Oligocene Caldera Complex and Calc-Alkaline Tuffs and Lavas of the Indian Peak Volcanic Field, Nevada and Utah
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Oligocene caldera complex and calc-alkaline tuffs and lavas of the Indian Peak volcanic field, Nevada and Utah MYRON G. BEST US. Geological Survey and Department of Geology, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah 84602 ERIC H. CHRISTIANSEN Department of Geology, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah 84602 RICHARD H. BLANK, JR. US. Geological Survey, Denver, Colorado 80225 ABSTRACT eruptive sequence consists of several cooling subject of recent controversy (Whitney and units of trachydacite tuff containing small to Stormer, 1985; Johnson and Rutherford, 1989; The Indian Peak volcanic field is represen- modest amounts of plagioclase and two Grunder and Boden, 1987). tative of the more than 50,000 km3 of ash- pyroxenes. Compared to contemporaneous volcanic flow tuff and tens of calderas in the Great These dominantly high-K calc-alkaline fields around the Colorado Plateaus to the east Basin that formed during the Oligocene-early rocks are a record of the biih, maturation, (Fig. l), the -10,000 km3 of ash-flow deposits Miocene "ignimbrite flareup" in southwest- and death of a large, open, continental in the Indian Peak volcanic field is an order of ern North America. The field formed about magma system that was probably initiated magnitude greater than in the Marysvale field 32 to 27 Ma in the southeastern Great Basin and sustained by influx of mafic magma de- (Steven and others, 1984) but similar to that of and consists of the centrally positioned Indi rived from a southward-migrating locus of the San Juan (Steven and Lipman, 1976) and Peak caldera complex and a surrounding magma production in the mantle. The small Mogollon-Datil fields (RattC and others, 1984). blanket of related ash-flow sheets distributed volumes of chemically diverse andesitic rocks In these three fields, however, individual ash- over an area of about 55,000 km2. The field were derived from separately evolving flow eruptions were on the average smaller, and has a volume on the order of 10,000 km3. A magma bodies but are modified representa- more calderas formed than in the Indian Peak. cluster of two obscure source areas and four tives of the mantle power supply. Recurrent The Indian Peak field also differs from the other calderas comprise the -80 x 120 km caldera production of very large batches (some three in its overwhelming dominance of silicic complex. Only minor volumes of rhyolite and greater than 3,000 km3) of quite uniform da- ash-flows over intermediate lava flows, a charac- two pyroxene andesite lavas were extruded cite magmas appears to have required combi- teristic aspect of Oligocene-early Miocene rocks episodically throughout the lifetime of the nation of andesite magma and crustal silicic of the Great Basin (Best and others, 1989a). magma system that formed the field, chiefly material in vigorously convecting chambers. This paper summarizes the eruptive history of during its youth and old age. Compositional data indicate that rhyolites are the Indian Peak volcanic field and the basic Six ash-flow sequences alternate between polygenetic. As the main locus of mantle compositional characteristics of the rocks and rhyolite and dacite in a volume ratio of about magma production shied southward, tra- concludes with a provisional history of the 1:8, and a culminating seventh is trachytic. chydacite magma could have been produced magma system that provides a basis for continu- The first, fourth, and sixth tuff units are of by fractionation of andesitic magma withiin ing more detailed analytical studies of its ther- rhyolite that contains sparse to modest the crust. mochemical evolution. amounts of phenocrysts, chiefly plagioclase and biotite, and abundant lithic and pumice INTRODUCTION REGIONAL GEOLOGIC SETTING lapilli; these deposits are confined within the caldera complex and form multiple and com- We document a large-volume, cyclic eruptive Tertiary volcanic rocks are virtually the only pound cooling units that are normally zoned sequence of rhyolite, dacite, and trachydacite magmatic rocks of Phanerozoic age in the with respect to bulk chemical composition ash-flow tuffs and coeval andesite and rhyolite southeastern Great Basin. They were deposited and crystal type, content, and size. The sec- lava comprising the Indian Peak volcanic field on an erosional surface of modest relief carved ond, third, and fifth tuff sequences are of astride the southern Utah-Nevada state line. into a thick, upper Proterozoic through lower crystal-rich dacite that forms extensive simple Tuffs were derived from a centrally positioned Mesozoic miogeoclinal sedimentary sequence. cooling-unit outflow sheets and partial cal- magma locus marked by the Indian Peak cal- During the Cretaceous Sevier orogeny, this se- dera fillings of compound cooling units. Each dera complex, a cluster of four known calderas quence was folded and thrust-faulted and subse- dacite unit contains similar amounts of plagi- and two inferred source areas. The dacite tuffs quently locally