Learn from Western Colorado University research professor and geomorphologist, Amy Ellwin, as she speaks her book, Geology Underfoot on Colorado's Western Slope. The book is about the active and sometimes enigmatic landscape west of the Continental Divide, and even features the geology of four giants of the national park system: Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado National Monument, Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, and Dinosaur National Monument. Fossil collectors, rockhounds, hot potters, and coal miners alike need this guide book!
The tenth book in the Geology Underfoot Series, Geology Underfoot on Colorado's Western Slope offers an inside view of the active and sometimes enigmatic landscape west of the Continental Divide. In this arid region where water drains through deep canyons en route to the Pacific, the crumpled rocks of the Colorado Rockies meet the famous red rocks of the Colorado Plateau to the west and the crazy pile of San Juan volcanics in the southwest. Nothing is simple here, with rich metal ores filling caldera fractures, coal seams metamorphosed by nearby granite, and rivers shifting course with each new uplift or eruption of lava. Join a team of geologists as they use clear prose, concise illustrations, and dramatic full-color photographs to tell the stories of 26 geologic sites. Included in the well-chosen sites are four giants of the national park system: Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado National Monument, Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, and Dinosaur National Monument.
Amy Ellwein, a geomorphologist, works primarily on the Colorado Plateau. Her first and favorite geology project in Colorado was in the Elk Range with her late husband, Tim Wawrzyniec. A geologist, science educator, and entrepreneur, she has been a university professor, worked with the USGS as well as environmental and archeological consulting firms, founded and ran a lidar services company as well as a teacher professional development group, and served the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory as Director of Science Communications. Currently, she runs Paradox Geologic and is a Research Professor at Western Colorado University. Amy has lived with her Malamute, Bella, in Crested Butte since 2010.
