize that other regions of earth geology do display strata that represent those years missing in the Unconformity. Does that make our survey of Earth's history nearly complete?!
Snowball earth caused sea levels to drop and the ice ground down most of the land. Eventually new volcanoes emitted enough CO2 to warm the earth, melt the ice, cause sea levels to rise, then erosion of the remaining land deposited sand into the new shallow seas.
@@earthandtime5817 I just got back from doing the loop of, 147 to 167 to 169 to 15 and back to Vegas. A little over four hours. Beautiful drive. I didn't do the Valley of Fire Highway today but I will. I'll put together a route so I can drive on every road in the park.
I'm confused. I thought the Great Unconformity was worldwide. I was about to ask if there are places on other continents were it's visible. I've seen pictures of it in the Grand Canyon, Frenchman Mountain, and in the Rockies in Colorado and Wyoming, where there are exposures right by major highways. In fact, I think it's visible right by the road that goes to the airport in Payson, AZ. But that's all in North America. In any case, I thought the Great Unconformity was worldwide. No?
Oh, I dunno @ 7:41, it looks like exposed coal to me. Perhaps it was buried and then an extreme earthquake or something with a similar result caused it to be lifted and exposed.
As a native born Vegan, I have been to this location, taking my family and trying to explain the features. Your explanation was awesome. I will probably be taking my grandchildren on a tour in the future.
@@peteklover2923 thanks for sharing. That spot is on my bucket list. I have been in the Grand Canton but I never visited the contact. Someday! Happy new year.
Well hey, I trust u have also been out to Red Rock and checked out how the older rock is on top of the younger rock ? I have always been fascinated by that. Also the few caves that are out there. We used to go in them a lot back in high school. 76 to 79. There had been a rumor that there was a river at the bottom of one of them but had been dynamite by the powers that be in order to protect it and keep people out. I'm not really sure if that's true but it's interesting. OK we'll thanks for your video I always love learning about the history of the valley and area. I just wish I knew more about Mt. Charleston. 👍✌️🚀🌌🛰👨🚀
Thanks for the comment and the extra info. I will put My Charleston on my list. I have never been. There is a good video about the Keystone thrust at red canyon by Myron cook. I will also put it on my list and see if I can add something new. Thanks.
What kind of unconformity do you think the Great Unconformity is?
Nonconformity
It does not comply with uniforitarianism.
@@stevemiller1517 interesting thought. Tell me more about why it does not comply? And thanks for the comment.
I thought it had something to do with "Snowball Earth" ??? I am definitely not a geologist so please educate me if I am wrong 👍
Nonconformity
I live in East Las Vegas..... Most of us call this Sunrise Mountain. Thanks for the information.
The Las Vegas Valley has a thing with calling peaks by the wrong names. Sunrise Mountain is actually a smaller peak north of Frenchman, behind Nellis Air Force Base. It seems a mislabeled map from the 1940's is the source of the confusion.
Also, Black Mountain in Henderson is actually the name of the tallest peak in the North McCullough Range. It is on the back side of Anthem. The one lots of locals call Black Mountain is a much lower peak with a bunch of television antenna equipment at the summit near Gibson & Horizon Ridge. It is the northern most peak in the same range, and looks like a collapsed cinder cone to me. Mountaineers call it "Henderson Benchmark".
@@bms9144 You are good with Las Vegas landmarks. Hav a good one.
@@desertfalcon thanks for the comment and sharing.
There used to be a set of nicely thought out informational panels set up at the Great Unconformity site and along the trail leading up the ridge. Frenchman Mountain as a whole is a remarkable geologic phenomenon, known sometimes as "The Mountain that Moved." The block that makes up Frenchman Mountain migrated some 40 miles from its eastern origin site over about a 2 million year period during the Miocene, leaving a trail of volcanoes and shear zones behind it. Unfortunately, those explanatory panels have been destroyed by vandalism, illustrating one of the hazards of trying to preserve and appreciate an urban unconformity.
Thank you for sharing. I read about the info panels and was bummed they were not there. I hope to get back to Frenchman and do a video about the stratigraphic package there and its structural history. Appreciate the extra info.
@@earthandtime5817 I believe there are some info panels describing the Great Unconformity in one of the parks along the Las Vegas Wash just south of Frenchman Mtn. Rainbow canyon is near there and has some interesting geological layering.
@ thank you. I will look for those the next time I am out there. I am planning a video on the Rainbow Gardens and another on Frenchman Mountain.
Destroyed by vandalism? I guess I shouldn't be surprised...
