Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-p9bg8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T10:52:42.171Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Lake Manly(?) Shorelines in the Eastern Mojave Desert, California

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Roger LeB. Hooke
Roger LeB. Hooke*
Affiliation:
Department of Geological Sciences, University of Maine, Orono, Maine, 04469-5790
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Near Mesquite Spring on the southern edge of the Soda Lake basin in the Mojave Desert, there is a shoreline of an ancient lake at an elevation of 340 m above sea level. At present, Soda Lake would overflow at 280 m; a lake surface at 340 m would extend ∼240 km northward, to the northern end of Death Valley. Shorelines and lacustrine deposits near the Salt Spring and Saddle Peak Hills, 75 km north of Mesquite Spring, are at ∼180 m; a lake surface at this elevation today would also extend to the northern end of Death Valley. The most prominent shoreline of the pluvial lake that occupied Death Valley during the Pleistocene, Lake Manly, is that of the Blackwelder stand which ended ∼120,000 yr ago. This shoreline is ∼90 m above sea level. The Mesquite Spring and Salt Spring Hills shorelines were probably formed by the Blackwelder stand and subsequently displaced with respect to one another, tectonically, due to transpression in the northeastern Mojave Desert and NW–SE extension across Death Valley. This tectonic regime would result in subsidence of Death Valley and the Salt Spring Hills relative to Mesquite Spring. A reconstruction suggests that the topography at the time of the Blackwelder stand would have had a sill near the level of the highest lake, and also one ∼20 m lower, corresponding to the next most prominent shoreline in Death Valley. Expansion of the lake over these sills would have increased evaporation, thus possibly stabilizing the lake level.

Keywords

CaliforniaMojave DesertLake Manlypluvial lakes
Type
Research Article
Information
Quaternary Research , Volume 52 , Issue 3 , November 1999 , pp. 328 - 336
Copyright
University of Washington

