In and near the Woodlands/Spring area there a five known outcrops of sandy geological formations deposited during the Quaternary period (2.6 million years ago to present day) that can be seen at the surface according to the USGS MAP (United Sates Geological Survey). To that end, I have created an Earthcache located where one of each the five formations outcrop at the surface. Here is a brief description of each formation:
1. Alluvium Formation: Light beige in color. A general term for clay, silt, sand, gravel or similar unconsolidated detrital material, deposited during comparatively recent geologic time by a stream or other body of running water, as a sorted or semi-sorted sediment.
2. Beaumont Formation: Beige with red tint in color. Known to hold fossils, it includes plastic and compressible clay and mud deposited in flood basins, coastal lakes, and former stream channels on a deltaic plain.
3. Deweyville Formation: Red/orange in color. Consists of very deep, very poorly drained, very slowly permeable soils formed in recent alluvium enriched with acid organic materials. These nearly level soils occur in oxbows and poorly defined drainage ways. Slope ranges from 0 to 1 percent.
4. Lissie Formation: Beige in color. Clay, silt, sand, and very minor siliceous gravel of granule and small pebble size gravel, concretions of calcium carbonate, iron oxide, and iron-manganese oxides common in zone of weathering; fluviatile; surface fairly flat and featureless except for numerous rounded shallow depressions and pimple mounds.
5. Willis Formation: Grey beige in color. Formation of sand and gravelly sand occurring at or near base of post-Fleming group in southeastern Texas and southern Louisiana. Called "unnamed Pliocene sand" and "Upper Citronelle sand" Is in general sandy, coarse and gravelly in part, and slightly indurated.
To log this Earthcache you must go to the listed coordinates, answer the following questions and email the cache owner with the answers to get your smiley 😎. Failure to do so will result in a deleted log 😡!
(A). Describe the composition and color of the sandy soil at the listed coordinates. Note that each formation has a different color of sediment.
(B). Which of the five above descriptions matches your description of the sandy soil found at ground zero? Note: answers are actually relatively easy if you refer to question (C) below.
(C). At the listed coordinates there will be a number on a large nearby tree (see hint for each cache) chest high. Note that the first digit of that number will correspond to the correct answer to question (B) above. Email that two digit number along with the answers to (A) and (B) above to the cache owner.
(D). Optional, but recommended: Take a picture 📸 of you and/or your group at ground zero and post it with your log. Feel free to discover the “stay in cache” geocoin associated with this Earthcache after you have logged a smiley.
To learn more about Earthcaches, including how to develop one of your own click here Earthcache.org. You can also obtain one or more of the following levels of the Earthcache Masters Program:
BRONZE (log three or more Earthcaches in at least two or more states/countries),
SILVER (log six or more Earthcaches in at least three or more states/countries and develop one Earthcache),
GOLD (log twelve or more Earthcaches in at least four or more states/countries and develop two Earthcaches), or
PLATINUM (log twenty or more Earthcaches in at least five or more states/countries and develop three Earthcaches.