Cape Pele Red Stone EarthCache

Cape Pele Red Stone

Cape Pele

The village on the Northumberland Strait of New Brunswick near Shediac was founded by Acadians in 1780 and incorporated as a municipality in 1969. Fishing is the dominant industry, and the town is home to several smoked herring processing plants known locally as oucannières. As many as 30 smokehouses are found in Cap-Pelé and its surrounding areas. They are used mainly for smoking herring, which is then exported worldwide. There is a local fishery of herring and scallops in the spring and mackerel in summer. Lobster is caught from August to October. Cap-Pelé is known for its sandy beaches, which include Aboiteau, Gagnon and Sandy.

Geology

This region is characterized by level to gently undulating slopes with elevations rising slowly from sea level to just over 60 m (200 ft) inland. This topography reflects the gently dipping to nearly level configuration of the underlying Pennsylvanian sedimentary bedrock, which consists of formations of gray and red sandstones with some conglomerates and siltstones/shales clastic sedimentary rock.

The grayish-green Pennsylvanian sandstone is harder and weathers comparatively slower than the red, fine-grained Permo-Carboniferous sandstone. Thus soils developed from this red sandstone are relatively free of boulders and stones and may appear to have been developed in situ or have been water reworked. Both lithological types lead to red soil parent materials, with the former a reddish brown and the latter a distinctive "brick" red, similar to the red soils of Prince Edward Island.

Sandstone Basics

The sediment particles are clasts, or pieces, of minerals and fragments of rock, thus sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock. It is composed mostly of sand particles, which are of medium size; therefore, sandstone is a medium-grained clastic sedimentary rock. Igneous rocks are formed from melted rock deep inside the Earth. Sedimentary rocks are formed from layers of sand, silt, dead plants, and animal skeletons. Metamorphic rocks formed from other rocks that are changed by heat and pressure underground.

How was Red Sandstone formed?

Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Red Sandstone refers to a Sandstone appearing red due to the inclusion of iron oxides (hematite).

Old Red Sandstone is a thick sequence of Devonian rocks (formed from 416 million to 359.2 million years ago) that are continental rather than marine in origin and occur in northwestern Europe, Scandinavia, Greenland, and northeastern Canada.

Over time, the small quantities of iron-rich minerals in the sand break down and the iron is oxidized into hematite crystals (Fe2O3) that form a very thin paint-like coating on the quartz sand grains. The hematite crystals absorb all light colors except red which they reflect, giving the sandstones their red color.

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Questions:

1. Describe the texture of the stone at Ground Zero?

2. Is there anything specific about the shape of the stone, look up the shore?

3. What colour is it and why?

4. What is causing the rippling in the rock?

5. Post a picture in your log with a personal item or hand in picture to prove you were there.

[REQUIRED] In accordance with the updated guidelines from Geocaching Headquarters published in June 2019, photos are now an acceptable logging requirement and WILL BE REQUIRED TO LOG THIS CACHE. Please provide a photo of yourself or a personal item in the picture to prove you visited the site.