Capping volcanic rocks: West central Nevada

Abstract

Cenozoic capping volcanic rocks in the Nevada portion of the Basin and Range Province of the western United States belong to the high alumina calcalkaline igneous series. Varying proportions of plagioclase (An=85 to 45 percent), pyroxene (augite, pigeonite, and hypersthene), olivine, magnetite, biotite, and oxyhornblende indicate a modal range from olivine basalt to andesite.

Major element analyses made on randomly collected samples, as well as on samples from systematically measured stratigraphic sections in localities of minimum erosion show ranges in Al₂O₃ (from 17.5 to 22.5 percent); SiO₂ (from 44.0 to 54.0 percent); MgO (from 3.47 to 8.20 percent) and CaO (from 7.19 to 11.90 percent). Na₂O/K₂O is always greater than 1.0. Ba⁺⁺ and Sr⁺⁺ abundances for some of the rocks are in agreement with those suggested, by workers in the field, for average basalt and andesite derived by melting of mantle or lower crust, but for many of the samples the values found are considerably higher.

Although the presence of biotite in the earlier flows and oxyhornblende in the later ones along with the presence of much magnetite in all the rocks examined suggests that in part these rocks were derived by crystallization of a melt under conditions of high partial pressure of oxygen, the available trace element data indicates that contamination of the magma with crustal material was also a factor in their developmental history. The case for a parent magma, subsequently fractionally crystallized and contaminated in part, is strengthened by the occurrence of crystal cumulates and highly altered xenoliths in some of the flows.