Fall 2007 Tri-State Field Conference Report
published Dec 12, 2013 10:50amFall 2007 Tri-State Field Conference Report
The 68th Annual Tri-State Geological Field Conference was hosted by the geology faculty at the University of Wisconsin River Falls on October 5-7, 2007. The event began on Friday night with a mixer in the new University Center, and tours of its green building design, and although lightning was dancing around River Falls that evening by Saturday morning the skies cleared and held throughout the conference. A good mix of geology professionals and students from Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin, as well as some geoscientists infiltrating across the border from Minnesota comprised the 80+ participants.
Saturday's field stops featured a range of topics from an unusual Quaternary unconformity / supercrop fill, to interesting features and stratigraphy of the Platteville and Oneota formations, to old glacial deposits southwest of River Falls. We ate well - with lunch provided by the YMCA at their camp near Hudson, Wisconsin (overlooking the scenic St. Croix River valley) and closed our activities Saturday evening with a buffet at the University Center. Tony Runkel, Chief Geologist at the Minnesota Geological Survey, presented the keynote address - a fantastic overview of how sequence stratigraphy works in the lower Paleozoic rocks of the upper Mississippi Valley region.
On Sunday morning Dr. Bill Cordua, UW-River Falls, led a long caravan of participants southeast from River Falls to the Rock Elm disturbance, an ancient meteorite impact site. We saw evidence on a large and small scale of the impact, and then visited new roadcuts through the unusual sedimentary units that filled in the impact basin.
Please note that some guidebooks remain (only $13 plus shipping). Please contact either of the co-chairs: Kerry Keen (kerry.l.keen@uwrf.edu) or Mike Middleton (michael.d.middleton@uwrf.edu) for a guidebook or for other questions regarding this conference.
The 68th Annual Tri-State Geological Field Conference was hosted by the geology faculty at the University of Wisconsin River Falls on October 5-7, 2007. The event began on Friday night with a mixer in the new University Center, and tours of its green building design, and although lightning was dancing around River Falls that evening by Saturday morning the skies cleared and held throughout the conference. A good mix of geology professionals and students from Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin, as well as some geoscientists infiltrating across the border from Minnesota comprised the 80+ participants.
Saturday's field stops featured a range of topics from an unusual Quaternary unconformity / supercrop fill, to interesting features and stratigraphy of the Platteville and Oneota formations, to old glacial deposits southwest of River Falls. We ate well - with lunch provided by the YMCA at their camp near Hudson, Wisconsin (overlooking the scenic St. Croix River valley) and closed our activities Saturday evening with a buffet at the University Center. Tony Runkel, Chief Geologist at the Minnesota Geological Survey, presented the keynote address - a fantastic overview of how sequence stratigraphy works in the lower Paleozoic rocks of the upper Mississippi Valley region.
On Sunday morning Dr. Bill Cordua, UW-River Falls, led a long caravan of participants southeast from River Falls to the Rock Elm disturbance, an ancient meteorite impact site. We saw evidence on a large and small scale of the impact, and then visited new roadcuts through the unusual sedimentary units that filled in the impact basin.
Please note that some guidebooks remain (only $13 plus shipping). Please contact either of the co-chairs: Kerry Keen (kerry.l.keen@uwrf.edu) or Mike Middleton (michael.d.middleton@uwrf.edu) for a guidebook or for other questions regarding this conference.