@@earthandtime5817I’ve been wondering about rainbow gardens for years! Glad someone is doing a video on it that place has always intrigued me
Lived in. Vegas for 50 years and climbed all over Frenchman Mountain to the top across and down . I knew of the Unconformity for years but it was never marked that I could see. I distinctly remember that granite rock your shared and was surprised to see larger bands of it on the hillside not really knowing is was standing where you were. What’s more amazing to me is sitting the summit of Frenchman. When sitting at the top with my Bible open and the crows riding on the thermal edges of the wind coming up from the backside, well you could hear the wind fluctuating off their wings. Also the backside of that peak is perfectly flat like a razor. What you geologists are missing will really answer your question as to why you believe 1.2 billion years are missing. That’s not true, you have been taught wrong. It looks like it was missing until you reach the summit and look down on each side.
The eastern back side is perfectly flat that was once the horizontal top of the ground, the unconformity side is the bottom of the original flat top that has been turned on is side at an approximate 75degree angle. Basically you have Frenchman Mountain laying on its side. If you look at the mountain pic it from a drone point of view as an equilateral triangle where the left side of the triangle is the original horizontal flat earth and the right side would be the underside of the earth pushed upwards like a cylinder slowly turning counter clockwise and suddenly stopped rotating as the sub-sedimentary levels of granite and other sediments were exposed to the surface.
Get a Jeep and take the road to the top as far as you can then hike a hundred yards farther so you can see both sides of the mountain and you will understand the mystery of the unconformity then give me the credit. Marc Mercury a former Geology student of Eastern Washington State College in Cheney Washington. Dr Orr was my geology teacher 67/68.
Thanks for the additional info. It is now well documented and understood that Frenchman mountain is the hanging wall of a listric normal fault, recording the early formation of the basin range. There are some great papers in this and exposures in Rainbow valley. The movement rotated the block, per your comment, and left the amazing exposure. Appreciate the comment.
So much fun to check off our bucket lists. This was very interesting, thank you. Happy and healthy New Year to you and your family.
@@bluwtrgypsy happy new year. 🎆🎊. I hope you and your family have an amazing one! Thanks for being a regular commenter on the channel. I appreciate you!
Just stumbled upon your channel! Pretty interesting!
Anyway, have you been to see the Morton Gneiss in Minnesota, the oldest rock in the US? There's supposedly a display of it in situ at its namesake site of Morton, Minnesota. Of course, there might be some on some buildings in Houston and other big cities you've been to, since it's a popular decorative stone. Also, since I live in Seattle (which has at least one building clad in Morton Gneiss), I have to advise you to check out Nick Zentner's videos on Northwest geology.
I've been hiking there before and didn't know what I was looking at. Now I know. It's great to listen to you explain it.
@@joeoutabout2947 thanks for the kind words. It is a beautiful place. Hope to get back and do another video in the geology across the entire Frenchman Mountains.
great video and if a person keeps driving along north shore road its considered the most amazing 40 miles of exposed geology in the world. I live in Vegas and I like hiking to and spotting "time zones and occurences" such as the great dying and we also have cretaceous just east of town as well. Also in frenchman mountain I will be looking to document that there must be alamo impact breccia in the layers roughly half way up from the comet/bolide impact that occurred north of Las Vegas.
That sounds like an awesome project. Please keep me posted and I would love to visit an impact site next time I am out in Las Vegas. I visited the shatter cones outside of Santa Fe and have a video in those if you are interested. Will link.
ruclips.net/video/4gVT-wErgy0/видео.htmlsi=q5BTvyciEpcHGktz
Thank you for the kind words and the comment. Excited to hear more about your research as you continue working on it!!!
@@earthandtime5817 thanks. I will be uploading various videos soon especially on cretaceous willow tank formation and other geology of the area. This is a new channel. My other one has 3,000 subscribers but had videos going back 2 decades so I started a fresh channel mainly for geology. I will also be going up Frenchman to locate the alamo impact breccia that reached the area. It would be roughly half way up.
I use to live in Vegas when i was a kid in the early 70s, WOW, this is cool. They also called Frenchman Mountain { Sunrise Mountain }
Vegas in the 70’s would have been amazing to see. I bet you have some great stories and memories. Thanks for sharing and the kind words.
Thank you ! My next trip to Vegas,Ill be checking this out . I did learn something :)
You are welcome and I am glad you enjoyed. Please
Let me know what you thought once back!
For years, I've been hoping that someone would explain the coastal area between Malibu and the Oxnard military base, I get so excited when we drive through there, So. Cal.
