CWU's Nick Zentner at the Saddle Mountains with geologist Skye Cooley. May 15, 2022 video 'Calcretes with Skye Cooley' : • Calcrete with Skye Cooley May 15, 2022 video 'Saddle Mountains with the Siblings' : • Saddle Mountains - Vol...
You're not the only one. This sort of thing spikes my blood pressure immediately. I go back and forth between admiring the topography and being terrified.
As a mining engineer I keep thinking "MSHA wouldn't allow them there without being roped off". It made me quite uncomfortable. It's probably a good thing the area is off limits to the general public.
Sky is a TOP guest! (Jerome as well)…….the agility, and layered logic in the verbal narrative creates for the audience an active mental scape of geologic history both micro and vast………absolutely FASCINATING 🎉😮. I think this an Oscar worthy documentary short. 1) Cinematography: stunning. 2) Script: Engaging conversation: funny, intelligent, knowledgeable, humble. 3) Intense viewer experience “ you are there “…….. on the edge of death! Spectacular! But that’s me 😊
I saw Skye’s pic of you on Instagram Nick! Great to see you Skye again! Just stunning views & formations! Nervous Nelly watching you two skirt the edge so close it’s a long way to the valley floor! 🤦🏻♀️ GREAT RAMBLE! Thank you both!
Thanks for a video on calcrete. That is part of our story in western Kansas. We too are puzzled by paleosols of cemented calcrete and silcrete separated by uncemented sediment with trace fossils. We have the same unanswered questions. Thanks to Skye Cooley for looking for answers.
Once again thank you Mr Zentner for another great video. Also it makes me happy that the siblings are willing to share their land with you and Skye so that we may further our knowledge on the geology in the Saddle Mountain range. A big thank you is owed to them.
So, 500m of uplift in 2.5 Ma (beginning of Pleistocene) is in the ballpark of the 1.6-1.8m/ka calculated through luminescence dating for Manastash Ridge. So definitely seems to be right around that “feather edge” of unite Skye talked about.
I always love/hate these type of videos.. I have so many question I would like to ask so much to learn and see there.. I must be content with the questions and answers given.. which are great by the way.. But I have so many more.. lucky Sky wasn't up there with me he would be there for the whole day and then all the way home.. I am a question mahine when I find things of interest Thanks Sky and thank Nick this was uber fun!
Ah, yes..... The 'Geologist's canundrum'.... one question answered(?), three more pop up!!! Younger brother was up from Phoenix last week... we spent a day up at Baker Ski area and I was sharing some of the info from the recent 'Yellow Aster' vid... He moved to AZ right out of high school, and knows very little about this area... I'll head him your way!! Thanks for sharing, Nick...
This was a great one Nick!! Skye is our favorite and it was such an amazing sight. So kind of the siblings to let us see it. I have to admit, I couldn’t look sometimes when you two were teetering on the edge, but I just kept saying, we wouldn’t be seeing this if you had fallen off.😂
Washington native watching from Yellowstone!! I'm relatively new to your channel but, as someone who practices interpretation for a living, I sure do appreciate your ability to make education accessible. What is often a daunting subject to many, is entertaining and fun when learning from you! Thank you, Nick. Perhaps I can see one of your lessons, in person, as I pass through on my way home for a visit.
Many thanks to both of you for a fascinating walk and talk. Great to hear Skye’s thought process at work. Thanks to the Siblings for letting you access the this wonderful terrain.
What a dramatic view looking down. Great example of the uplifting you talked about in your presentations. Just amazing!! Great work as usual. Thank you.
I'm from the Colorado Rockies and have done some pretty intense mountaineering and those guys had me on the edge of my seat. I'm going to have to watch it again to focus on the geology now that I know they lived through it.
Same here, Chinle. I've climbed and biked all over Colorado/Utah/Arizona, This region is awe-inspiring. Thank you, Nick and Skye for defining the landscape for us. Nick, your videos and instruction has taught me so much. I'm just itching to saddle up explore and experience that area.
Skye just walks along the edge & up/down the slopes like a mountain goat. He is just so sure footed! I kept saying to my husband "I wouldn't be walking that close to the edge, especially knowing how undercut some of those layers are!"
