Isotopic Compositions of Intrusive Rocks from the Wallowa and Olds Ferry Arc Terranes of Northeastern Oregon and Western Idaho: Implications for Cordilleran Evolution, Lithospheric Structure, and Miocene Magmatism
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
4-2017
Abstract
Late Paleozoic and Mesozoic intrusive rocks from the Wallowa and Olds Ferry arc terranes of the Blue Mountains Province, Oregon-Idaho, provide constraints on the paleogeographic and tectonic setting of magmatism preserved in both arcs. Sr, Nd, and Pb isotopic data show that the Wallowa terrane represents an isotopically depleted, juvenile intra-oceanic island arc. By contrast, isotopic data for intrusive rocks of the Olds Ferry arc are more isotopically enriched, and thereby establish a clear distinction between the two arcs. This distinction strengthens paleogeographic interpretation of the Olds Ferry terrane as a fringing continental arc, and it provides a basis for correlation to other inboard Cordilleran arc terranes including Quesnellia and Stikinia. The Wallowa terrane is by contrast more similar geologically and isotopically to the outboard Insular terranes.
These isotopic data also constrain interpretations of regional lithospheric architecture. Isotopic profiles generated orthogonal to the inferred Wallowa–Olds Ferry terrane boundary and the western Idaho shear zone show abrupt increases in initial 87Sr/86Sr that mark the transitions between three geochemically distinct lithospheric columns. West-to-east spatial variability in the isotopic compositions of Neogene volcanic rocks is explained by the partial melting of these three geochemically distinct mantle reservoirs coupled to their respective crustal columns since the early Mesozoic, rather than alternative models of lithosphere-scale décollement offset during Sevier shortening. The inherited arc-related mantle of the Olds Ferry arc may also have played a primary role in the petrogenesis of distinctive Neogene low-K, high-alumina olivine tholeiites of the High Lava Plains.
Publication Information
Kurz, Gene A.; Schmitz, Mark D.; Northrup, Clyde J.; and Vallier, Tracy L.. (2017). "Isotopic Compositions of Intrusive Rocks from the Wallowa and Olds Ferry Arc Terranes of Northeastern Oregon and Western Idaho: Implications for Cordilleran Evolution, Lithospheric Structure, and Miocene Magmatism". Lithosphere, 9(2), 235-264. https://doi.org/10.1130/L550.1