@@jstwntmusic I will put it on my list of places to visit. I hope you and yours are doing ok in So Cal.
Great video, I just found this channel and subscribed. I live along the Colorado River 90 miles south of Las Vegas (near Laughlin, Nevada) and definitely will be planning a trip to touch the Great Unconformity and that nice Gneiss and marvel at the missing time!
Thank you for the kind words. Let me know what you think when you visit. And welcome aboard. 😀
Good presentation! Thank you!
You are welcome and thanks for the kind words.
I'm about a mile away from that mountain. Dumping in that area is really becoming a problem.
Over time that dumping may fill in the missing billion years. And far into the future that will really throw geologists for a loop!
@@sailingaeolus thanks for sharing and I noticed some dumping farther up the road. Was sad to see. Thanks for sharing.
@@frankblangeard8865 ha. This put a smile on my face. Definitely would be a head scratcher in the geologic record. Thanks for the comment.
I wasn't aware of this until now. There is quite a lot of interesting geology here in the Las Vegas area. Being in the NW part of the city, I am more familiar with the Red Rock Canyon/Mt Charleston area. Most locals call this area Sunrise Mountain. North Shore Road near Lake Mead has always been a fascinating area for me, lots of stuff going on there.
@@VegasCyclingFreak I am glad you enjoyed and learned something new. Thanks for the additional info. Hope to hear about your adventures around Frenchman when you go.
as far as the uncomformity I am a believer that it represents snow ball earth time in which glaciers helped grind away alot of material which washed away
I actually don’t know much about snowball earth other then what I read about it as an undergraduate. I will need to read up on it. Thanks! Appreciate the comment and knowledge!
Yes! In at least one place in Wyoming in the Big Horn Basis just east of Yellowstone Park, the Great Unconformity exposes 2.8 billion year old Archean gneisses and granites with thinly bedded Cambrian limestones and shales of the Flathead formation deposited on a red granite that looks like it had been smoothed by giant grinder! Here the marine sediments may be peeled back to reveal rock last exposed to daylight more than 500 million years ago! That is evidence of ice sheet abrasion roughly 800 million years ago, .sometime before the supercontinent Rodinia broke up, later to join other fragments to become Pangea.
The great unconformity is exposed or not exposed in different places. Not all unconformities are snowball earth related. There are many.
Happy New Year friend.
Happy new year. I hope 2025 will be a great one.
one of my rewatch videos because of so much good information and he also talks about the different types of unconformities.
Thank you so much for the kind worlds. I am glad you enjoyed it and unconformities are pretty cool!
Hi Garrett. I love to watch those old 1930's B Westerns that were filmed up in Lone Pine, CA. I've never visited, but find the Alabama Hills to be very interesting geologically. If you ever get a chance and can get up that way I would like to learn a little bit about how and why they were formed and their relationship to the nearby Sierras.
Thanks.
Thank you for the info. I will add the Alabama Hills to my list. I appreciate the kind words. Happy new year.
I go hiking north of Vegas on North Pecos and I’ve noticed very similar r looking rocks. Thanks for the info.
You are welcome and thanks for sharing your observation. I am curious if the Unconformity is there as well.
Always wondering what rock I'm looking at. Just drove the West side of Lake Mead. Some of what you have said explains a little. Thanks Man!
You are welcome. Glad you enjoyed and I was able to share what I learned with you. Thanks for the comment.
Thanks for highlighting that I live within 20 miles of this unique place-but have never visited. I have intended to but life… I WILL do it now!😊
@@samuelingalls5424 excited to hear what you think about the area when you visit. Please let me know and thanks for the comment.
Thank you for you great information I actually live in front of the Frenchman Mountain AKA “SUNRISE MOUNTAIN” at Hollywood Blvd and Stewart Avenue and actually I have go , hiking, there a couple times all the way to the top by the antennas and yes the topography of sunrise mountain is very unusual, when we compared to the other Las Vegas local mountains, thank you for the great information!
I am glad you enjoyed and thanks for sharing with us.
So an old geologist here. After a quick look online it appears that at that unconformity in the Cambrian there were no land animals and little in the way of land plants. So what was the rock surface doing over the course of a billion plus years? Was it slowly eroding (of course it was)? Is there evidence in the lower metamorphic layer of differential erosion and stripping away of sediment? Are there erosional features to see? There is enough time for mountains to have built and then eroded to a peneplain during that time.