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anderson, D.E. (1998). Late Quaternary Paleohydrology, Lacustrine Stratigraphy, Fluvial Geomorphology, and Modern Climatology of the Amargosa River/Death Valley Hydrologic system, California and Nevada. University of California, Riverside., p. 520.Google Scholar
Anderson, K.C., Wells, S.G. (1997). Late Pleistocene and Holocene valley-fill deposits of Lake Dumont. San Bernadino County Museum Association Quarterly. 44, 29–32.Google Scholar
Bassett, A.M., Muessig, S. (1957). Possible high shorelines of a Pleistocene lake in eastern Mojave Desert, California. Geological Society of America Bulletin. 68, 1818–1819.Google Scholar
Belknap, D.F., Anderson, B.G., Anderson, R.S., Anderson, W.A., Borns, H.W. Jr., Jacobson, G.L., Kelley, J.T., Shipp, R.C., Smith, D.C., Stuckenrath, R. Jr., Thompson, W.B., Tyler, D.A. (1987). Late Quaternary sea level changes in Maine. Nummedal, D., Pilkey, O.H., Howard, J.D. Sea Level Fluctuation and Coastal Evolution. 71–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brady, R.H. III. (1984). Neogene stratigraphy of the Avawatz Mountains between the Garlock and Death Valley fault zones, southern Death Valley, California. Sedimentary Geology. 38, 127–157.Google Scholar
Burchfiel, B.C., Stewart, J.H. (1966). “Pull-apart” origin of the central segment of Death Valley, California. Geological Society of America Bulletin. 77, 439–442.Google Scholar
Butler, P.R., Mount, J.F. (1986). Corroded cobbles in southern Death Valley: Their relationship to honeycomb weathering and lake shorelines. Earth Surface Processes and Landforms. 11, 377–388.Google Scholar
Clayton, L and Attig, J. W.(1989). Glacial Lake Wisconsin. Geological Society of America Memoir 173, 80, p.Google Scholar
Clifton, H.E. (1973). Pebble segregation and bed lenticularity in wave-worked versus alluvial gravel. Sedimentology. 20, 173–187.Google Scholar
Copeland, P., Harrison, T.M. (1990). Episodic rapid uplift in the Himalaya revealed by 40AR/39AR analysis of detrital feldspar and muscovite, Bengal Fan. Geology. 18, 354–357.Google Scholar
DeMets, C., Gordon, R.G., Argus, D.F., Stein, S. (1990). Current plate motions. Geophysical Journal International. 101, 425–478.Google Scholar
Denny, C. S. (1965). Alluvial fans in the Death Valley region, California and Nevada. U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 466.Google Scholar
Dohrenwend, J.C., Bull, W.B., McFadden, L.D., Smith, G.I., Smith, R.S.U., Wells, S.G. (1991). Quaternary geology of the Basin and Range Province in California. Morrison, R.B. Quaternary Nonglacial Geology: Coterminous U.S.. Geological Society of America, Boulder., 321–352.Google Scholar
Dokka, R.K., Travis, C.J. (1990). Late-Cenozoic strike-slip faulting in the Mojave Desert, California. Tectonics. 9, 311–340.Google Scholar
Drewes, H. (1963). Geology of the Funeral Peak quadrangle, California, on the East Flank of Death Valley. U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 413.Google Scholar
Eberhart-Phillips, D., Lisowski, M., Zoback, M.D. (1990). Crustal strain near the Big Bend of the San Andreas fault: Analysis of the Los Padres–Tehachapi trilateration networks, California. Journal of Geophysical Research. 95, 1139–1153.Google Scholar
Hale, G.R. (1984). Reassessment of the Death Valley–Colorado River Overflow Hypothesis in the Light of New Evidence. University of California at Berkeley, p. 291.Google Scholar
Hale, G.R. (1985). Quaternary Lakes of the Eastern Mojave Desert, California. p. 144.Google Scholar
Hooke, R.LeB. (1972). Geomorphic evidence for late-Wisconsin and Holocene tectonic deformation, Death Valley, California. Geological Society of America Bulletin. 83, 2073–2098.Google Scholar
Hooke, R.LeB. (1998). Did Lake Manly overflow at Ash Hill?. Earth Surface Processes and Landforms. 23, 377–384.3.0.CO;2-X>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hooke, R.LeB., Dorn, R.I. (1992). Segmentation of alluvial fans in Death Valley, California: New insights from surface exposure dating and laboratory modelling. Earth Surface Processes and Landforms. 17, 557–574.Google Scholar
Hunt, C. B and Mabey, D. R.(1966). Stratigraphy and Structure, Death Valley, California. U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 494-A.Google Scholar
Jahns, R.H. (1954). Investigations and problems of southern California geology. Jahns, R.H. Geology of Southern California.Google Scholar
Li, J., Lowenstein, T.K., Brown, C.B., Ku, T.-L., Luo, S. (1996). 100 ka record of water tables and paleoclimates from salt cores, Death Valley, California. Paleogeography, Paleoclimatology, Paleoecology. 123, 179–204.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lowenstein, T.K., Li, J., Brown, C., Roberts, S.M., Ku, T.-L., Luo, S., Yang, W. (1999). 200 k.y. paleoclimate record from Death Valley salt core. Geology. 27, 3–6.Google Scholar
Maxson, J.H. (1950). Physiographic features of the Panamint Range, California. Geological Society of America Bulletin. 61, 99–114.Google Scholar
Meek, N. (1989). Geomorphic and hydrologic implications of the rapid incision of Afton Canyon, Mojave Desert, California. Geology. 17, 7–10.Google Scholar
Meek, N. (1997). The elevation of shorelines in Death Valley. San Bernadino County Museum Association Quarterly. 44, 75–84.Google Scholar
Muessig, S., White, G. N. and Byers, F. M. Jr.(1957). Core Logs from Soda Lake, San Bernadino County, California, U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin 1045-C, pp. 81–96.Google Scholar
Smith, G.I. (1984). Paleohydrologic regimes in the southwestern Great Basin, 0-3.2 myr ago, compared with other long records of “global” climate. Quaternary Research. 22, 1–17.Google Scholar
Tippett, J.M., Kamp, P.J.J. (1993). Fission track analysis of the late Cenozoic vertical kinematics of continental Pacific crust, South Island, New Zealand. Journal of Geophysical Research. 98, .CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zeitler, P.K. (1985). Cooling history of the northwest Himalaya, Pakistan. Tectonics. 4, 127–151.CrossRefGoogle Scholar