Las Cruces Country II

About this guidebook

It has been 23 years since the New Mexico Geological Society last visited the Las Cruces area (Guidebook 26). Greg Mack and his field conference committee have put together an interesting and diversified meeting including Paleozoic basin evolution, Cenozoic history of southern New Mexico, and economic geology of the area. The first day follows a route from Las Cruces to Truth or Consequences along I-25. The goal of the first day is to examine parts of the Paleozoic and Mesozoic sedimentary sections. The morning stop at Derry Hills is to examine the Magdalena Group and Permian Abo formation. In the afternoon we visit Mescal Canyon, east of Truth and Consequences to examine upper Cretaceous siliciclastic sedimentary rocks. The second day is dedicated to the Cenozoic history of southern New Mexico exposed in Selden Canyon, Broad Canyon and near Rincon. The third day focuses on economic geology with visits to see features associated with a recently discovered geothermal field, and a quarry where barite and manganese were mined on a small scale.