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Geologic units containing volcanic ash

Earth material > Unconsolidated material
Volcanic ash
A fine pyroclastic material (under 2.0 mm in diameter). The term usually refers to the unconsolidated material...
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Kansas - Louisiana - Montana - Nebraska - Oklahoma - Oregon - South Dakota - Washington
Kansas
Ogallala Formation (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Tertiary | Miocene)
massive to cross-bedded, generally arkosic sand, silt and gravel, locally cemented with calcium carbonate; also contains limestone, volcanic ash, diatomaceous marl, opaline sandstone and bentonitic clay
Louisiana
Catahoula Formation (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Tertiary | Oligocene)
gray to white sandstones; loose quartz sand, tuffaceous sandstone, volcanic ash, and brown sandy clays; petrified wood locally.
Catahoula Formation (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Tertiary | Oligocene)
gray to white sandstones; loose quartz sand, tuffaceous sandstone, volcanic ash, and brown sandy clays; petrified wood locally. Overlain by 1-9 meters of loess.
Dough Hills Member (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Tertiary | Miocene)
gray to yellow silty clays; light gray calcareous clays which may weather to black soil; some siliceous silt and volcanic ash beds.
Lena Member (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Tertiary | Miocene)
gray calcareous clays which may weather to black soil; siltstone, taffaceous clays and some volcanic ash beds
Montana
Flaxville gravel (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Tertiary)
Flaxville gravel: Brown, yellow, and gray gravel, sand, and silt with marl and volcanic ash locally.
Nebraska
Arikaree Group (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Tertiary | Oligocene Miocene)
Consists mainly of gray, fine, loose to compact sand that has layers of hard, fine-grained dark-gray concretions which vary from few in to 15 in and often have tabular form. Includes a large amount of volcanic ash mixed in with the sand. Contains a number of channels filled with coarse conglomerate along ridge south of North Platte River. About 500 ft thick.
Ogallala Group or Formation (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Tertiary | Miocene)
Silt, sand, sandstone, gravel and conglomerate. Predominantly interfingered fine- to coarse grained, poorly sorted, arkosic, fluvial deposits of light-gray, light-olive-gray, and grayish-green calcareous silt and sand, and locally poorly consolidated conglomerate, sandstone, and siltstone.
Oklahoma
Ogallala Formation (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Tertiary | Pliocene)
CIMARRON- Generally semiconsolidated clay, silt, sand, gravel, and caliche 0 to 400 feet thick. BEAVER- Interbedded sand, siltstone, clay, gravel lenses, and thin limestone. Caliche common near surface but occurrence is not limited to the surface. Caliche accounts for most of the white color in the Ogallala. Other colors generally light tan or buff but locally may be pastel shades of almost any color. The Laverne and Rexroad Formations of Pliocene age and the Meade Group and Odee (of local usage) and other formations of Pleistocene age occur locally and are included with the Ogallala Formation, 0-700 feet thick. WOODWARD- Gravel, sand, silt, clay, caliche, and limestone, locally cemented with calcium carbonate. Generally light-tan to gray to white. Thickness ranges up to 400 feet and probably averages 150 feet. CLINTON- Gray to light-brown, fine- to medium-grained sand with some, clay, silt, gravel, volcanic ash, and caliche beds; locally cemented by calcium carbonate. Thickness ranges from 0 to about 320 feet. The formation thins eastward.
Pleistocene and Pliocene deposits, undifferentiated (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Tertiary Quaternary | Pliocene Pleistocene)
TEXAS- Interfingering beds, tongues, and lenses of sand, silt, clay, gravel, sandstone, caliche, limestone, conglomerate, and volcanic ash. Includes Ogallala and Laverne Formations of Pliocene age and younger deposits of Pleistocene age. Locally the units are tightly cemented by calcium carbonate; other places, they are very poorly consolidated and nearly free of cementing materials. Thickness ranges from 0 to about 800 feet.