overlain by lower Tertiary oclase, biotite, hornblende, quartz, two py- are representative of the Monotony composi- sedimentary deposits (Stewart, 1980). A grow- roxenes, and Fe-Ti oxides; trace amounts of tional type of tuff which dominates the late ing body of data documents episodes of locally sanidiine and titanite also occur in the young- Oligocene of the Great Basin (Best and others, extreme crustal extension (as much as 300%) in est. Cognate inclusions in the dacites show 1989a; compare the "monotonous interme- the middle Cenozoic era (for example, Wust, only slight intra- and inter-unit differences diates" of Hildreth, 1981). The origin of similar 1986) before, during, and after volcanism and in bulk chemical composition. The seventh crystal-rich dacite tuff in the San Juan field is the generally before the classic high-angle Basin and Geological Society of America Bulletin, v. 101, p. 1076- 1090, 8 figs., 3 tables, August 1989. INDIAN PEAK VOLCANIC FIELD, NEVADA AND UTAH \ I ANDESlTlC LAVA PLATEAUS \ a AND DEBRIS FLOWS \ 1 ,FELSIC INTRUSIVE ROCKS L CALDERA MILES 400 I 0 KILOMETERS Figure 1. Generalized distribution of Oligocene and lower Miocene (mostly 34 to 17 m.y. old) magmatic rocks and known calderas in the Great Basin of Nevada and western Utah and in the .... Marysvale, San Juan, and Mogollon-Datil volcanic fields. The Mogollon-Datil field includes considerable intermediate composition lava flows which are not separately distinguished. Data from Lipman (1984), Ratti! and others (1984), Sargent and Roggensack (1984), Steven and others (1984), and Stewart and Carlson (1976). Dotted line is approximate margin of Colorado Plateaus. --- Range normal faulting and extension in the late broad zone of voluminous late Oligocene-early graphic expression in the present terrain which is Cenozoic era. Many recent interpretations of the Miocene volcanic rocks extends across Nevada dominated by northerly trending basins and total amount of this more or less east-west ex- and Utah into southwestern Colorado (Fig. 1). ranges produced by subsequent block faulting; tension suggest that it varied greatly from place Within this zone, chiefly calc-alkaline, highly nearly half of the caldera complex now lies bur- to place through time (for example, Coney and potassic intermediate to silicic volcanism was ied beneath alluvium-filled basins. Most impor- Harms, 1984; Wells and Heller, 1988; Taylor, in gradually supplanted by bimodal basalt-rhyolite tantly, gravity gradients mark the southwestern press), precluding a reliable single-value estimate volcanism in the late Cenozoic era. Within the and southern margin of the complex which is of the stretching of Great Basin tuff sheets. We eastern Indian Peak volcanic field, early, middle, apparently filled with thick, low-density tuff or use a figure of 50% east-west crustal extension and late Miocene episodes of generally high- underlain by low-density intrusive rocks. With- since deposition in restoring the distribution of silica rhyolitic activity were accompanied by ex- out the gravity data, the southern margin can be the different sheets and in calculating their origi- trusion of mafic lavas, but not until the last only indirectly located, even in the mountain nal volumes. episode had their content of K20 and Si02 de- ranges, because of an extensive cover of younger The Cenozoic volcanic history of the central creased to the level of true basalt (Best and oth- volcanic rocks. western United States is dominated by a broad ers, 1980, 1987~). Aeromagnetic data (Zietz and others, 1976, southward sweep of essentially calc-alkaline ig- 1978) also disclose the general location of the neous activity (Cross and Pilger, 1978) while GEOPHYSICAL EXPRESSION OF Indian Peak caldera complex. oceanic lithosphere was subducting beneath the THE CALDERA COMPLEX Geologic mapping corroborates the com- western margin of North America. Between pound nature of the geophysically expressed about 30 and 25 Ma, this transgressive activity Although bearing the overprint of basin and caldera complex. Topographic margins of four decelerated or even stagnated in the southern range faulting, gravity data delineate the -80 x nested calderas are indicated by striking discon- Great Basin (Best and others, 1989a) where the 120 km Indian Peak caldera complex (Fig. 2). tinuities in thickness of tuff deposits and by Indian Peak volcanic field developed. This None of the Oligocene calderas has any topo- coarse breccia of older rocks shed off caldera 1078 BEST AND OTHERS walls. Short segments of caldera-bounding faults generally high K20 concentrations that qualify 35-34-m.y.-old rhyolitic tuffs and lavas were are locally exposed or indirectly expressed by them as a high-K calc-alkaline suite (Ewart, emplaced in and near the volcanic complex small dacite lava domes. The sources of two 1979). prior to its development (Best and others, additional ash-flow sheets are approximately Voluminous eruption of lavas did not precede 1987%; Loucks and others, 1989). located by the distribution of the sheets and by nor accompany ash-flow eruptions from the In- Volumes of ash-flow tuff deposits in Figure 3 clast size.