Every Saturday morning I grab my mug of coffee, sit in my recliner and seek to find Nick Z talking about the geology of a state(s) I don't live in. THAT is a testament towards his teachings and ongoing discoveries. It's just relaxing; like watching the old, "Sunday Morning with Charles Kuralt".
Some of your videos, including portions of this one, are Chamber of Commerce-worthy ads for your area. What a gorgeous place. Thank you for the videos and for teaching me about geology.
There is a cool new free Geology App developed by a Professor at UW Madison called Rockd. It combines GPS with Geologic mapping as well as rock descriptions and ages. I think it could be very useful. Thanks Nick for your videos I wish could turn back time 30 years but better late than never to discover something I'm this interested in. Your a huge part of that. Thanks again.. Jeff Eau Claire WI.
I know there may be some who are confused that you're asking all these questions, and not having all the answers. But, as you say, those of us who have been with you for a while (mid 2020 in my case,) appreciate your thought process, and enjoy seeing it in action. These videos are less you teaching, and more you researching, and that's enjoyable to watch, also. At least for me. Thank you for bringing us along on the entire journey, not just the end product. (The Baha-BC A-Z series.)
Nick, I really enjoy your field trips. I was a geology major in college, and while I didn’t end up pursuing a career in geology, I still like to learn!
Finally finished it. We have a lot of schist here, in Vermont and I find it so hard to crack open - we have much more weathering here than is seems you have in WA. Anyway, next time I go out with my hammer, I won't give up after only a whack or too. One of those hand specimens you showed us looks like a beautiful pressure shadow to me. Many thanks for these films, again. and looking forward to November!
Haven't watched your videos since I got out for summer break for the school I work at. Driving back from a trip to the Red Woods I started catching up on your podcasts and now all the videos you put out this summer. Man I missed these. Something about learning from your Geology content gets me back in the mood for returning to work this upcoming school year. Your energy for learning & teaching is so infectious. 💪
Funny that you have rocks holding down your papers. I was on a fire crew up at Stevens back in '88 and we had to put rocks on the tables to keep our plates and cups from being blown off the tables. As it was October, it was not long before those rocks were frozen into place and the tables covered with a thin layer of ice. It totally blew up, and am not ashamed to say that was the most terrified I have ever been, and there have been some 'interesting' times in that. But also, part of that batholith makes it possible for me to post this today.
I'm starting my master's of geology in less than a month and it is truly inspiring to see ideas that are a work in progress. It helps me realize that my master's can't and won't be solved by me before I start. It too will be a work in progress. Thank you for the reminder and the great content!
Hi Nick, I love that you include us in your learning process! It is great to see how you approach learning and exploring new thoughts and ideas. I don't know if your thinking out loud helps anybody else, but it does help me to start thinking in a different way! Also, the places today were just beautiful and as always thanks for sharing with us!
Nick, u drop bangers. I’ve just turned 43, and am too old to chase a 2nd career, but If I could it would be yours. Can’t believe I won the lottery and was born in Monroe, WA, and get to explore this PNW.
I love your videos Nick. As a kayaker, from mountain creeks to the coast, geology forms my playground, and I love to learn more about the processes that shaped it. Although the geology where I am is older (New Hampshire), many of the processes of formation is similar. We have extinct volcanoes, dike intrusions, faulting, and extensive erosion and glacial erratics and deposits from the ice age and so much more. Your videos help me understand it all, and I thank you for all that you do.
I looked at your drive and thought "That looks like snow!" I watch a guy who had claims on the Frazier in Canada and his vid today he couldn't make it to his claim because of snow at the end of May. And here I am, 7-10-22 and it is 104º in Texas...
Thanks, again, Nick, for another fun geohike! Looking through the comments seems someone has found the Mexican Gabbro! Appreciate you busting open a few rocks to let us enjoy all that sparkle, too! I don't know about other viewers, but the color, sparkle, and presence of fun minerals helps me remember 😉 rock types!
Awh! I wish I was there sniffing and seeing. Came through there last April. Thanks, it is very satisfying. I am learning about everything a little at a time. Now I'll know more about what I passed through because of your work Nick.
