Paleomagnetic and rock magnetic evidence for a secondary yet early magnetization in large sandstone pipes and host Late Middle Jurassic (Callovian) Summerville Formation and Bluff Sandstone near Mesita, west central New Mexico

Abstract

Processes responsible for the acquisition of ancient yet secondary magnetizations are important facets of the geologic history of rocks and, when the age of such magnetizations can be estimated with confidence, provide useful information on the ancient geomagnetic field. In west central New Mexico near Mesita, on the Colorado Plateau, hematitic sandstone and siltstone beds of the Middle Jurassic (Callovian) Summerville Formation and overlying Bluff Sandstone are host to numerous large (up to 100 m2 in map area) pipe‐like sandstone bodies. The pipes are as strongly cemented by hematite (colors range from 10R 6/6 to 10R 3/4) as the host strata; paleomagnetic data from them and their host strata are interpreted to indicate that these rocks have been remagnetized, probably in association with sandstone pipe formation. Reverse polarity magnetizations isolated in both alternating field and thermal demagnetization from pipes are well grouped and are similar to, and not statistically distinct from, those in adjacent host strata. The grand‐mean direction for 16 sites (7 sites in sandstone pipes and 9 in host strata), corrected for slight (5°) west‐northwest tilt of the strata, is D = 163.0°, I = −44.3° (α95 = 2.7°, k = 169). This direction yields a pole position of 72.8°N, 135.7°E (dp = 2.1°, dm = 3.4°). Assuming a modest (i.e., ∼5°) clockwise rotation of the Colorado Plateau, the pole lies at 68.7°N, 143.8°E. Median destructive fields for the remanence in pipes and host strata are typically 40–50 mT; over 90% of the remanence is “unblocked” or removed during changes in the magnetic mineralogy by temperatures of ∼400–450°C. Isothermal remanent magnetization (IRM) acquisition data, and thermal demagnetization of “saturation” IRM, however, demonstrate that the dominant magnetic phase is of high coercivity and relatively high (above 600°C) laboratory unblocking temperatures in both sandstone pipes and host strata, yet it does not appear to contribute significantly to the characteristic remanent magnetization. The similarity in demagnetization properties between pipes and adjacent host strata, the absence of a well‐defined high unblocking temperature remanence that is more typical of hematite‐cemented detrital strata, and the essentially uniform reverse polarity of the remanence are all interpreted to indicate that pipes and host strata contain secondary, yet early acquired magnetizations and that magnetization acquisition continued after pipe injection. We propose that acquisition of the secondary magnetization took place in the presence of alkaline, high pH brines formed by the dissolution of the underlying gypsum‐dominated Lower Jurassic Todilto Formation strata and therefore the remanence is early in age. On the basis of a comparison with Summerville and Morrison (Middle and Late Jurassic) paleomagnetic poles from rocks on the Colorado Plateau, we interpret the secondary remanence in Summerville strata and sandstone pipes near Laguna to be latest Middle to Late Jurassic in age. If realistic, this interpretation further emphasizes the importance of fluid‐rock interaction in the acquisition of secondary magnetizations.