BLACK  SAND  BASIN  (UPPER  GEYSER  BASIN,  YELLOWSTONE  HOTSPOT)  HYDROTHERMAL  FEATURES

 

Cliff Geyser (above & below), Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in Aguust 2011 (looking ~NW).

A small cliff of geyserite (siliceous sinter), separates this feature from adjacent Iron Spring Creek.  Cliff Geyser erupts frequently with water reaching up to 40 feet high.  This feature alternates between having an empty geyserite basin (above & below) to having a water-filled basin (third photo below) to having eruptions (fourth and fifth photos below).

Below: iron-oxide stained, tuberculose geyserite lining crater of Cliff Geyser.

 

Cliff Geyser (looking ~NE) having an empty crater.

 

Cliff Geyser (looking ~NW) having a water-filled crater.

 

Cliff Geyser (above & below) having eruptions (looking ~NNW).

 


 

Jagged Spring (left) & Ragged Spring (right), Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011 (looking ~SW).

Both hot springs have frequent to ~continual splashing and also have short to moderately high eruptions.

 

Jagged Spring (above & below), Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011 (looking ~W).

Jagged Spring first appeared in the 1930s and has splashing to moderately high eruptions.  The crater has an irregular to scalloped margin consisting of somewhat overhanging, layered to nodular geyserite.

 

Ragged Spring (above & below), Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011 (looking ~SW).

 

Ragged Spring - partially iron oxide-stained, tuberculose geyserite masses on the southwestern side of Ragged Spring’s crater.

 


 

Spouter Geyser (above & below), Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011 (looking ~WNW).

Formerly a perpetual spouter, Spouter Geyser has fairly frequent splashing eruptions up to 8 feet high.  The vent is surrounded by nice whitish-gray geyserite (siliceous sinter).

 

 


 

Opalescent Pool, Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011 (looking ~NNW).  This feature has variously been a boiling hot spring, a dry pool, and an overflowing pool.  Significant capture of runoff water from Spouter Geyser (see above) started in the early 1950s.  The conifer tree skeletons surrounding Opalescent Pool have been partially permineralized with geyserite (siliceous sinter) - see the whitish-colored bases of the trees.

 


 

Green Spring, Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011 (looking ~S).  This feature is usually an ordinary hot spring, but heavy overflow episodes and rare eruptions have been reported.

 


 

Iron Spring Creek (a.k.a. Iron Creek), Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011 (looking ~S).

Iron Spring Creek runs through the heart of Black Sand Basin.  In many places, it is surrounded by geyserite and hot spring/geyser runoff channels, many of which have orangish-brown extremophile bacterial mats.

 


 

Cinnamon Spouter, Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011.  This relatively young feature is essentially a perpetual spouter.  It first appeared as a geyser in the late 1980s, but first manifested as a hot, leaky fracture in the 1930s.

Above: looking ~W.  Below: looking ~NW.

 

Cinnamon Spouter - runoff channel with yellowish & orangish-brown extremophile bacterial mats along the margins.

 


 

Rainbow Pool, Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011 (looking ~ESE).  This large, colorful, slightly overflowing hot spring rarely has eruptions.  Some geyser eruptions here reached over 100 feet high.

 


 

Sunset Lake, Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011 (looking ~N).  Steam frequently obscures much of this beautiful, large, overflowing hot spring.  Geyser eruptions do occur, sometimes up to 35 feet high.

 


 

White Sand Spring (above & below), Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011 (looking ~SE).  This feature has occasional small geyser eruptions.

 


 

Emerald Pool (above & below), Black Sand Basin, southwestern Upper Geyser Basin, Yellowstone Hotspot, northwestern Wyoming, USA in August 2011.

This moderately large hot spring does not have geyser eruptions.  The deep green coloration is the result of a deep blue-colored center combined with the color of yellowish bacterial mats on the floor of the crater.

Mindless twits have tossed objects into Emerald Pool for many decades (just like Morning Glory Pool), resulting in partial blocking of the vent and slight cooling of the hot spring.  This has altered the colors of the pool.

 

 


 

Info. mostly synthesized from:

 

Bryan, T.S.  2008.  The Geysers of Yellowstone, Fourth Edition.  Boulder, Colorado.  University Press of Colorado.  462 pp.

 

Schreier, C.  1987.  A Field Guide to Yellowstone’s Geysers, Hot Springs and Fumaroles.  Moose, Wyoming.  Homestead Publishing.  96 pp.

 


 

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