You are really getting professional on your camera work. Very interesting and enjoyable content. Sherlock Holmes would be impressed. 🙂 Thanks once again for your time and effort.
I did a road trip from Berkeley a few weeks ago to see of the the great geology you’ve highlighted. Saw some great schist along Icicle Creek, ophiolitic and granitic rocks along the Ingalls creek. I left you something at Vinman’s Bakery, too! Thanks for everything you do for us!
I agree on your calculation on where Noraly is. Her last video I believe she stated she was 3 days behind on uploads? Anyway, thank you for another great video with stunning scenery and of course the geology lesson. My son who is 14, who btw sits for few videos longer than a minute or two, sits still through every one of these hikes you upload. Thank you again and looking forward to the next one!
This was fantastic as always. Love hearing you think through the evidence as you develop your understanding. It helps me follow along better. Thank you!
Gorgeous country, that I won't get to see in person this summer, but the field trips are still fun to go on vicariously, and as a non-geologist, there's always something to learn, even if I don't absorb as much as I'd like. I've seen enough videos that, in my head, if not in person, I know some of the differences between rock types.
This area is amazing. Spent many many days camping and hiking this area. Your videos Nick are always amazing and very informative. Since watching your videos I actually look and pay attention to the rocks and land formations while hiking in the mountains.
Never seen snow in July ( midwest city boy here) but here it is on the mountain tops with metamorphic rock everywhere! . Do like going on a field trip with my favorite geology professor. By the way your presentations afield are top notch!
That is the greatest part of your videos.. we can learn right along with you it is exciting to lear with some one that know a thing or two... Good night... we love you back and see you in the next video!
Another great video, thx. Great dialogue. I soak this up like a sponge, pls continue to share. I feel like an Armchair Geologist, with a bit of knowledge.
Just finished episode 59 Nick at home that is an awesome episode I could not stop smiling your native friend is so energetic when he's telling his stories I wish I could see more of him maybe you can make that possible thank you for all you do
Hi Nick, I've enjoyed your presentations of the past couple of years. I keep hoping you will take a stab at Walker Valley Rock hounding SE of Mount Vernon. I've worked the formation for years pulling Vugs. The stratification is pretty amazing. Just a thought.
Did you see any obsidian out there? I heard pacific trail had obsidian and I make arrowhead and spearheads with them and always wanted to go and find my own
I lived in Kirkland Lake, Ontario for about 10 years. Amazing place, worth any mineral hound vacation for sure. Travelling just south of Earlton looking right there is an early Batholith (KL region is up to 2.8bn)
Beautiful fire ring. Even have an oven of sorts and a small separate fire pit maybe for a coffee pot. Nicely done and such good rocks as building materials. Area is beautiful scenery and forest, would be a nice hiking place. Geology is also great thanks
It took a lot of leverage and a rather long lever for me and some others to fold all that batholith. And we did it simply to confound future geologists like you.
In general, the more mafic intrusions in a batholith can represent either earlier, more primitive injections of magma, melted directly from the depleted peridotite of the mantle, or otherwise a kind of “restite”, or mafic residue of the igneous differentiation processes which mobilized more felsic minerals, and due to their lower melting temperature, became molten, and thus less dense, and were able to physically separate from their source to form an upward-intruding blob of granite, leaving the refractory mafic restite behind. And even earlier mafic intrusions can be cannibalized and differentiated, with more felsic melts extracted from them during later events. These refractory “leftovers” can be gabbros, gabbronorites, but it is usually more common to find them in this context as pyroxenites or garnet pyroxenite “arclogites” (after “eclogite”, but referring to their genesis from differentiation underneath felsic continental arcs). Edit: I should add though, that such garnet pyroxenite “arclogitic” rocks, though surely they are part of nearly every volcanic arc in the Earth’s history, are rarely observed at the surface of the earth, because they tend to be located at great depth and so dense that they “delaminate” from the lower crust and recycle back into the mantle. But lower crustal mafic and ultramafic cumulates on the other hand are found exposed at Earth’s surface, from time to time-for example the Bushveld Complex in Southern Africa, the Stillwater Complex in Montana, and the Muskox Intrusion in the Northwest Territories of Canada. These represent the refractory mafic roots of long-eroded batholiths and volcanic arcs that formed dozens of kilometers above them in the past.