Terrace Deposits (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Quaternary | Pleistocene)
WOODWARD- Lenticular and interfingering deposits of light-tan to gray gravel, sand, silt, clay, and volcanic ash. Sand dunes are common in many places. Thickness ranges up to 150 feet and averages about 60 feet. ENID- Sand, silt, clay, and gravel. Maximum thickness, about 75 feet (23 m) along major streams. TULSA- Fine gravel, sand, silt, and clay. CLINTON- Stream-laid deposits of sand, silt, clay, gravel, and volcanic ash; thickness ranges from 0 to about 120 feet. OKLAHOMA CITY- Lenticular beds of sand, silt, clay, and gravel. Thickness ranges from a few feet to about 100 feet and probably averages about 50 feet along major streams. FORT SMITH- Gravel, sand, silt, and clay. LAWTON- Sand, clay, and gravel as much as 75 feet (23 m) in Tillman County, ranging from 5 to 50 feet (2 to 15 m) elsewhere. ARDMORE-SHERMAN- Gravel, sand, silt, clay, and volcanic ash; thickness, about 5 to 50 feet; at various levels, as high as 160 feet above present flood plains. McALESTER TEXARKANA- Gravel, sand, silt, clay, and volcanic ash; several levels 20 to 160 feet or more above present flood plains, with each level containing deposits that average 20 to 30 feet in thickness, some windblown sand on top; may include colluvial wash down sides of hills
Oregon
Lacustrine and fluvial deposits (Miocene) (Miocene)
Poorly to moderately consolidated, bedded silicic ash and pumicite, diatomite, tuffaceous sedimentary rocks, minor mudflow deposits, and some coarse epiclastic deposits. Vitroclastic material in some beds diagenetically altered to zeolites, secondary silica minerals, and clay minerals. In eastern Blue Mountains province vertebrate fossils indicate unit is mostly of late Miocene (Clarendonian) age, but may also include some rocks of middle Miocene (Barstovian) age. In High Lava Plains and northern Owyhee Upland provinces, vertebrate fossils indicate unit is partly late Miocene (Clarendonian), but probably is mostly middle Miocene (Barstovian) in age. Interfingers and grades laterally into unit Tmb. Includes lake and stream sediments and tuffaceous lake and stream deposits of Prostka (1962, 1967), Deer Butte Formation of Corcoran and others (1962) and Kittleman and others (1967), Juntura Formation of Shotwell and others (1963), some rocks originally assigned to the lower part of the (now obsolete) Danforth Formation of Piper and others (1939), and interbeds in upper part of Columbia River Basalt Group in northern Wallowa County
South Dakota
Arikaree Group (Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Tertiary | Eocene Oligocene)
Includes: Rosebud Formation (Miocene)- Pink siltstone with channel sandstone and concretions. Thickness up to 250 ft (76 m). Harrison Formation (Miocene)- Gray, silty sandstone and reworked volcanic ash with calcareous siltstone and marl. Thickness 180 ft (55 m). Turtle Butte Formation (Miocene)- Light-green to gray siltstone with sandstone channels containing claystone pebbles. Thickness 65 ft (20 m). Monroe Creek Formation (Oligocene)- Tan to grayish-tan, massive sandy siltstone and reworked volcanic ash. Thickness 100 ft (30 m). Sharps Formation (Oligocene)- Pink siltstone and claystone with concretionary layers, paleochannels, and beds of reworked volcanic ash. Thickness 360 ft (110 m).
Washington
Glaciolacustrine deposits (Pleistocene)
Fine-grained sand and silt, well-stratified, with some gravel, clay, and diatomaceous earth. Contains clastic dikes in Walla Walla area.
Quaternary nonmarine deposits (Pleistocene)
Periglacial lacustrine deposits. Light-brown, well-sorted and bedded clayey sandstone and sandy clay with interbeds of volcanic ash and calcareous cemented gravels.

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