Why Is There Evidence Of Sea Life High Up In The Tetons?

One truth about planet Earth, and the rest of the Universe, is that nothing stays the same. Everything is in constant motion and change.

Turn the clock back and you'll not only have trouble recognizing the geogrophy, but the climate itself will be a mystery.

Nothing stays the same.

The Teton Range in Wyoming contains some of the oldest rocks in North America.

Those rocks were formed when Wyoming was a seafloor of sediment and volcanic debris that was buried up to 18 miles deep.

Unimaginable heat and pressure at great depths metamorphised those sediments.

All the while molten magma was squeezing into cracks around 2.5 billion years ago, which cooled and crystallized to igneous granite.

Somewhere around 775 million years ago, the region stretched and cracked, forming a series of vertical uplifts.

Basaltic magma began to flow in between.

Sediment began to cover parts of it. That happened when global sea levels rose, depositing beach sands with limestones and mudstone in shallow seas.

It was all still underwater, at that time, but rising.

Today we can see the evidence of that as high up in the Tetons there are seafloor rocks and a variety of fossils, including trilobites, stromatolites, corals, and shells.

Many of these formations contain the fossil remains of marine organisms. The presence of these fossils indicate that where the Teton Range now stands was once the floor of an ancient sea inhabited by algae, coral, brachiopods (clam-like shells), and trilobites. (Teton Park Website).

When they finally arrived on the surface the Tetons went through many eons of climate change, including times of glaciers and a period when Wyoming was tropical and swampy.

The Tetons today are tall and sharp. That means they are young. They are one of the youngest mountain ranges in North America.

Today's Teton fault is still active and pushing up.

Over a longer period, those sharp peaks will wear down to rolling hills, like the Black Hills and Bighorns have done, or even the Blue Ridge Mountains of the East.

Nothing stays the same.