Tierra Redonda Mountain
Tierra Redonda Mountain is a mountain in northwestern San Luis Obispo County, California. It is in the eastern portion of the Santa Lucia Range, separated from the main ridge by the Nacimiento River.
Location
The mountain is north of Lake Nacimiento, with the summit being about a mile and a half (two kilometers) from the shoreline near the northwestern extremity of the lake. It is about 18 miles (30 km) from the Pacific Ocean at San Simeon. The elevation of the summit is 2501 feet (762 meters).
The mountain is part of a small island of Bureau of Land Management land, 320 acres, entirely surrounded by private land. BLM has designated it as an Area of Critical Environmental Concern (ACEC), along with several other BLM holdings in San Luis Obispo County (such as the Carrizo Plain and Cypress Mountain) due to the high concentration of unique, sensitive, and threatened species found in the vicinity, as well as for its singularly rich paleontological resources. San Luis Obispo County has also designated the region as open space in their General Plan.[1]
Redonda Formation
It has had two extinct creatures named after it, due to them having been discovered there; the aetosaur Redondasuchus,[2] and the phytosaur Redondasaurus.[3] Other fossils include primarily middle-Miocene creatures[4] such as the redfieldiids Cionichthys and Synorichthys stewarti, the semionotids Semionotus and cf. Hemicalypterus, the lungfish Arganodus, a possible coelacanth, the temnospondyl Apachesaurus gregorii, an unnamed cynodont, the archosauromorph Vancleavea, an unnamed aetosaur, a giant sphenosuchian, and may even have housed fossils of theropod dinosaurs.[5]
References
- ^ "Chapter 11 - ACECs Coast Management Area - Tierra Redonda". U.S. Department of the Interior Bureau of Land Management. Retrieved 2008-07-14.
- ^ "Aetosauria Translation and Pronounciation Guide". www.dinosauria.com. 1996-01-01. Retrieved 2008-07-14.
- ^ "Phytosauria Translation and Pronounciation Guide". www.dinosauria.com. 1996-01-01. Retrieved 2008-07-14.
- ^ "Energy Citations Database". www.osti.gov. 2001-05-13. Retrieved 2008-07-14.
- ^ "The Microvertebrate Fauna of Shark Tooth Hill, Redonda Formation (Late Triassic, Apachean), Quay County, New Mexico". Andrew B. Heckert, Specer G. Lucas and Adrian P. Hunt, New Mexico Museum of National History. 2005. Retrieved 2008-07-14.
Further reading
- Subsurface Geology of East-central New Mexico By Roy W. Foster, Richard M. Frentress, Walter Charles Riese. Published 1972, New Mexico Geological Society. Original from the University of Michigan.
- Bulletin of the Geological Society of America By the Geological Society of America. Published 1890.
- The San Andreas Fault System By Robert E. Powell, R. J. Weldon, Jonathan C. Matti. Published 1993 Geological Society of America. ISBN 0813711789