Dynamic landscapes

Try to get your bearings here. Find Round Top looming above you, the old volcano now cloaked in eucalyptus trees. Now figure out which way is East, and look out over the hills in that direction. Imagine you are on a Miocene lanscape. To the west, tall mountains loom above what is now San Francisco Bay, and a big river flows from those highlands to the spot where you now stand. The river flows past you, heads east, and empties into the ancient Bay in that direction. The local ecosystem hosts a diversity of massive mammals, including horses, rhinos, lions, saber-toothed cats, camels, and the relatives of mammoths and mastodons called gomphotheres. Fossils from this time period were discovered during the construction of the Caldecott Tunnel (Hwy 24), and some of these are now housed in the UC Museum of Paleontology. When you think about the eruption of Round Top on this field trip, try to imagine this rich, riverine landscape at the edge of the Bay.

Picture 2 © Carl Buell