A Trip To Condon Peak, California

1. Geology Field Assignment
A Trip to
By: Kacy Clements
Photo by: Kacy Clements

2. Condon Peak
• Condon Peak is on the outskirts of Clear
Creek Management Area (CCMA) and
within Fresno County.
• The peak reaches 4,970 feet.
• It contains grassy Slopes covered in
shrubs, pines and oaks.
• Recreation includes:
hiking, camping, hunting, stargazing and
wildflower viewing. (blm.gov)
Photo by: Kacy Clements

3. California Quail
•The California Quail is not indigenous to all of the Northwest. Since becoming a game-bird, it has
become widespread.
•They live in brush for shelter.
•They eat leaves, seed, fruit, and some insects, spiders and snails.
•They have one brood of 12 to 16 cream-colored eggs per season.
•They are New World Quail and were thought to be a part of the Phasianidae family (Old World
quail, pheasants, partridges, and francolins) but in in 1990 Sibley found that they were from an
early divergence from 63 million years ago in South America.
•The plume on the head is called a top-knot and is used by the males to attract a mate.
(bss.sfsu.edu)
Photo by: Kacy
Photo by:
Clements
backyardbirdshop.com
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Galliformes
Family: Odontophoridae
Genus: Callipepla
Species: Callipepla
californica

4. Mule Deer
• They are named Mule Deer because their
ears are “mule-like” however, they mainly
rely on their sense of smell.
• Mule deer are usually a dark grey-
brown, with a small white rump patch and a
small, thin, dropped, black tipped tail.
• They have a particular high-bounce trot
which helps them escape from predators.
• They have one to two offspring at a time.
• Mule deer evolved from blacktail bucks
breeding with whitetail does.
Photo from google.com (conservenature.org)
Class: Mammalia
Order: Artiodactyla
Family: Cervidae
Genus: Odocoileus
Species: Odocoileus hemionus

5. Vesper Sparrow
•They are found in open habitats like prairie, meadows, and pastures on
the ground.
• They have two to six eggs at a time and eat grasses, grains, and insects.
•They are 5.1 to 6.3 inches long.
•House Sparrows came to North America in 1852. Now sparrows have
evolved into many different colors and subspecies all over the United
States.
•The sparrows in higher latitudes are larger and those who live in arid
areas are paler.
•They migrate to the southern states and Mexico. (birdweb.org)
Photo by: Kacy Clements Photo from
google.com
Class: Aves
Order: Passeriformes
Family: Emberizidae
Genus: Pooecetes
Species: Pooecetes
gramineus

6. Common
•Blue Oak covers
Name: Californis
Blue Oak
over 3 million
Blue Oak, Iron
acres.
Oak, Mountain
•The Scottish
White
biologist David
Oak, Mountain
Douglas named the
Oak
blue oak in 1831 for
Genus: Quercus
the color of its
Species:
leaves.
douglasii
•Blue oaks
•They can survive
temperatures evolved in the
above 100 F for early Cretaceous
several weeks at a period and have
time and grow to evolved to drier
average heights of and warmer
30 feet. climates over the
•With their root last 10 million
system, they are years.
able to grow (http://bss.sfsu.e
through cracks in du)
rocks to depths of
80 feet to reach Photo by:
ground water. Kacy Clements
•They are fire

7. Yucca Plant
•Was used by Native
Americans for basket
weaving.
•Was used for medicinal
purposes and to make soap
and shampoo.
•The flowers or pods from the
plant were eaten.
•The flowers range from 5 to
13 cm long.
•Yucca with fruit flowers in
the spring, starting in April to
July. Order: Asparagales
•Tiny Yucca moths and Yucca Family: Asparagaceae
plants evolved together. Genus: Yucca L.
Since the moths are Species: Yucca
small, they can fit into the baccata
flowers and pollinate them.
The larvae of the moths eat
the Yucca seeds.

