For 100 years, the National Park Service has preserved America’s special places “for the enjoyment, education, and inspiration of this and future generations.” Celebrate its second century with the Find Your Park GeoTour that launched April 2016 and explore these geocaches placed for you by National Park Service Rangers and their partners.
geocaching.com/play/geotours/findyourpark
The most dramatic changes on barrier islands are brought about by hurricanes and other storm force winds. The winds which accompany these storms blow sands down the shoreline and blow waves across the island, carrying sands with them. These storms can open inlets, erode beaches, and build up the marshes on the soundside of the island.
However, the wind and waves do not need storms to reshape an island. The gradual migration of sand as it is blown by winds and carried by waves constantly alters the shape and location of barrier islands in such a way that the passage of a few decades, even with few or small-scale storms, can radically alter the landscape.
Geologists are generally perceived as dealing with millions of years of geologic time. It is true that, when considering earth history, geologists do think in terms of millions, and even billions of years. From two major tectonic events in Earth history, the formation of the Appalachian Mountains and the Atlantic Ocean, came the development of the Atlantic continental margin with its coastal plain and continental shelf. The modern coastal zone is a product of and has inherited its characteristics from this Earth history, in the same way that you are a product of and have inherited your characteristics from your family history.
As plate tectonics systematically moved the continents further apart through time, the Atlantic Ocean grew wider and wider. Along with the opening of the Atlantic Ocean came the deposition of marine sediments on the continental margin to form the North Carolina coastal plain, continental shelf and continental slope, and our modern coastal system. This Coastal province of low and flat landforms was produced largely from the sediments that were being weathered and eroded off the older and higher Appalachian and Piedmont provinces and carried to the ocean by an extensive drainage system, as is still happening today.
Questions to answer in order to log this earthcache are below. Answers can be found in the above descriptions as well as on the Horizons of Islands sign located at the above coordinates for this earthcache. Please email your answers to the cache owner within 48 hours of logging this earthcache as found.
- Which three undeveloped barrier islands make up the Cape Lookout National Seashore?
- What are the two main ways barrier islands are reshaped?
- Ultimately, the Carolina coastal plain came from the development of which two major tectonic events in Earth history?
- On which of these three undeveloped barrier islands do wild horses find shelter?
- The competing currents at Shell Point are a small-scale version of the dramatic island-shaping forces that occur where?
- From where you are standing at the Horizons of Islands informational sign at Shell Point, what is the distance to Shackleford Banks?
- From where you are standing at the Horizons of Islands informational sign at Shell Point, what is the distance to the Cape Lookout Lighthouse?
- Optional: Post a photo of you at the above coordinates (please DO NOT include the Horizons of Islands in your photo.).
History of Shell Point:
Before the arrival of European explorers and settlers, Harkers Island was inhabited by Native Americans of the Coree tribe, who likely spoke a language of the Algonquian family, like most coastal tribes. The nearby Core Sound and Core Banks are named after the Coree. The Coree left little in the way of evidence of permanent habitation on Harkers Island, except for a large mound of oyster shells at Shell Point on the eastern end of the island. Similar shell mounds were found by Europeans on the Shackleford Banks and other islands of the Outer Banks. The exact purpose of the mounds for the Coree remains unknown, but varying cultures of indigenous peoples in the Southeast had been building major earthwork mounds since 3500 BCE, the Middle Archaic period, usually related to religious and ceremonial uses.
Congratulations to EcoCharge on another FTF!!