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Post by 1dave on Apr 20, 2018 22:40:40 GMT -5
I wanted to pull some images from RTH for my thread on Big Disturbances in the force - forum.rocktumblinghobby.com/thread/82803/great-disturbances-force, but couldn't find it. I posted it on at least 4 sites most of them have gone the way of the world, but apparently not posted here. Retrification time!![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203103-c299716c-me.jpg) Big Spencer Flat is about 12 miles East of Escalante Utah. Take State road 12 out of town and drive just past mile marker # 13 as I recall. Looking at the area on Google earth, they have placed a cattle guard just after the turn off on what used to be the Old Sheffield Road - now BLM -103, making it easier to see. That road leads into the middle of Big Spencer Flat. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/22/20180422090738-38aa4a36-me.jpg) Too bad I didn't know about the Red Breaks until now. I would have loved to explore them back in the day when I had the energy to do it. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203103-8e5b5f0e-me.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203103-aee8cafd-me.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203103-4799fa70-me.jpg) When I first visited the area in 1988, the top of one of the hills looked like this: ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203103-4248fb27.jpg) I returned in 1997 There had been a lot of erosion. The hill now looked like this: ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203104-600068e1.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203103-72e4047e.jpg) I returned in 1999 with a couple of my daughters. There had been even more erosion. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/21/20180421130905-c27a35dc-me.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/21/20180421125053-b090dc92.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203104-9d9f5b43-me.jpg) I returned again in 2001 with Robert Eves of the SUU Geology Department. Even more erosion. I wonder if there is any of the hill left any more. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203104-0ab8e454-me.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/21/20180421084745-3ef06a80-me.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/21/20180421084745-ab06c6c3-me.jpg) Yes, as of 2016 there is still a nub. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/20/20180420210417-6ad4ae29-me.jpg)
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Post by 1dave on Apr 20, 2018 23:20:53 GMT -5
When I first visited the area I thought WOW! A large meteorite hit this place! over time I realized a LOT of water under pressure must have spewed out in places to form these pipes. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203104-a64d9917.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/21/20180421084745-c44c14b9.jpg) I am wondering now if they weren't formed 154 million years ago when the Upheaval Comet struck by Moab northeast of here, pressurizing the ground water. Perhaps that had something to do with the formation of the "marbles" also. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203104-e51a6f14.jpg) A Moqui I sawed in half. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203104-ad4f1b3f.jpg) The inside of a shell: ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203104-b1a48b3c.jpg) I sent some of the Moqui's to a scientist in the Netherlands who was studying their local "Rattle stones" that are similar. His report back was that the layers began as limonite, but as they dried out, they changed to goethite.
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Post by orrum on Apr 21, 2018 8:04:56 GMT -5
Hey are the moqui marbles you gave me from there Dave??? I have them displayed with some tomahawks I knapped, they are cool! Thanks again for them.
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Post by 1dave on Apr 21, 2018 10:03:25 GMT -5
Hey are the moqui marbles you gave me from there Dave??? I have them displayed with some tomahawks I knapped, they are cool! Thanks again for them. yes, they are from my 1988 trip. I gathered a washtub full in about a half hour. I've given most of them away, have perhaps 10 pounds of them left.
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Post by 1dave on Apr 21, 2018 11:20:40 GMT -5
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goatgrinder
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Post by goatgrinder on Apr 21, 2018 11:37:54 GMT -5
Ha! Pathetic and foolish humans. We will hide our cosmic iron gobbling rabbits from you until our time comes.
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Post by 1dave on Apr 21, 2018 11:45:46 GMT -5
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Post by 1dave on Apr 21, 2018 16:31:11 GMT -5
The moqui's formed in layer after layer - apparently pulse after pulse. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/21/20180421125052-e9231b7b-me.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/21/20180421125053-3a0ebc4c.jpg) A closer look at the center of the one I sawed in half reveals that the first pulse coated specific sand grains while ignoring those around them. The next pulse filled in the outer ring that protected the inner grain from receiving another layer. Later pulses repeatedly coated the outermost layers. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/21/20180421125052-78eec782.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/22/20180422074926-f0bbbc78-me.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/22/20180422085137-9a0b1e08-me.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/22/20180422085139-5d03fda2-me.jpg) What caused the separation? Magnetic Repulsion? There are bits of calcite. Do they have something to do with why they formed in spheres with ever changing spaces between them? Iron laden water spurted up joints in the sandstone, filling them with goethite. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/21/20180421125053-ad67e580.jpg) When the pressure became too much, water spurted out of the sandstone margin edges, forming the pipes. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/21/20180421125053-4de7f7fb-me.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/21/20180421125053-b9f1a9f0-me.jpg) Erosion left huge chunks of goethite like this laying around, but within a couple of years, even they were gone. ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/21/20180421125052-643a1b7a.jpg)
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Post by 1dave on Apr 22, 2018 11:30:04 GMT -5
My Old Grey Matter ain't what it used to was, so I've made a (hopefully) final run through - additions and corrections to this thread, closing it with my BIGGEST PUZZLE.
Why did the iron show such selectivity - selecting specific sand grains, ignoring others, and ending up with spherical structures? Magnetic Attraction/Repulsion? ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/22/20180422085137-9a0b1e08-me.jpg) www.explainthatstuff.com/piezoelectricity.html ![1](https://cdn4.explainthatstuff.com/solid-state.gif) So PRESSURE put electro-magnetic forces to work!
