Physical Geology (2017)

Petrified wood and the Kaindy Lake earthquake

Physical Geology Final Project, Stockton University, Jeff Webber

Received 27 November 2017

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Abstract

Petrified Forest National Park has the largest concentration of petrified wood in

the world. Wood can turn to stone if not exposed to oxygen for outstandingly long

stretches of time, turning organic material into rock. The study of petrified wood helps

scientists understand the effect minerals can have on a living thing once it dies and does

not decompose.

Chalcedony(quartz) mineralization is not the only form of fossilization as

previously thought present. Similar to the trees in Petrified Forest National Park, the

spruce trees of Kaindy Lake in Kazakhstan have been dead for over a century, but are

perfectly preserved under and above water. A 7.7 magnitude earthquake caused a

mountain face to give way, trapping the trees in a valley that later formed into Lake

Kaindy.

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Introduction

The Earth and her sciences have not stopped impressing man. If someone was told that a

tree could turn to stone then they might have mistaken it for a pagan tale. Organic material

turning to precious gems seems more like an urban legend than actual science, but the purpose of

this study isn't to entice mythical lore or help one make a bounty of gems, but how an organism

the size of a tree can be preserved with impeccable detail for hundreds of millions of years. Or

how an entire mountain side could just collapse, dragging its forests with it, only to be entombed

under water to this day. Understanding the science of fossil preservation and petrification will

shed light on life as it was millions of years ago, giving us a better understanding of the history

of our planet.

Sources and information collected for the purpose of this assignment are broad but not

limited to books and general knowledge. The research is riddled with footage, documentaries,

and peer reviewed articles of these natural wonders, for the specific intention of avoiding any

skepticism.

Background

Extensive research and present evidence indicates surrounding sediment and possibly the

permeability of certain sediments surrounding the tree during lithification could have a great

influence on how much of the wood is petrified, and how much is allowed to decompose be

disappear forever. The type of evidence shown for example would be that of the badlands in

Arizona. Over 225 million years ago the stretch of land of what is now today eastern Arizona

was once a lush forest with all kinds of life. The trees left behind used to live in a fluvial
environment, where there was plenty of minerals and nutrients moving downstream. The

discovery of petrified wood has allowed paleobotanists to identify species and provided proof of

certain depositional environments. Even major events such as climatic can be noted by a single

tree trunk, no different then how we study precipitation in a forest by measuring width of rings

on a tree for certain years.

Concerning Kaindy Lake, there is nothing in particular special about the tree species

themselves. Spruce is still an existing conifer, with many varieties nowadays, but the information

we get from Kaindy Lake are analogous to Petrified Forest National Park in that they both show

types of depositional environments slowing down the decay process of long dead organisms.

Methods:

The first basic step when dealing with fossils is finding out how old they are.

Petrographic samplings of the old wood were done by cutting small sections of the tree. This is

often done with an electron microscope to get pinpoint accuracy on the microscopic level. The

mineral composition can be simply X-rayed or tested with chemicals. If there is any calcite, or

dolomite in the tree, then it would react with diluted hydrochloric acid, which narrows down the

mineral type. Although technically a tree, there is no trace of phloem or the trees cortex

remaining, a clear sign of complete fossilization.

Geological observations:

The trees in Arizona at the time; 250 million years ago, were mostly tropical coniferous

trees, which meant they did not have the rings you would get on a deciduous tree, since there are

no seasons in the rainforest. Petrified Forest National Park has an array of silica based trees,

which leads to the discovery of different types of quartz crystals. The colors seen on logs are not
from precious gems, they are still quarts but blended in with trace minerals, giving it a reddish

hue in some areas, dark yellow in others, and even blueish green. The red hue comes from an

iron and magnesium reaction, the clearer crystals have a heavier carbon content, and the bluer

colors have traces of chromium in the mix. Caches of Semi-precious stone are found however.

Jasper, and Amethyst have been found in the aptly named Jasper Forest area of the park.

The trees in Kaindy Lake have no signs of petrification, as they have been floating on

water and exposed to oxygen for the past century, but the region is not void of any geological

finds. The 7.7 magnitude earthquake that displaced the mountain face where the trees lived was

caused by the continuing collision between the Eurasian and Indian plates. The constant thrusting

on the strike-slip boundary on which the forest sat, was beginning to give way, and a severe

earthquake like the 1911 Kebin earthquake was more than enough to displace that much earth.

After the mass-wasting, rainwater filled up the valley and drowned the trees’ overtime, leaving

behind the beautiful lake we see today.

