Petrified trees-the gems: a magical creation time

Millions of years ago Eastern Arizona looked quite different: in place of deserts towering pine forests, green relict Ginkgo and cycads, similar to the thick trees.

But gone era. No more of the supercontinent Pangaea, about dinosaurs and the ice ages we are judged only by their footsteps. Something was left over from ancient American forests. And these creations of time is just amazing!

About 220 million years ago in Arizona there were many rivers and lakes feeding the local vegetation. The water contained various metals and minerals. Magnesium, chromium, silica and other elements from falling on the earth's surface by eruptions of a chain of volcanoes, which were located West of the modern Park the Petrified forest.

When the trees fell under the onslaught of storms or insects, then rolled into the river and settled on the bottom. Trunks, which were under a layer of soil not subjected to rotting process. Thousands of years they lay at the depth, passing through their fiber and pore water with dissolved minerals. As a result, these minerals accumulated in the wood and replaced her organic matter that is gradually being destroyed.

The intercellular space of trunks, branches and leaves filled with crystals of quartz and its varieties: amethyst, opals, citrines and chalcedonies. Among the fossils there are even conifers and spores of ferns.

Treasures of prehistoric forests appeared on the surface due to uplift of the Colorado plateau about 60 million years ago. The first petrified wood remains were found tribes of Indians, and in the 1870s they have learned in Europe and was used for making decorative accessories.

Translated by «Yandex.Translator»