Discovering the Tufa at Mono Lake

Hi Blog!

If you read our prior blog post, you'll know we spent the morning hiking around an extinct volcano. Well, the adventure didn't end there. After finishing our hike we drove over to have lunch at the South Tufa parking area on Mono Lake. We stopped here so we could get an up-close look at the famous Tufa Towers of Mono Lake. Here is a good example:

Turns out we were just in time to join a tour of the tufa (pronounced TOO-fa) by none other than Bartshe Miller, the Education Director for the Mono Lake Committee. Bartshee normally doesn't do public tours, but since it was Mother's Day, he volunteers so the other staff could take the day off. As a former Park Ranger, he was full of lots of interesting facts and figures about the lake.

Mono Lake covers 60 square miles - 13 miles east-west by 8 miles north-south. It is an ancient lake, over 700,000 years old. Mono Lake is two-and-a-half times as salty as seawater. You would think nothing could live in such an environment, but the water is teeming with life - brine shrimp and alkali fly larvae! This attracts millions of birds as they pass through on their migratory flights. Dave is posing in front of some tufa towers, while standing on a tufa sidewalk.

One of the first things we learned was how the tufa towers are formed. Underneath the lake, underwater springs pump calcium-saturated water through the lake bed. When the spring water meets the alkaline lake water, calcium and carbonate salts instantly react to form insoluble calcium carbonate (limestone), which precipitates out, settling in mineral deposits around the spring.  If the lake is deep enough, these deposits continue to grow upward like stalactites, creating the tufa towers.

As we hiked along the lake shore, Bartshe had us perform a little science experiment. We took spring water, added some calcium and mixed it with lake water and made our own tufa. We also collected some brine shrimp. Here Kathy is watching the little shrimpies swim around in the frisbee (also known as a brine shrimp hot tub). At this time of year, the shrimp are too small to show up in the photo.

One interesting fact:  tufa towers can only form underwater. It is the interaction of the spring water with the lake water that makes the limestone. The reason we can see all these towers is that the lake level has fallen. You see, the City of Los Angeles has been taking the water coming down from the Eastern Sierras and diverting it into a big aqueduct to provide water to LA. As the lake slowly shrunk after 1941 when L.A. started diverting the water, more and more towers began to appear.

As the lake shrunk, the water became even more salty. An environmental catastrophe was in the making. Lawsuits were filed and years of litigation ensued before the parties came to an agreement. The City of Los Angeles agreed to cut back the amount of water it takes allowing water to once again flow back to Mono Lake. It is too soon to tell whether or not new towers will form.

After we finished up the tour, we spent some time just wandering around the various towers. This one seems to be pointing to the Eastern Sierras. Kathy decided to join in the pointing.

Looking at tufas is a lot like looking at clouds. You start to see familiar shapes. What do you think? Since this is Mother's Day, I'm thinking Momma camel and baby camel.

We just loved the way the lake changed color.

The spring water tends to seep in along a fault line, so most of the towers grow in a line along the fault.

Tufa Towers tend to grow straight up, since the spring water is lighter than the salty water of the lake. However, the path of the water can be blocked causing it to escape sideways.

As the tower grows and reaches the surface of the lake, a new spring erupts and so on and so on until there is a whole column of towers.

We really enjoyed walking around the unusual formations. On the way back to the Jeep, we were followed by a very curious Jack Rabbit.

We decided to take the scenic forest road back to Lee Vining. At one point, the road crossed Rush Creek. The source of Rush Creek lies high on Mount Lyell, and its upper forks descend from Marie Lakes and from Davis Lakes on Mount Davis, then combine to flow through Waugh Lake, Gem Lake, Agnew Lake, Silver Lake, and Grant Lake on its way to Mono Lake. It was definitely running full and fast as we passed.

We are not sure what adventures await us tomorrow. The weatherman said to expect some snow tonight around 11:00 a.m. We may wake up to a winter wonderland. Stay tuned!