Erosion in the Mecca Hills: using GIS to investigate potential erosion factors along the southern San Andreas Fault.

Abstract:

The Mecca Hills (MH) occur in a region of transpression along the southern San Andreas Fault. These geomorphic features are a result of the interplay between uplift and erosion. The MH are mostly covered by uniform sedimentary rocks with > 70% the Pliocene-Pleistocene Palm Spring Formation, > 20% Quaternary sediments and a minor amount of crystalline rock suggesting similar denudation rate over the region. However, Gray et al. (Quat. Sci. Rev. 2014) found a wide range of denudation rates (20 to 150 m/My) by using ¹⁰Be concentrations in active-channel alluvial sediment. We investigate potential causes of erosion to understand the variation of the denudation rate and examine the maturity of watersheds in the MH. We use ArcGIS to find the best geomorphic proxy for the published erosion rates by considering elevation, lithology, mean slope and active faults by using the index value method proposed by Gray et al. We apply the best geomorphic proxy to the overall MH to predict the spatial variation of erosion rate over the region. We use hypsometric integral (HI) and basin elongation ratio (BER) to study the maturity of the overall MH watersheds. We found that active faults are the main factor influencing erosion in the MH. Drainage basins located closer to active faults have higher erosion rates than others. Most watersheds are in a mature stage of the erosion cycle. Overall, the watersheds in the central MH are in a more youthful stage of the erosion cycle than the ones to the north and south. BER values suggest that the watersheds in the central MH formed earlier and have more time to develop their stream networks. Although watersheds in the central MH formed earlier than the others, their stage of erosion cycle is more youthful due to the proximity of active faults enhancing local erosion rates.