Geo 365: April 27, Day 117: Terrace, Berm, Sand

Dana walks over to investigate the basalt berm and overlying terrace deposits, on the other side of the sandy inlet. Even though there's no sky visible in this photo, the most striking thing visible to me is weather/climate related. It's tough to say what a lot of the shrubs on the terrace deposits are, but some of them-definitely those in the upper right corner- are shore pines. Look at how coastal winds have whipped and shaped them. Winter winds can be fierce on the Oregon coast, often over hurricane force, sometimes well over 100 mph (160 kph).

Hopefully I'll get a few shots in ten days or so of an excellent bio-geo-meteoro interaction near Humbug Mountain, on the southern coast. Dana's coming into town May 6, and I'm pondering whether to schedule this series for that week, or try to keep up on the fly. Both have upsides and downsides. We'll see.

Photo unmodified. September 21, 2010. FlashEarth Location.

Geo 365: April 26, Day 116: Mini Canyons

A fun thing to do at the beach during low tide is to look at the short-lived erosional features. Many fluvial landforms can be found, at small scales, changing and evolving over periods of minutes in ways that would take real stream systems years to centuries. In this case, we're seeing sheet wash on the upper "plateau" channeled into a series of distributary "canyons" in response to the rapid drop in base level as the tide went out.

Of course, there's plenty of water percolating through the sand as well. Under the sheet wash, the water table is right at the surface, and that level drops to the left. But the main stream has cut below the water table, so "springs" have formed along the base of the "plateau's" "escarpment." With that former groundwater back on the surface, it can again erode the sand grains in that area, creating an apron similar to a bajada between the main stream and the escarpment.

Photo unmodified. September 21, 2010. FlashEarth Location.

Geo 365: April 25, Day 115: Raindrop Imprints

It was a typical fall day on Dana's first visit, spitting rain from time to time. When we clambered down off the rocks onto the beach, I noticed those occasional patters had left an impression.

 Photo unmodified. September 21, 2010. FlashEarth Location.

Geo 365: April 24, Day 114: Sand-Rock Interface

Water running off the tidepool platform combines with water from a small stream and more seeping out of the hillside to carve a moat around the rock. This area is not as heavily colonized by sea life; it's frequently buried in sand. They can survive a little of that, for short period of time, but burial will eventually kill them off.

 Photo unmodified. September 21, 2010. FlashEarth Location.

Geo 365: April 23, Day 113: Self-Indulgent Surge

Though hidden under the water and biota, there is likely a small fault here...

...similar to this...

...and this.

Why self-indulgent? I couldn't pick a favorite, and rather than really think carefully about which was the most pleasing, I just said, "Heck, I'll post all of them."

Photos unmodified. September 21, 2010. FlashEarth Location.

Geo 365: April 22, Day 112: Hand and Foot

Mussels along the top and right, barnacles on the left, a sea star in the upper right middle, and hooman beans top and bottom. Geology not so much (basalt), but I really like this photo. Dana told me later this was the first time she'd seen a starfish in it's native habitat (we saw a LOT of them). I was a little surprised at the time, but I've realized since she just hasn't spent that much time at rocky coastlines. Most of her coastal visits have been unconsolidated sediments.

Photo unmodified. September 21, 2010. FlashEarth Location.

Sunday Funnies: Scramble! Edition

Funny to Me

Bits and Pieces

 Sober in a Nightclub

Funny to Me

Ramblings

xkcd

 "When I said I would procrastinate less this term" What Should We Call Grad School?

"When I lose my mapping partner and hear something rustle in the brush behind me" Geology is Hard

Tastefully Offensive

SMBC

What Would Jack Do?

Bits and Pieces

Text From Dog

Derpy Cats

Wil Wheaton's Tumblr

Text From Dog

Surviving the World

I've posted this before, but it still makes me chuckle. Will Wheaton's Tumblr

Funny to Me

Savage Chickens

Very Demotivational

SMBC (Click over, and hover over the red dot at the bottom for an even funnier tag-on to the above comic)

Sober in a Nightclub

Medium Large

Dork Tower

Bits and Pieces

Funny to Me

Maneggs

Geo 365: April 21, Day 111: Spouting Horn

There is a spouting horn here, but I'm not certain this is actually it. A true spouting horn consists of a sea cave with a hole in its roof toward the end. Waves funnel into the cave and then burst through the hole, creating a geyser-like feature, but timed to the wave period. I'm not certain the feature we're seeing here is actually a cave rather than just a blind alley that's causing the waves to splash up at its end. The true spouting horn here is at the southern end of the trail system, below and seaward of a high bridge.

I didn't notice it until I'd assembled the gif, but in two sequential frames of this animation, you can see a human silhouette walking in front of the plume. Person for scale!

Photo unmodified. September 21, 2010. FlashEarth Location. (This is the viewing platform for the actual horn; I'm not sure where I was standing nor where I was looking in the above photo. Also, we were here intentionally at low tide; the horn is more spectacular at high tide. Unless you spend a whole day here- and there's certainly enough to justify that- you either get tidepools, or waves crashing at their most vigorous.)