So a short story about that area. Just across the road which is Lake Mead Boulevard there is another mountain called sunrise. Over 30 years ago a couple of friends and I were running up the hill on an old trail. On the way down one of my friends observed an unusually flat Rock just off the trail and picked it up. On the back side of the Flat Rock was a fossil of a fish. If I recall it looked to be about 6 to 8 inches long. This rock was very close to the top of Sunrise Mountain on a steep slope. At some point in time all of that area was under water. I don't completely understand the information in this video but I'll watch it again.
God Bless America
Thanks so much for sharing and what a cool find. I plan on making another video about the geology there and will make sure to cover some of the basics of geology to hopefully help those watching understand the story a little better. Appreciate the comment.
@@earthandtime5817 you're welcome. It was a long time ago when I was a young man. When I saw that fossil of that fish up on that Hill it took me back. I knew that area was underwater at some point. Anyway great video I'll look up some more info and try to understand. Not sure why there's a billion year old rock and then there's later rocks
I used to fly helicopter tours to the Grand Canyon. One day a geologist who 20 years before studied all around the Southern Nevada region was on the tour. So I asked for a little class as we flew out. He became the tour guide for a while. Really fascinating stuff. Then I asked what he was doing now? Turns out he was making a living as a professional poker player.😮 awesome.
@@T7J2003 thanks for sharing that amazing story! I bet you see a lot of amazing geology from the air. Never been on a helicopter but one day!
The pegmatite/schist layers reminds me of a friend taking me up past Boriana Mine Rd (NW AZ) in Yucca where we found similar layering. I have a nice flat piece of the schist sprinkled with staurolite crystals (I use it as one of my jewelry displays) and I found a mostly solid garnet crystal in a section of schist, solid black - I was told it was black due to millions of years of UV exposure. (It was garnet, the classic crystal shape.)
Thank you for sharing. I have yet to find a staurolite. In my bucket list 😀.
I’d like to know what the black spots are in the Tapeats. I have lots of samples I took from this location.
Great question. I didn’t take any samples. A thin section would be helpful. I was wondering if it is related to iron staining. I saw evidence for iron staining there.
Over what area does the Great Unconformity occur? I believe you mentioned that the same unconformity can be seen at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. Is it contiguous? Great presentation!
Thanks for the kind words and glad you enjoyed. The Unconformity is broken up. The opening of the Basin and Range is the latest tectonic event to chop it up. However it was affected by multiple tectonic events. Thanks for the question.
Thank you sir 🙏
That area is always made me wonder. Looking on Google map the eroded sandstone jumps out at you. thank you.
It is a fantastic and beautiful place. Thanks for the comment.
I enjoy content like this. We live in an amazing world/universe, and thanks to folks like you, I learn more about it every day.
The time scale of what you are showing, is mind blowing.
The geology tells part of the story, would love to know the rest, which make it a compelling mystery.
One of my own local geological places of interest is...
A section of cliff face, next to Lake Natoma, in Folsom California, exposed by erosion from the Lower American River.
I often see it on bike rides, as it is next to one of my favorite bike paths.
It has many layers of sediment including some with fist sized round rocks.
What I always wonder is, why such variety of texture, and how that variety got deposited there.
I assume it was put there by the river, but I don't understand why it changes so drastically in composition, and even vertical/horizontal orientation.
EDIT: I googled it, and learned a great deal about it. Fascinating. Your video inspired me to finally investigate 🙂
Best wishes for your continued success/fun with geology 🌎
The Shinarump conglomerate is found there as well as Red Rock Canyon at Oak Creek. The tuff layer has petrified logs above the Shinarump.
@@stevesyverson8625 thanks for sharing. I didn’t realize the Shinarump was exposed in this area. I have looked at it on many occasions around St. George. Would love to see the petrified logs. I will look for them next time.
Today I drove past the Granite Mountains in the Mojave National Preserve. The rocks looked like those of Joshua Tree.
Good observation. I am not as familiar with the geology there, however there are a lot of granites in Southern California and it could be similar rocks! Thanks for the comment.
While it's not as easy to get to as just driving down Lake Mead, the great unconformity in the Grand Canyon is much more pronounced. Thank you for a great video.
@@captdoug thanks for sharing and the kind words. Hope to get to the contact in the Grand Canyon someday!
@earthandtime5817 Just below Havasupai Garden, before you get to the Devil's corkscrew you'll cut through the tapeats and can stand with your feet on the vishnu schist and your hand on the tapeats.
@ thank you.
currently 18 and trying to decide on a college major, I excel at english more than math but geology has always been really fascinating to me, how much math is used in geology & does a geology degree have a lot of applications?
