The summit of Mount Whitney, the highest point in the contiguous United States. Image from the National Park Service's page.
The parks
Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks sit side by side in the southern Sierra Nevada, in Tulare and Fresno counties, California. Both were established in 1890. Together they cover 350,443 hectares (865,964 acres) of huge mountains, rugged foothills, deep canyons, vast caverns and the world's largest trees. They were designated a Biosphere Reserve in 1978.
Elevation, and with it the weather, varies enormously: from 418 m (1,370 ft) in the foothills to 4,418 m (14,494 ft) at the top of Mount Whitney, the tallest mountain in the contiguous United States. Eleven more peaks above 4,270 m (14,000 ft) form the crest of the Sierra Nevada along the parks' eastern boundary.
The rocks
Most of the parks are Mesozoic igneous rock formed along with the Sierra Nevada. Many units record molten rock arriving in complex episodes, grouped into the Mount Whitney, John Muir, Mitchell, Sequoia, Shaver, Fine Gold, Palisade Crest and Scheelite Intrusive Suites.
| Age | Rocks |
|---|---|
| Older metamorphic remnants | metavolcanic rock, schist, quartzite, phyllite and marble: pieces of volcanic islands added to North America by plate movement before the Sierra Nevada rose |
| Paleozoic | metasedimentary units: the Cambrian Campito and Poleta formations, and the Permian Keeler Canyon, Lone Pine and Conglomerate Mesa formations |
| Mesozoic | the intrusive suites above, which make up most of the parks |
| Cenozoic | rhyolites and olivine basalts |
| Pleistocene | glacial till left by the glaciers that carved deep canyons, Kings Canyon among them |
Caves in marble
Surprisingly, the scattered marble hosts more than 270 caves, including Lilburn Cave, the longest in California, with nearly 27 km (17 mi) of surveyed passage.
A high Sierra lake. Image from the National Park Service's page.
The parks belong to the Cascade-Sierra Mountains physiographic province and share its geologic history, and some of its characteristic formations, with a region reaching far beyond them.
Sources
Based on "NPS Geodiversity Atlas—Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks, California," National Park Service Geologic Resources Inventory, which cites Anderson (2017); a work of the United States government in the public domain.
In these publicationsSequoia & Kings Canyon National Parks
Licence: CC0 1.0 (public domain) · Adapted from www.nps.gov
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