Outstanding video Nick! Your camera work has come such a long way. Sky needs to change his name to Spiderman. The two of you were nonchalantly discussing sediment origins and the ramifications while standing on a crumbling slope a meter or two away from your doom. I have experience shooting video and producing for TV news and I will be rewatching this over and over. Great work gentlemen.
Skye seems so aptly named as he walks along the edge of the sky around minute 49. What a vista. Thanks for not falling off, it looked steep. I wondered about the red bands below the level you were working on; were they intersections of the new basalt upon the older surfaces?
Farmed on the southside of saddle mt., the wahluke slope. A friend Gary Maugham owns every other section of the mountain. Use to be a missile site on the eastern end of the mountain that protected Hanford. There are deposits of agate and petrified trees on the south slope. Love the area.
I got to ride my motorcycle very near here in about 1974, but haven't been able to be back since. This vista truly is a incredible. And to think there might be an important geologic story...or piece in a larger puzzle that characterizes the section between here and Palouse intrigues me. And some of those calcretes look similar to what I grew up with in the Eltopia, Ringgole, and Basin City area. I had no clue "caliche" layers could be so interesting. And thank you Skye & Nick. You guys make a good team for us RU-vid amateurs to learn from...and get a sense you two seem to be on the edge of putting 2+2 together on a bigger discovery. Go science!
I can tell you as a native in Smyrna, yes earthquakes happen on the Saddle Mountain generally within miles of the Smyrna Bench . We'll have had multiple in a year then go years without quakes. USGS picks them up, generally they are 1.5 to 3.0, a lot of them are shallow like at 1 mile depth. Years back was centered in my field. Because of how shallow Quakes are anything over a 2.5 is usually felt. A couple times I have heard the compression wave when it hits a structure. The ground has shifted enough in the last 20 years that wells that go through the fault line have been pinched causing issues for servicing pumps.
Skye made me nervous watching him transverses the crumbly edge of that fantastic geology. What a view. Years ago we ago we found tiny petrified wood limbs up on Saddle mountain, My favorite found piece was a a branched trunk with a cone. Ginkgo? Thanks Nick & Skye for another adventure near where I grew up. Reminds me that when we moved to the Okanogan Valley from Tacoma we went over Blewett Pass in a 31' Model_A. I was fascinated by the rocky structures and the old mining shafts. At that time Blewett Pass was hung off the sides of the mountains and was essentially one lane with turnouts. Still remember it vividly 73-years later, especially the parts driven at night when the feeble headlights streamed out over the abyss on a sharp corner. Mom Clutched me hard in those sections. And I still have that occasional nightmare of driving over a high cliff at night.
Just a note, your friendly nextdoor neighbor, Hanford, has a treasure trove of drilling data. Paleosols are a component across most of the site especially on the plateau. It doesn't drain well, so it's a place that sometimes encounters certain liquid waste accumulation issues. Great stuff.
Your excitement at the outcrops starting at 3:30 is an experience I've also felt in my fieldwork during my Field Methods course as an undergraduate. Nothing like seeing outcrops from afar and making sense of the geology of a certain area, especially when you are studying such a beautiful and scenic place.
This is so breathtakingly beautiful. Once again thanks for another informative jaunt into geologically rich Eastern Washington. Skye is so relatable & informative about these calcretes, that I almost feel like if he got into video-editing, he could easily be a YT star like Mr. Z. :) In time.... I realize it's a wide angle/fish-eye effect going on with the camera, but I gotta say, some of that looks pretty damn steep! My heart leapt in my chest a few times, thinking of both Nick & Skye so easily losing their footing.... YIKES! It's a tribute to the starkness of the landscape that even in a wildfire haze it can be so gorgeous. CANNOT WAIT for BAJA BC!
This is fantastic in a couple of ways. True, it's private land so we can't go there. But, you have made the video and shared with us. When I was young I got to canoe crab creek more than once. Our take out was down in the view you were showing. As we drove around that area doing Botany when going to CWU, I would wonder, what does it look like at the top of the mountain. Now, I that is answered, thank you. The other reason this is fabulous is the opportunity to watch Skye doing research! He articulates what he is thinking and wondering so very well. I love hearing him talk it out. It's showing me how to work through and analyze what we are seeing. I've lived much of my 75 years in Central Washington. I truly didn't know how significant this region is. I only knew there was volcanism and there were ice age floods. I knew there had been folding and uplift. I had no clue deep and amazing this story is. My very deep thanks to the land owners for giving you and Skye access to the land.
