Situated at the southeastern edge of the Northern Coast Range, where subduction complex abuts the Great Valley Sequence, two outlying strands of the broad San Andreas fracture zone cut a striking and majestic tectonic landscape. The picture perfect Cordelia fault, and its more significant fractious neighbor, the Green Valley fault, sculpt plunging walls and scarps, … More Earthquake Country: The Cordelia and Green Valley Faults

Every April 18th I ponder the fateful events my great-great, and great grandparents endured that very early morning, and for months to follow. With toddler in tow, and possibly pregnant, my great grandparents fled their South of Market flat to cross the Bay to join family in Larkspur, Marin County in the north. Their home … More On the Eve of the Great Earthquake

Mendocino Triple Junction Parts 1 and 2: Tectonics, Evolution, and Structure Mother Earth has made it clear that it’s time to talk about the Mendocino Triple Junction. On December 5th, 2024 the most seismically active region in California had its largest earthquake in 20 years*: a magnitude 7.0 along the Mendocino Fracture Zone, approximately 35 … More Mendocino Triple Junction Tectonics

The Maacama fault forms linear northwest trending transtensional basins in central Sonoma and Mendocino Counties, which contain many of the major towns in these counties, including Hopland, Ukiah, and Willits. Tell-tale evidence of fault creep can be traced throughout the town of Willits along the northwest trending slice of the Maacama fault where it cuts … More Creepy Fault Creep on the Maacama, Halloween Edition

As an ode to my natal beach, which has recently and unfortunately made the news for being closed to public access indefinitely due to sewage contamination, I’m taking a look back at a happier time for this spot on the southern tip of the Point Reyes Peninsula, and the discovery of the lone specimen of … More Hometown Fossil: The Lone Six Million Year-Old Parabalaenoptera baulinensis

One of California’s most unique and rare wetland systems is found nested between vast, migrating dune lobes on the Mendocino Coast. The Inglenook Fen-Tenmile Dunes ecological reserve forms the northern portion of MacKerricher State Park, a few miles north of Fort Bragg, CA.     Most fens in California are found in the Sierra Nevada, Klamath Mountains, … More Inglenook Fen: A Rare Coastal Wetland System

Geomorphology in action! Sinkhole, anyone? A startling site while hiking out on the mesa grasslands, even for this lifelong CA coastal hiker and geologic explorer. I have never seen a seepage-cut depression this large and deep; cut down through the bedrock; this far from the shoreline; and apparently not influenced by human drainage/irrigation debacles. Surging, … More Spring Ranch: Sinkholes, Emergent Tectonics, and Mini Terraces

Marine terraces are a defining geomorphological feature of the West Coast, and are dispersed along the entire extent of California’s active, uplifting coastline. Found on emergent tectonic coastal margins worldwide, marine terraces underlay much of California’s heavily developed and populated regions.  Terrace Geomorphology: Tectonics and Sea Level Change Marine terraces begin as wave cut platforms, … More California’s Marine Terraces