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Red Rocks Park Amphitheater
Red Rocks Amphitheater, west Denver --- Tilted layers of Fountain Formation are sand and conglomerate deposited from erosion of the ancestral Rocky Mountains.
North-Hueco-la-Zorra-from-South-Cerro-Blanco
View of Cerro Hueco la Zorra, which consists mostly of layers of sandstone and silstone rocks.
County Rd 301
SEDIMENTARY - CLASTIC: Conglomerate in a recent stream channel deposit, Colorado River Rd near McCoy --- Several features can be observed in the picture: Rounding of the boulders was probably caused by tumbling in a stream channel. Variation between sand layer and boulders indicates a variation in stream energy from low to high.
RedRocksPark FountainCongl
SEDIMENTARY - CLASTIC: Conglomerate of the Fountain Formation, Red Rocks Park, west Denver --- These large boulders were rounded and transported by high-energy water action as the ancestral Rockies were eroded.
RedRocksPark FountainFm
SEDIMENTARY - CLASTIC: Sandstone of the Fountain Formation, Red Rocks Park, west Denver --- Vertical height of the picture is about 15 feet.
Rt 139 GreenRiverFm
SEDIMENTARY - CLASTIC: Shale of the Green River Formation, Rt.139 near Douglas Pass --- Mud becomes hardened to form shale. Organic material gives the darker gray color to some of the layers; this oil shale is a mostly untapped energy resource.
Ripple cross-lamination
Cross-sectional view of a calcareous mudstone to fine-sandstone bed, showing planar lamination passing upward to ripple-cross lamination. The symmetric shape of the ripples, the presence of foreset laminae dipping in opposite directions, and some lamina draping suggest that the cross-lamination was likely generated by wave-ripples. The sequence from planar lamination to ripple cross-lamination can be indicative of decreasing velocity of bottom currents (or changes in sediment grainsize and supply rate). Diameter of lens cap is 6 cm. Photo taken at the I-70 roadcut, near Morrison, Colorado (Cretaceous Dakota Group).
MaroonFmDike
Clastic dike in the Maroon Fm at Vail Pass along Interstate-70 --- The Maroon Fm on the west side of the Ancestral Rockies corresponds to the Fountain Fm on the east side. Both were deposited from the outwash of the erosion of the ancestral Rockies. The sand in the diagonal cross-cutting dike had not yet been turned to rock when it was intruded into a crack in the horizontal sandstone layers.
Trail14ClastInLimestone
Reworked clasts in the Morgan Fm, Harpers Corner, Dinosaur N.M. --- Quartzite (metamorphosed sandstone) from the Precambrian Uinta Mountain Group was eroded, rounded during transport, and deposited in what is now the Morgan Limestone.