Where I live in Missoula, Montana, there are beautiful colored rocks everywhere at Grant Creek Road and I-90. These are gorgeous purple, pink, blue, mint green, and salmon-colored rocks, in various sizes from basketball to large watermelon. They're marvelous for landscaping, and I've collected many Jeep loads, as they're not so heavy that I can't lift them. (Practicing proper body mechanics, of course, so I don't get hurt.) Some are striped. Some are bleached out by the sun, but when you uncover them fully from the sandy soil, they're still brilliantly colored. Most are roughly round, but they can be flat or triangular, with rounded edges. These rocks sit in a low area (picture Nick's chalkboard with a "V" to show water cutting through a landscape, with the rocks in the bottom of that "V" and a bit up on its sides) between rolling hills covered with grasses, which go on for miles and miles. They're really building this up, so if you come this way, take the Grant Creek Exit and find a vacant lot. At least for now, they're all over the place. EDIT: Going to 4:32 of the video, Nick has a blue stone with layered color. This is the same type of rock that I called "blue" above, but it is way smaller.
Great videos. I've lived in Oregon and Washington over 60 years and I never learned much about the basic geological history of these areas. I had heard of the Missoula floods and how they formed the areas of eastern Washington but never knew the enormity of it.You do a wonderful job of creating a narrative, and the video representations are well done. The occasional humor is good too. Wish I had a teacher like you in school. Mike in Oregon
Dr Ring taught me Geology at CWU in the eighties, I spent many hours out at Green Canyon finding blues. I have collected rocks since I was a kid, I have found Jade and tortquoise and many ageats all in western washington.
I was floating the river with my cousins, in the canyon on the day that slide happened in 98, the weather got real bad real fast and we had to get out early and got a ride from a guy in a state vehicle as are car was parked much further down the canyon at the Rosa dam/spillway. the rode washed out just behind my cousin as he drove out towards Yakima. Pretty wild.
There's a guy named Randall Carlson with many videos on RU-vid which discuss catastrophic events that makeup the landscape. One is near you at a place called the Camas Prairie which has giant ripples in the countryside that are similar to the ripples created by water rushing on a sandy beach. Thanks for the interesting video.
Thanks for watching. I will look at his videos. Yes, the Giant Current Ripples at Camas Prairie were created catastrophically....but most in geology were not.
I lived in the northern end of Spokane county in the '70s, and I wandered the hills around Mt. Spokane, Elk, and Chattaroy. I found a few places that you would like to see I think.
Great teacher. Nice video from basic info. to an overall view of understanding. What type of boulder, go from the sand on up to boulders. Nice. Of course, I love geology. I live in Genesee, ID between Lewiston and Moscow, ID. God Bless.
I am so glad I stumbled upon these C.W.U. geology videos. One of your cameramen, Rick Spencer, is a golfing buddy of mine. I'll have to ask him why he never mentioned these videos before.
Just subscribed. I live on Whidbey Island but get over there once in a while. Been reading about the 12800 flood. Evidence mounting to a comet fragments melting the glacier not Lake Missula.
FANTASTIC! If we had the money, we would donate in an attempt to encourage posts of Roadside Geology. I'm having trouble grasping the difference between igneous and metamorphic rocks, the wife understands well. Your posts are appreciated and helpful keep her interests while she is taking other supportive courses, i.e. math. Please keep-up the good work.
A very simple explanation is that Igneous rock is rock that was, at one time, molten. Metamorphic rock is rock that has been altered physically and or chemically by high temps and pressure, but it was not ever melted in the process. Hope that helps, even though I'm 2 years late in replying. LOL!
Well, you have to be careful with the vocabulary. When you say "deposited" it sounds like it could be their sort of "last resting place", so if they are round when you found them, they were deposited round. But when they are first transported because of erosion of it's original place, yes, they are angular :) If they travel short distances they remain mostly angular, if they travel long distances they start rounding up.
Thanks for watching, John. We observe rocks are angular when originally entering a river system - and as they tumble down the river - are more and more rounded as they are transported. No rounding after they are deposited.
In the Yakima Ellensburg Canyon there is a hole through a rock and it has a shape like it was used for a bell ! Do you know anything about how that was formed or history on those rocks?
9" per year in Central Washington compared to 12' to 14' in the Hoh Rain Forest on the Olympic Peninsula makes the Pacific Northwest truly a remarkable place both biologically and geologically. Both the mountains and the waters working together in harmony, mostly!
Makes me a bit sad that I didn't stick out another 2 years in school to finish Geology degree. I'm as crazy about the geology of Western Mass + the Grenville orogeny as you are about Washington Nick! Luckily, it doesn't take a degree to simply appreciate deep time and the history of Earth! Check out this beautiful piece of Grenville bedrock gneiss aprox. 1.1-1.2bil years old: i.imgur.com/AB3y89Y.jpg that sits on my desk. Can you believe people just drive right past this stuff on the highway never thinking twice? :D Love your videos and I'm thinkin of making a trip out to Washington to see all this great stuff you feature in your lectures in the future!
3:40 " There's a beautiful, organized plan..." "....its not random"..."actual, systematic patterns.." Perhaps it is all an intelligent design, which requires an Intelligent Designer..
