Imagine over 225 million years ago there was a large forest with conifer like trees that stretched from Utah to Texas. Over time, floods uprooted some of the trees and washed them into an ancient river system. While in the river, they eventually settled at the bottom or in a log jam. Over a short time they were then buried under sediments, which depleted the oxygen content. Without oxygen present, organic matter had the break down of its structure slowed drastically.Â
Water has an amazing affect on most things in life. It can create and destroy. Not only did it remove the trees and change the landscape, but it also allowed for dissolved minerals to seep into the wood over time.
For example, some of the minerals like silica from volcanic ash made its was through the small pours in the wood. Once there, they crystallized within the cellular wood structure, which is called Petrification. Over time the organic wood material was replaced with crystals. Such as the smoky quartz, clear quartz, yellow citrine, and purple amethyst crystals.
Time once again came into play to uncover the now rock like logs. Gradual uplifting happened as well from the Colorado Plateau over 60 million years ago. This created so much pressure on the logs that some ended up cracking with clean fractures. For the nerds out there, the petrified wood pieces are considered a 7.8 hard on the 1 – 10 Mohs Hardness Scale, yet can be brittle.Â
Arizona is pretty awesome when it comes to ancient cultural and natural sites. I love learning about the diverse history and being about to take a small peak at what has withstood Mother Nature or humans.
What a wonderful part of the world this is – love ancient sites like these. Must add Arizona to the list 🙂