Episodes
Sunday Feb 18, 2024
Ep. 1- Capulin Volcano: How Tall Is Your Imagination?
Sunday Feb 18, 2024
Sunday Feb 18, 2024
New Mexico’s Capulin Volcano National Monument features a drive-up vista into four states across a volcanic landscape, as well as trail access to the crater and lava flows. Its landscape and rocks tell a story of the power of Earth forces that expands the imagination. Meet interpretative ranger Geoff Goins and volcanologist Matt Zimmerer, to learn how less than a decade of eruptions may have built a mountain, and where New Mexico’s next eruption might take place.
Read the rest of this entry »Thursday Feb 15, 2024
Ep. 2- Wild Rivers: the Power of Water
Thursday Feb 15, 2024
Thursday Feb 15, 2024
Rio Grande del Norte National Monument features the deepest canyon in New Mexico at its Wild Rivers Recreation Area. The Rio Grande River is continuously carving this gorge into the Taos Plateau, a dry plain dotted with extinct volcanoes. The cutting of the canyon began when a vast Ice Age lake in Colorado spilled over about 440,000 years ago.
The Taos Plateau itself forms the floor of the Rio Grande rift valley, flanked by mountain ranges both east and west. Like the East African rift valley, famous as the home of early humans, the rift is a place where the Earth's crust is pulling apart.
Join Rock on Mother Earth for a hike into the gorge with two rangers, and an interview with the lead author of a recent study of its geology.
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