I wish 50 years ago I would have gotten a tutor to help me through the math I needed to take. I loved geology but gave up to easily. Find a way, make it happen. I've always regretted not trying just a little harder. There are jobs out there. Good luck.
Apologies for the delayed reply. Excited to hear you are thinking about geology. There are a lot of jobs out there and with the mineral and energy boom in now I think there are options. I use math most days but nothing to complex. Strong English skills are important. As a scientist we have to be able to communicate our results and have discussions and a lot of that is done through writing. Take some basic geology classes and see if they catch your interest. And please keep me posted. Luck!!!
Greta advice and thanks for sharing. It is appreciated.
Adding to this class of sunrise hills facing Las Vegas near by the summit there are some stones like eggs shape facing the City looking up to the west that should be visited
I didn't realize that other regions of earth geology do display strata that represent those years missing in the Unconformity. Does that make our survey of Earth's history nearly complete?!
I also buy the global ice cap theory. The Old Testament missed it by this much!
I need to go back and research “snowball Earth”. It has been a long time since I learned about it. Thanks for the comment.
Snowball earth caused sea levels to drop and the ice ground down most of the land. Eventually new volcanoes emitted enough CO2 to warm the earth, melt the ice, cause sea levels to rise, then erosion of the remaining land deposited sand into the new shallow seas.
Thank you. I need to read up on snowball earth. Been since my undergraduate that I have thought about it! Thank you for sharing.
Check out the video about this by Myron Cook. "An ordinary looking Nevada mountainside..." Search that. Very cool.
Thanks for the suggestion. I like Myron’s videos. I will look it up.
@earthandtime5817 I moved to Vegas last month. I loved your video and I'll go check that place out myself, thanks.
@ thanks and let me know what you think when you go. Enjoy Vegas.
@@earthandtime5817 I just got back from doing the loop of, 147 to 167 to 169 to 15 and back to Vegas. A little over four hours. Beautiful drive.
I didn't do the Valley of Fire Highway today but I will. I'll put together a route so I can drive on every road in the park.
@ sounds like a nice day and thanks for sharing.
I'm confused. I thought the Great Unconformity was worldwide. I was about to ask if there are places on other continents were it's visible. I've seen pictures of it in the Grand Canyon, Frenchman Mountain, and in the Rockies in Colorado and Wyoming, where there are exposures right by major highways. In fact, I think it's visible right by the road that goes to the airport in Payson, AZ. But that's all in North America. In any case, I thought the Great Unconformity was worldwide. No?
The dike has to be younger than the gneiss. Did it intrude into the Toroweaps Sandstone?
It is definitely younger. I did not see or read about it crossing into the sandstones. I believe the dikes are also in the billion year + range.
Oh, I dunno @ 7:41, it looks like exposed coal to me. Perhaps it was buried and then an extreme earthquake or something with a similar result caused it to be lifted and exposed.
As a native born Vegan, I have been to this location, taking my family and trying to explain the features. Your explanation was awesome. I will probably be taking my grandchildren on a tour in the future.
Thank you for the kind words. Please let me know what you all think when you go. So happy you enjoyed this episode.
That rock was thrown there.
Ha. I think they all were. Thanks for putting a smile on my face.
Another reason it is "great" is because it can be seen all over the world.
I also put my hand on the Great Unconformity in the bottom of the Grand Canyon, the time involved in the gap is beyond our comprehension
@@peteklover2923 thanks for sharing. That spot is on my bucket list. I have been in the Grand Canton but I never visited the contact. Someday! Happy new year.
I can see my house from there lol
Awesome views from Frenchman.
Thanks for the comment.
Remains of a giant
A giant listric fault recoding the extension of the basin and range. Fascinating geologic story, right. Truly an amazing place.
Ever hear of the flood? 😇
I'm glad you don't really believe that.
@@garyb6219 Thanks for your agreement....
Well hey, I trust u have also been out to Red Rock and checked out how the older rock is on top of the younger rock ? I have always been fascinated by that. Also the few caves that are out there. We used to go in them a lot back in high school. 76 to 79. There had been a rumor that there was a river at the bottom of one of them but had been dynamite by the powers that be in order to protect it and keep people out. I'm not really sure if that's true but it's interesting. OK we'll thanks for your video I always love learning about the history of the valley and area. I just wish I knew more about Mt. Charleston. 👍✌️🚀🌌🛰👨🚀
Thanks for the comment and the extra info. I will put My Charleston on my list. I have never been. There is a good video about the Keystone thrust at red canyon by Myron cook. I will also put it on my list and see if I can add something new. Thanks.