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Geology

Utah State University

Montana

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Structural And Kinematic Evolution Of Eocene-Oligocene Grasshopper Extensional Basin, Southwest Montana, Julie C. Kickham May 2002

Structural And Kinematic Evolution Of Eocene-Oligocene Grasshopper Extensional Basin, Southwest Montana, Julie C. Kickham

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The Grasshopper basin of southwest Montana is a complex east-dipping graben containing five unconformity-bounded sequences of Tertiary sedimentary rocks. The Eocene-Oligocene basin lies within the northern Rocky Mountain Basin and Range province. Geologic mapping in five and a half 7.5 minute quadrangles indicates that at least three distinct phases of extension characterize the Cenozoic tectonic evolution of Grasshopper basin from approximately 46 Ma to < Ma.

The significant phases of extension in Grasshopper basin were phases 1 and 3. During the first phase of extension (46-27 Ma) the nonplanar Muddy-Grasshopper fault was initiated and 90% of the basin fill was deposited. At …