Yellowstone Geology

Climbing Granite Peak is a geologist’s dream! 12,807 ft Granite Peak is just northeast of Yellowstone Park and is the tallest peak in Montana AND the tallest peak in the Beartooth uplift.

This video documents a successful climb to the summit via the Mystic Lake to Huckleberry Creek route, up Granite Glacier to the east ridge and a route-finding puzzle up the south face to the summit.

In the film I explore the deep and dramatic geology of the Beartooth uplift.

Ken Pierce was a modern-day James Hutton when it comes to the geology of Yellowstone. In this video series you will learn about cutting edge Yellowstone geology from one of the premiere Yellowstone geologists of the last century. He was one of a handful of researchers in the mid-twentieth century who mapped the geology of the park and surrounding geo-ecosystem. His first assignment for the United States Geological Survey fresh from graduate school was to map the glaciation of northern Yellowstone park. Later he tackled big questions like understanding the track of the Yellowstone hotspot working with Lisa Morgan. He worked with paleoclimatologist Kathy Whitlock to understand the climate history of Yellowstone. He worked with archaeologists like Ken Cannon to date inflation and deflation of the Yellowstone caldera as it relates to human occupation on the Yellowstone plateau.

1) A Window Into the Earth (Released July, 2025)
An introduction to Ken Pierce, the USGS geologist who mapped the glaciation of Yellowstone in the 1960s, and then became a prolific Yellowstone geologist for over 50 years. Also, a review of the dramatic discoveries leading to the theory of plate tectonics and ultimately to the understanding of the Yellowstone hotspot.

Ken Pierce was a modern-day James Hutton when it comes to the geology of Yellowstone. In this video series you will learn about cutting edge Yellowstone geology from one of the premiere Yellowstone geologists of the last century. He was one of a handful of researchers in the mid-twentieth century who mapped the geology of the park and surrounding geo-ecosystem. His first assignment for the United States Geological Survey fresh from graduate school was to map the glaciation of northern Yellowstone park. Later he tackled big questions like understanding the track of the Yellowstone hotspot working with Lisa Morgan. He worked with paleoclimatologist Kathy Whitlock to understand the climate history of Yellowstone. He worked with archaeologists like Ken Cannon to date inflation and deflation of the Yellowstone caldera as it relates to human occupation on the Yellowstone plateau.

2) Ice Age Yellowstone (Released July, 2025)
Ken’s first assignment as a new geologist with the USGS was to map the glacial deposits in northern Yellowstone park. This episode describes the history of glaciation of Yellowstone over 150,000 years at the end of the Pleistocene. And, Ken describes the features of the landscape that tell the geologic story of Ice Age Yellowstone.

In July of 1967 in far eastern Lindsay Montana, dryland farmer Joe Walker was running his combine along a Dawson County road when he spied some white, chalky material weathering out of the borrow pit. Upon closer examination, he was stunned by its size and thought that it looked like pieces of a fossilized elephant tusk.

News of the find made its way to Montana State University in Bozeman, and young PhD candidate Les Davis was hired to direct the Lindsay Mammoth recovery project. Over 30 hot days in July and August, Davis and six students painstakingly uncovered the massive mammoth grave.

This was a museum video that we created for the Columbia Gorge Discovery Center and the Wasco County Historical Museum in the mid-90s. It’s a short documentary describing the Milankovich Cycle and the potential effects on the Pleistocene glaciation.

In 1994, a team from the Center for Great Lakes Studies was contracted to explore the thermal features on the bottom of Yellowstone Lake. Using a remote Operated Vehicle (ROV), they discovered never-before-seen thermal features in Yellowstone Lake including a thermal tube garden made of glass and underwater geysers.

This video explores the earliest life on earth and how it evolved from micro-organisms to us. From four billion year old microbial mats or stromatolites to life on earth today, the scientific mystery continues to unfold. Astrobiologists study thermofiles or hot water microorganisms that acquire their energy from chemicals through chemosynthesis rather than photosynthesis. The thermal features of Yellowstone can be considered an analog for the environment of early earth or perhaps a far away planet. This is a great introductory video describing the earliest life forms on earth.

This video describes the discovery of the Egg Mountain dinosaur excavation site in north-central Montana by Jack Horner. It is descriptive of the “duck-billed” Maiasaur dinosaur which, it is thought, cared for her young as birds do today.

Dinosaur Hunters describes the excitement of being a “dinosaur hunter” like Museum of the Rockies Curator Jack Horner. Much of the video was shot at the famous Egg Mountain site where the Maiasaur “duck-billed” dinosaur was first excavated.

Butte, Montana – A Mile High and a Mile Deep… This was the legacy of the infamous robber barons who built America on copper. Butte has a rich history of life, death, culture and money… Known as the richest hill on earth, the Butte area has a fascinating geology described by Butte School of Mines geologist Dick Berg. The video tells of the harsh working conditions, and the melting pot of cultures coexisting to create one of the richest cities in America in the nineteenth century. This video was originally designed for display at the Butte Mineral Museum.

Skiing Blaze Mountain near Bozeman Montana is documentary that follows an expedition of skiers into the Lee Metcalf Wilderness of Montana to ski a summer snow field in the Spanisk Peaks. The geology of the area is described as the skiers trek to the summit for the exciting descent.