Origin of Sierra Nevadan granite: evidence from small scale composite dikes

Abstract

Composite dikes at Hell Hole Meadow, in the central Sierra Nevada, contain hybrids created by small scale mixing of andesitic and rhyolitic magmas. Early rhyolitic injections had partially solidified when subsequent andesitic magmas arrived and mixed with small increments of remnant rhyolitic magma. In major element chemistry, the hybrid rocks define linear MgO-variation diagrams that closely resemble those for the Half Dome, Mt. Givens, and Eagle Peak granodiorites. The patterns suggest that mixing of mafic and felsic magmas has been important in the evolution of these plutons.

Hornblendes in three Hell Hole Meadow hybrid rocks ranging from dacite to andesite display indistinguishable crystal-chemical variation patterns. The crystals apparently developed as phenocrysts of endmember andesitic magma prior to the mixing event and retained their compositional character in the hybridization event. Plutonic hornblendes (Dodge et al. 1968; Noyes et al. 1983) display crystal-chemical patterns nearly identical to those in the dike cores making it unlikely that the plutonic hornblendes represent restite of a complex lower crust.

Hornblende chemical data from a suite of rocks collected across the width of the compositionally zoned Half Dome granodiorite (Yosemite National Park) define clusters, like their Hell Hole Meadow counterparts, that are very similar to one another despite the large range in host rock bulk composition. Sr isotopic data (Kistler et al. 1986) and linear MgO-variation patterns for the major elements (Reid et al. 1983) suggest that the Half Dome is a mixture of high-alumina basalt and rhyolitic magmas. We propose that while the bulk chemistry of hybrid granodiorites is determined by the proportions of the constituent mafic and felsic magmas, the hornblendes in the mixed rocks largely retain compositions created in the mafic component prior to mixing. Mixing may occur either by incremental addition of felsic magma into a relatively large volume of mafic magma (as at Hell Hole Meadow), or by the chilling and subsequent disaggregation of mafic pillows in a largely felsic host.