I am ever wondering if you are going to get a chance to get to the heart of Baja-BC? That being the SICKER GROUP of Vancouver Island aka WRANGELLIA in my mind. Maybe a trip north of the Border and redevous with Jerome again on our turf this summer if plausible. Seems like these early episodes, are the late cars (Mt Stuart, and such) of the pack drafting up the coast. I know there needs to be a certain order. But I surely wait in anticipation that you would/could make it up to this Island of Paradise. Forever enjoying the journey you are steering us viewers on this course of action @NickZenter
I had to jump back to the previous video. I think you're right about granite and gabbro not being firestone. Their micas can harbor water. The kyanite and andalusite you mention in that video are both aluminosilicates sought for their refractory properties.
Lovely outing plus learning more with each one. And as usual, more questions. These areas are really familiar to me, but I dont know what I'm looking at. I feel handicapped by not having studied rocks & minerals. Sure appreciate you, Nick.
I enjoyed both videos and look forward to checking out the area on the next road-trip to the north. Isn’t Tunnel Creek close to the site of the Wellington train disaster, the deadliest train disaster in US history?
13:24 Oh Nick...you're courting danger. Everyone knows... You don't tug on Superman's cape... You don't spit into the wind... You don't pull the mask off the old Lone Ranger... And you don't mess around with Jim.
This is the granite I always wanted for countertops. But I couldn't find a source for them. The house I bought has boring black granite countertops. I do have a piece of ms granite that I gathered in my medicine bag. When I lived in Colorado I would get it out and immediately feel grounded to my mountains at home. Also that road at the top has a large huckleberry patch. Then it crosses into the little wenatchee river drainage, then on down to Lake wenatchee. A nice fall drive from east wenatchee.
So, does the existence of the faults that have obviously shifted the schist been affected by the intrusion of the granite or have they exposed it? Or are the two completely unrelated? Regardless, thank you, Nick, for showing us beautiful scenerey while helping us to learn more about WA geology.
JUST THINKING if the batholith were still "plasticky " while the thrust faulting were active : could could the minerals then form anticline syncline zones like you mention in previous vid? so technically it wouldnt show it to be folded , is it possible the minerals during this could show some sort of allignment other than the normal randomness of the pluton? Almost a bandedness but not so apparent?
At 20:25 I recognized the location, I've stopped there for lunch many times. The road continues on to Lake Wenatchee with abundant edible fungi along the way. I knew the former ranger, Fred Blodgett, a native American who shared the location of a giant Western Red Cedar roughly 25 feet in diameter just 20 feet off the road. There are large boulders of pure albite (sodic end-member plagioclase) if you know where to look. Plenty of Black Bear too, so be noisy when hiking about and they'll scoot.
Finding where the strike slip faults either end or continue on the other side of the ‘hook’ , would I think , contribute to whether or not the MS batholith is folded. Interesting.
I used to do "rock talks" at my son's school- i always stressed to the kids that "magic happens on the boundaries" of changes in rock types- i always look for rock changes on trips over the pass... lots of mineralization on those intrusive boundaries.
Seems like all the deformation could have taken place before the intrusion of the MSB and then moved. Is the story that the surrounding area is all much older?
Couldn't you use the paleomagnetic data to determine if it has been folded? Namely, if there has been deformation since it formed there should be variations in the direction of the paleomagnetic data, while if the paleomagnetic data always points in the same direction that would indicate no deformation. Also, if the movement of the windy pass thrust was in the 90s would that mean that the batholith was being deformed while it was cooling?
18:13 Wouldn't some good lidar on the region really help to highlight the topography, and be able to better tell what kind of folding or not-folding exists?
Nick, A little Far but I think it's in the window of our shared geology, just got back from the lava flows that created the Oregon sunstones and mined for two days. Check it out and there's no place like it, geology playtime!!!