Discussion:

After all of this information, it is still hard to imagine the whole petrification process. A

possible explanation for when petrification starts is the moment silica is absorbed and

precipitated into the tree. Normally, trees have a low silica content to begin with, so it couldn't

have self-petrified after death. The silica must have come from the surrounding elements and

minerals present during its fossilization. In a fluvial jungle system, like the one Western Arizona

would have been 250 million years ago, small coarse-grained sand bits from the river could have

penetrated through the bark after being embedded. If a log falls into a river rich in minerals, the

mud and sand finds its way into the tree. Even simply covering the fallen tree in these minerals
could petrify the outer bark of the tree, it isn't always the entire log that turns to stone. Several

samples eastern Denmark have been found to have wood still inside the logs, protected by the

stone outer shell. These trees however are nowhere near as old as the ones in Petrified Forest

National Park, and samples like these are incredibly rare. The types of logs seen in Agate Forest

took hundreds of millions of years, but companies today are learning how to petrify hardwood

floors and sell them commercially. The conditions of turning wood to stone are just as important

as the time it takes, which isn't always millions of years.

A thought provoking argument could come out of this new house-building material. Is

building homes out of fossiles really a good idea? It is no surprise really, we burn fossils all of

the time, it is an integral part of how we function as a society. Entire economies are based on the

destruction of prehistoric relics. Others depend on preserving them, such as Caribbean nations

for instance, which rely heavily on tourism to keep them stable.

Everyone likes to enjoy nature every now and then, and gorgeous sites such as Petrified

Forest and Kaindy Lake are no different. But like many places around, tourism can often be

detrimental to the environment and preservation of such sights. Agate bridge for example, was a

famous sight in Petrified Forest in the early 20th century. People kept walking over the old tree

until it finally started to buckle, damaging the tree permanently. Today there is a concrete pillar

preventing its collapse. Even earlier than that, treasure hunters and souvenir keepers visited

Jasper Forest and often took large chunks off the logs and sold them for profit.

Kaindy Lake was originally supposed to be a place for scientific research and a site for

world heritage. The idea was never fully adopted, and the people of southern Kazakhstan took

advantage of this and used the lake for other recreational things. Such as racing boats in between
the trees, trees that have been delicately preserved for over a century, the leaves still clinging on

to the trunk just below the surface of the water. Jet skis that ride back and force displaces water,

dispersing and disintegrating what is left of the spruces needles.

Conclusion

To reiterate, Kaindy Lake is not like Agate and Jasper forest. The preservation of those

trees were caused by a seismic event that displaced them. Unlike the stone trees of Arizona, the

birchwood and spruce in Kaindy Lake was not buried under sediment, it survived on the top

layer of rubble and only died once rainwater filled the valley over the decades. No volcanism

was involved in preserving the trees, implying the silica used to preserve the trees must have

some from somewhere else. The most likely to be from weathered rocks, liberating the minerals

and ending up in the river. The tree would fall over, get buried, and resurface after not being

exposed to oxygen for a few thousand years. Although re-introduced to oxygen, the tree is

already going through the metamorphosis. The minerals, now trapped in the tree, become a

pseudomorph, and after mind boggling stretches of time, turn the tree to stone.

Kaindy Lake is a stark reminder of an earthquake that killed hundreds of people, but still

proves to be a useful specimen when it comes to understanding mass wasting and why slopes

fail. More importantly to this research, it teaches us how things are preserved. The lake itself

mysteriously never goes above 6 degrees, even in the summer, which slows the decay process

even when exposed to oxygen. The unconsolidated sediment at the bottom of the lake may

become a conglomerate one day, once the clasts round out and lithify with finer grained material.

Since it has only been around since the 20th century time will tell if the lake can live to see
another century, dry out and have its trees finally decompose, or turn to stone and rival the

beauty of Petrified Forest National Park. As sea levels continue to rise and glacial deposits

change, we are expected to see many more Kaindy lakes. They will be much larger and deeper,

hopefully preserving more trees for posterity and the future geologists 250 million years from

today.

References

Mustoe, George. “Late Tertiary Petrified Wood from Nevada, USA: Evidence of

Multiple Silicification Pathways.” ​MDPI,​ Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute, 14 Oct.

2015, [Link]/2076-3263/5/4/286/htm.

Viney, Mike. “Dating Petrified Wood.” ​The Virtual Petrified Wood Museum,​ The Virtual

Petrified Wood Museum , 5 June 2008, [Link]/.

Arnold, 1941,​C.A. Arnold The petrifaction of wood ​Mineralogist, IX (9) (1941), pp. 323-355

Barghoorn, 1960 E.S. Barghoorn Petrifaction Encyclopedia of Science and Technology,

Vol. 10, McGraw-Hill, New York (1960), p. 49

Krauskopf, 1959 K.B. Krauskopf The geochemistry of silica in sedimentary

environments A. Ireland (Ed.), Silica in Sediments. A symposium with discussions, Soc. Econ.

Paleontol. Mineral. Spec. Publ., 7 (1959), pp. 4-19

Buurman, 1972 P. Buurman Mineralization of fossil wood Scripta Geol., 12 (1972), pp.

1-43
 Buurman et al., 1973 P. Buurman, N. van Breemen, S. Henstra Recent silicification of

plant remains in acid sulphate soils Neues Jahrb. Mineral., Monatsh., 3 (1973), pp. 117-124