Battle Creek Regional Park Earthcache EarthCache
Battle Creek Regional Park Earthcache
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Battle Creek Regional Park is located less than 5 miles from downtown St. Paul. Although within an urban area, the park’s more than 750 acres of oak woods, old fields, creek and second-growth woodlands provides the perfect habitat for a wide variety of wildlife and is a great place for birders and nature enthusiasts. While exploring there, you may see many species of birds; including horned owls, pileated woodpeckers. Whitetail deer, red fox, and raccoon are also very common. But what is bringing you to this location is the beautiful white sandstone walls of the ravine that runs through this part of the park.
About 460 million years ago, the sand that you are looking at originated near Lake Superior. Carried southward by rivers and the wind it settled near a warm shallow sea that covered most of North America. Over a few million years, as water levels rose and fell, this sand created the beach area along the edge of this sea. Over time, this sand cemented together forming a beautiful fine-grain, white colored sandstone that today is called, St. Peter Sandstone. The name for this sandstone formation came from Dr. D.D. Owens who was a geologist for the U.S. Department of the Treasury. In his 1847 geological survey of Minnesota, he described this new formation and mapped it. He found that it ran north-south from Minnesota to Arkansas and east-west from Illinois to western Nebraska. Owens named the formation for the St. Peter River (now called the Minnesota River) where he studied it. In the Twin Cities, this formation reaches a thickness of up to 190 feet (58 meters). Being about 99% pure silica it is mined for the making of glass, sandbox sand, and filtering systems.
When at the park, please stay on paths. There is NO CLIMBING of the cliff or any part ravine. There is no reason to go into the forming cave. Scratching your name into the sandstone is an act of vandalism and is against the law. Please respect this fragile ecological area.
To log this “find” please answer the following question:
In front of you at GZ there is a beautiful cliff made of St. Peter sandstone. Estimate the height of this cliff and calculate what % of the sandstone you see at this location.
Email your answers to the questions, to me, using the link in my profile only. If your answers are not recieved by me in an appropriate amount of time, your log will be deleted. Photos are accepted and appreciated as long as the answers to the questions are not revealed. You do not have to wait for confirmation from me before logging this cache as completed. Most of all……learn……and enjoy the view.
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