Friday, December 6, 2019

Stephen Samuelson Week 6

This week I decided to visit Yosemite National Park. This beautiful landscape is home to many historic geological landmarks and sees thousands of visitors a year. Because of this location being labeled a national landmark, it has gone relatively untouched, free from any major human interference.
Yosemite National Park is absolutely covered in plutonic igneous rocks. Knowing this, I would ask to see a chart of documented volcanic activity. Learning about previous volcanic activity can help us figure out what the landscape looked like millions of years ago as well as possibilities for major future eruptions.
Looking at the geologic map, we see a large amount of granite rocks as well as paleozoic sedimentary and volcanic rocks. Knowing that this era ushered in an explosion of life I would ask to look at fossil records to find out if anyone notable was unearthed at Yosemite. Fossil records are immensely important for finding out more information about our early earth.
Finally, Yosemite is known for it's massive Sequoia forests. I would ask to see records of documented plant species in the area. It would be fascinating to find out if some of these trees are found elsewhere in the world and if so, how did they get to Yosemite? As the earth breaks apart and changes animal species and plant species can be spread across the world. Documenting plant species could help us figure out if the park was attached to something else entirely previously.
Geology. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.nps.gov/yose/learn/nature/geology.htm.
Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.nps.gov/yose/planyourvisit/mg.htm.
 

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