I can't help but imagining this stuff being created by the Columbia River flooding into a basin and later the water evaporating. Wash rinse and repeat for thousands of years. ..but then I suppose there would be sand.. What a mystery. Thanks for sharing Nick.
The saddle mountain is 2 million years old, ice ages were happening, glacial weight from the north and on the mountains pushed down. Yakima fold and thrust belt got pushed up, water movement made the gravel fans, siletzia kept pushing in and turning 2 degrees clockwise or so. That seems like a viable reason for those calcrete deposits the climate shifting to dry steppe to wet to floods from the glaciers advancing and retreat.
Thing is though wetland deposits does NOT automatically equal lowland. It equals fairly low relief, but low relief can occur in a mountain plateau environment just as easily. After all there are an awful lot of peat bogs in plateau environments in mountains in the UK. Given the thrusting history of the area then lowland is very likely for those deposits but it's not automatic.
I know you didn't want to say it but I will. It's a damn shame that such a beautiful place is privately owned and off limits for the public. I hope one day it can be available for everyone to enjoy because it truly is one of the most beautiful sites in Washington. Thanks for the view!
Great video! A few questions for Skye; How long does one investigate the geology before putting out a paper? Seems like it could take eons. How does one know when they are done? What was the initial question you wanted to answer? One for Nick, Does this getting out in the field give you a desire to take on your own project of field work? Maybe back to COTM? Thanks to both!
Hello, Nick. Will you please do a video on the geologic history of the Tarim Basin? I can't find any info on it. Or post links to where I can learn about it? Thank you.
Good lord you just cannot beat the view up there, it ain't just the geology but tectonics has everything to do with why those views are there. Just spectacular. I sorta wish at least a section of this area was open to the public for not only the spectacular vistas but interpretation of the geology there. Simply amazing.
That was incredible! I have such a better understanding of the timeframe, the faults, upthrust and alluvial sediment deposits. And Nick, try to keep up with Skye the billygoat. I would have loved to see what he was looking at on those last few outcrops. Hey Skye, what kind of boots do you have?
Doesn't hurt that there's a mile wide recent river valley below you to exaggerate the fault offset and that river left lakes. Behind that is an even wider basin back to the falls. Amazing area.
Although I did not understand all of what you and Sky discussed, the close up view of these formations was great. So these do not completely extend around the basin? So this was up lifted or was the floor of the basin eroded to it by ice age floods? So this was all under water prior to the ice age floods? Would there be fossils in the cal create layer?
50:58 Looking at the dip on those basalt beds, and knowing we're along a fault, is this actually an anticline, or a back rotated block? Beautiful vistas. Interesting video. Thanks.
How are you guys still in one piece?! I've always loved the rocks, but I'd have wanted a good rope and belay just to take in the view from the top! There weren't even any goats up there! Thanks for showing us though. (y)
23:30 Wouldn’t “lowland wetland deposits” have more dark carbon remaining? Or did the “oxidative process” eliminate the organic materials? Definitely a BIG thanks to the owners for allowing Nick and Skye access to this location to give us a remote view of the site.
Not much organic material preserved in late Pliocene and Pleistocene sediments. Carbon seems largely locked up in the CaCO3. The cemented root casts are plentiful, though (trace fossils of plants). Dark gray paleosols are found farther along the ridge and elsewhere in the area. And the cicada were chewing on something - maybe organics? Slightly older sediments of the Ringold Formation are full of fossils - fish, plants, and mammals.
Also wanted to add… as a retired biologist.. like geology…I have to remind people we still don’t know far more than we know. We have learned a lot but it is still a grain of sand on the beach of knowledge.
How do you differentiate basalt that is uplifted (like you describe saddle mountain) vs basalt that is eroded by floods as is present elsewhere along the banks of the Columbia?