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Post by 1dave on Apr 23, 2018 8:26:02 GMT -5
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Win
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Post by Win on Apr 27, 2018 10:56:39 GMT -5
Great write up, Dave. I love that area, been several times and only scratched the surface. We weren't collecting in those times, just exploring. I was going out on Spencer Flat in 2006 or 07 and met a ranger, he warned me that coll3ecting Moqui Marbles was off limits. I knew what they were but had never actually found any, none that day either. I'm betting that place has now been over run and nearly picked clean.
On our first trip to Escalante we hiked the trail in Petrified Forest State Park, what great pieces of wood! I have no idea where my old files are but my wife has a photo from there framed and hanging. I get a smile on my face when I see how many rock photos we have hanging, long before we had any interest in collecting.
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Post by 1dave on Apr 27, 2018 12:48:48 GMT -5
Great write up, Dave. I love that area, been several times and only scratched the surface. We weren't collecting in those times, just exploring. I was going out on Spencer Flat in 2006 or 07 and met a ranger, he warned me that coll3ecting Moqui Marbles was off limits. I knew what they were but had never actually found any, none that day either. I'm betting that place has now been over run and nearly picked clean. On our first trip to Escalante we hiked the trail in Petrified Forest State Park, what great pieces of wood! I have no idea where my old files are but my wife has a photo from there framed and hanging. I get a smile on my face when I see how many rock photos we have hanging, long before we had any interest in collecting. All the people collecting wouldn't be a thousandths of those rolling down into the bottom of lake Powell, buried forever as far as humanity is concerned. More weather out every year from the Navajo, Kayenta, and Wingate Sandstone.
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Sabre52
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Post by Sabre52 on Apr 27, 2018 13:52:09 GMT -5
Every time I see those marbles I smile. When I was a kid and new to rocks my dad had his old Chevy wagon break down ( as usual) somewhere on the desert. Left me to hound while he went to town for a part and I was surprised to find a deposit of those marbles in a nearby road cut. Me being a kid and all, my first introduction to rocks had of course been those round sparkly geodes, and lo and behold, I figured with all those neato round rocks I had hit a geode bonanza. So, by the time pop returned with the part and started working on the wagon, I was sitting on the ground near the car with a veritable pile of what I thought were geodes. Figured I'd spend my time waiting for him by cracking all them nice geodes to see the pretty crystal centers. Man, I laid one of those marbles down and proceeded to take me a fine swing with my rock hammer, smacked that sucker and it shot off like a friggin cannon ball and put a nice round dent in the side of the wagon right near my pop's noggin. I promptly found out three things 1. Moqui marbles are not geodes! 2. Moqui Marbles do not break open to reveal pretty crystals but do make fine ironstone projectiles when given the proper impetus. and 3. My pop did not have a well developed sense of humor and could outrun me *L*. Moral of the story. Do not take a hammer to Moqui Marbles *L*....Mel
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Post by fernwood on Apr 28, 2018 5:27:41 GMT -5
Excellent abstract with the usual amazing photos.
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Win
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Post by Win on Apr 28, 2018 8:36:43 GMT -5
Not long ago I was at a "going out of business sale", fellow had been working on his store for 7 years, never opened. He was a rockhound first and an artist. He had buckets of Moqui Marbles and Moqui Cups. I picked up a few large for $1.00 ea, had to buy something.
My wife picked out a large, natural sandstone "flame" wall hanger, we brought it home and she said "I have no place to hang it". Some day it will join other rocks in a place of honor.
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Post by 1dave on Apr 28, 2018 9:46:26 GMT -5
Did everyone catch that the Moquis are unique?
I am tempted to try and make a drawing of the process.
Iron laden water flowing through sandstone is not unusual, BUT it stains every sand grain in its paths. THAT DID NOT HAPPEN IN THE MOQUIS!
Specifically selected grains were heavily coated while those around them were ignored.
What was the selection process?
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Post by 1dave on Jun 9, 2018 9:51:13 GMT -5
Why only selected grains were coated with iron?![1](https://i.pinimg.com/564x/87/7c/75/877c75171884f43a6be132260693aec0.jpg) Why the Pipes? ![pipes](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/upload/2018/04/20/20180420203104-a64d9917.jpg) ![Eves-3](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/04/21/20180421084745-ab06c6c3-me.jpg) DUH! The answer has been staring me in the face for the past 30 years. 90 miles away the Upheaval impact occurred 150 million years ago. The billions of shock and reflection waves only had a short way to go before they started collapsing spaces between sand grains and forcing water out in huge amounts through every joint and forcing new paths near rock margins.
![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/06/09/20180609071323-e0c7cfa6-me.jpg) ![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/06/09/20180609071323-64328c60-me.jpg) Elastic waves squeezed the quartz crystals, generating electromagnetic waves that selectively were attracted and repelled creating Liesegang bands and spheres. WHY Spheres jammed so closely together? Now I finally know.
![](http://www.rockshow.rocktumblinghobby.com/i.php?/upload/2018/06/09/20180609071323-6c0d6b56-me.jpg)
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