8. Foothill Pine
•The foothill pine’s
maximum height when
mature is 80
feet, produces large
pinecones, and has
yellow flowers in spring.
•The foothill pine was
once called the Digger
Pine because of the
“Digger” Indians.
•Also known as “Bull
Pine”.
•It is native and limited to Class: Pinopsida
California and is found Order: Pinales
between 0 and 4500 feet Family: Pinaceae
elevation. Genus: Pinus L.
(http://plants.usda.gov)
Species:Pinus
•The Pinus genus
evolved 100 million years sabiniana
ago in the Cretaceous
period. The individual Photo by:
species evolved in the Kacy Clements

9. Sandstone
My sample has a grainy look to it, and is a
slightly yellow and brown color. It is smooth on
•Sandstone is a clastic one side and jagged on the other, as if it had
sedimentary rock usually broken off a larger piece. It also looks like it
composed of quartz or has parallel lines running across the smooth
feldspar. The cement holding portion, as if it was layered. Many of the grains
them together is usually have different colors and seem as though they
made of calcite, clays, and are of different sediments.
silica.
•Was used by natives for
bowls and is used for
domestic construction and
house wares today.
•How it is formed: Layers of
sand accumulate from
sedimentation from water or
air and then it is compacted
by pressure, turning it into
Photo by: Kacy

10. Gneiss
My sample is fairly small and
mostly black with swirls of white. It
has cracks and is slightly coarse
with some tiny craters. Most of the Photo by: Kacy
edges seem to have been rubbed Clements
smooth, maybe from being under
water so long ago, or from a
stream that dried up not so long
ago.
•Gneiss is a widely distributed
metamorphic rock.
•They are usually medium to coarse
and have compositional banding due to
high temperatures.
•They are usually previously igneous or
sedimentary rocks.
•The parent rocks are usually
shale, granite, or volcanic rocks.
•hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu)

11. Siltstone
My sample is small with a slightly Photo by: Kacy Clements
blue and green color. It has small
craters and lines in it. The edges of
it are also smooth like they have
been worn down. The texture is
slightly coarse and bumpy and the
blue streaks have a slight shine to
them.
•Siltstone is a sedimentary rock primarily
composed of silt particles.
•It is finer than sandstone and more
coarse than claystone.
•Coarse silt forms across laminations in a
current while finer particles are usually
deposited from suspension.
(csmres.jmu.edu)

12. Fossils
I also found quite a few shells within
large clumps of sand and gravel. There
were depressions from larger shells that
Photos by: Kacy Clements
had probably fallen off and smaller shells
that were still stuck to the sand. I also
found singular small shell that looked
very old and had big clumps off hard
sedimentary rock attached to the inside
portion of the shell.

13. Fossils Continued
Photos by: Kacy
Clements

14. References
• CONDON PEAK: YUCCA:
• www.blm.gov/ca/st/en/fo/hollister/condon_pea plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=yufi
k.html biology.clc.uc.edu/courses/bio303/coevoluti
• www.picacho.org/interest/condon_peak_acces on.htm
s.html FOOTHILL PINE:
• QUAIL: http://plants.usda.gov/java/charProfile?sym
• Backyardbirdshop.com bol=PISA2
• http://bss.sfsu.edu/holzman/courses/fall00proj http://www.sierracollege.edu/ejournals/jscn
ects/quail.html hm/v2n1/fieldtrip2.html
• MULE DEER: http://ddr.nal.usda.gov/bitstream/10113/3659
• http://www.conservenature.org/learn_about_wi 0/1/IND44288309.pdf
ldlife/prairie/mule_deer.htm SANDSTONE:
• VESPER SPARROW: www.tulane.edu/~sanelson/geol212/sedrxint
• www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Vesper_Sparrow/i ro.htm
d GNEISS:
• www.birdweb.org/birdweb/bird/vesper_sparro http://hyperphysics.phy-
w astr.gsu.edu/hbase/geophys/gneiss2.html
• 10000birds.com/vesper-sparrow-pooecetes- SILTSTONE:
gramineus.htm http://csmres.jmu.edu/geollab/fichter/SedRx
• BLUE OAK: /Rocks/Silt1.html
• http://www.blueplanetbiomes.org/blue_oak.htm
• http://www.fs.fed.us/psw/publications/docume
nts/psw_gtr217/psw_gtr217_93.pdf