40Ar/39Ar Ages from Coherent, High-Pressure Metamorphic Rocks of the Franciscan Complex, California: Revisiting the Timing of Metamorphism of the World's Type Subduction Complex

Abstract

In the Franciscan subduction complex of California, high-pressure metamorphic rocks have generally been divided into two groups, "high-grade blocks" and "coherent metamorphic rocks." High-grade blocks, typically discrete blocks centimeters to tens of meters in diameter, exhibit coarse metamorphic minerals and relatively high metamorphic grade, including blueschist, eclogite, and amphibolite assemblages, and are typically found encased within mélange matrix of distinctly lower grade. Coherent metamorphic rocks are generally of epidote blueschist and lower grade and consist of large, more or less intact thrust sheets of metasedimentary and metavolcanic rocks. Considerable age dating work has been completed on the high-grade blocks, but dating the metamorphism of the coherent units has proven very difficult because of the very fine grain size of their metamorphic minerals, which has precluded the preparation of pure mineral separates for isotopic analysis. In this paper, we report new white mica and amphibole 40Ar/39Ar step heating ages from mineral separates from several coherent units. These new ages include: (1) white mica ages of 120.5 Ma from the South Fork Mountain Schist; (2) white mica ages of approximately 132 Ma from the Skaggs Springs schist; (3) a white mica age of approximately 154 Ma from the coherent schists of Ward Creek; and (4) white mica ages of 146.5 Ma (eclogite) and 134 Ma (epidote blueschist) from the Willow Spring slab, a newly recognized 2.1 by 1.2 km (map view) coherent metabasite slab in the Panoche Pass area comprising rocks ranging from lawsonite blueschist to eclogite. We also obtained hornblende ages of about 156 and 159 Ma, respectively, from high-grade amphibolite blocks from McLaren Park and the Hunters Point Shear Zone in San Francisco. A review of the new and previous ages indicates that the ages of the high-grade blocks and the coherent metamorphic rocks partially overlap, strongly suggesting they formed in the same subduction zone. Moreover, our field mapping near Panoche Pass has identified several fault-bounded sheets of coarse-grained, coherent metamorphic rocks similar to the Willow Spring slab that display mineralogy identical to that of many highgrade blocks. Unlike many of the world's subduction-related metamorphic terranes, the Franciscan exhibits evidence for high-pressure metamorphism that spanned at least 80 m.y. in time, the product of subduction, accretion, and metamorphism of different packets of rock at different times. Although the Franciscan may be an exception among subduction complexes, attempts to define a single age of metamorphism in other high-pressure or ultrahigh-pressure terranes may need reconsideration.