Not much. Li and Ji (2020) investigated the orthogonal joints in the Potsdam sandstone at Ausable Chasm (New York State) and Beauharnois (Quebec) and Professor Antun Husinec (2020 a, b) at St. Lawrence University has published two Youtube videos on the Potsdam sandstone. Below I have provided links to that recent paper and to the two Youtube videos on the Potsdam sandstone published in 2020 by Antun Husinec. While the outcrops in the videos are referenced and figured in numerous field trip guides (e.g., Husinec and Donaldson, 2014; Lowe, 2014; Selleck, Arnott, and Sanford, 2010) and peer reviewed articles, the videos are impressive.
Both videos were filmed for the Sedimentology Virtual Lab, St. Lawrence University during the COVID-19 pandemic, by Antun Husinec, Professor of Geology, St. Lawrence University, New York State. The first video, entitled ‘"Potsdam Sandstone" shows four outcrops: the first outcrop is a mile and half from Alexandria Bay with great shots of a nonconformity; the second outcrop [7:30] is at Goose Bay a mile and half northeast of previous outcrop; the third outcrop [9:38] is at Schermerhorn landing and shows an unconformity within the Potsdam; the fourth outcrop [11:19] is at Chippewa Bay with U shaped burrows, disconformably overlain by theTheresa formation. The second video entitled “Potsdam Sandstone Eolian Deposits" has great shots of eolian dunes in the sandstone.
Interestingly, Professor George Dix of Carleton University’s Earth Sciences Department has also prepared a series of Virtual Sedimentary Geology Field Trips [see: https://newsroom.carleton.ca/story/virtual-sedimentary-geology-field-trips/ ]. The only one that I can find on the web is a short [2:56 ; 7 Oct 2020] video on the Theresa Formation. In that video he mentions that there is one on the Keeseville, but I cannot locate it.
Li and Ji (2020) observed that at both sites the orthogonal joints in the Potsdam sandstone “are organized essentially in grid-lock pattern, rather than ladder-pattern . Mutual abutting/cutting relationships (e.g. both sets of joints abut each other) indicate that the orthogonal joints are geologically coeval extension fractures. Each set of orthogonal joints displays a uniform strike, and is straight and continuous over several meters. ... Furthermore, these joints are opening-mode fractures and display no detectable shear displacement along them. No joints contain detectable mineral fill indicating that brittle fracturing occurred at shallow depths where temperature was so low that the solubility of quartz or calcite was too low to form veins along the joints...” [citations omitted]. They concluded that the “sandstone beds stretched in the direction not only parallel but also perpendicular to the maximum tensile stress (s3) direction in the flat-lying layers, forming closely-spaced fracture set J1 and widely-spaced fracture set J2. ... [and that the vertical orthogonal joints resulted] “from the auxetic effects of quartz-rich sandstone in the absence of local or regional stress rotation.”
Below I've listed papers from 2016 to 2019 that I've mentioned in footnotes to earlier blog posts.
Christopher Brett
Ottawa, Ontario
References and Suggested Reading
Brink R., Mehrtens C., Maguire H., 2019
Sedimentology and petrography of a lower Cambrian transgressive sequence: Altona Formation (Potsdam Group) in northeastern New York. Bulletin of Geosciences, 94, 369-388
http://www.geology.cz/bulletin/contents/art1728
Dashtgard, S. E., Vaucher, R., Yang, B., & Dalrymple, R. W. , 2021
Hutchison Medallist 1. Wave-Dominated to Tide-Dominated Coastal Systems: A Unifying Model for Tidal Shorefaces and Refinement of the Coastal- Environments Classification Scheme. Geoscience Canada, 48(1), 5–22. https://doi.org/10.12789/geocanj.2021.48.171
[Free download]
Dix, George, 2020
Theresa Formation (Marine Shoreface). A YouTube video [2:56 minutes ; 7 Oct 2020]
https://youtu.be/EJz12HnOEg0
Engelder, J. T. And Sbar, Marc L., 1976
Evidence for uniform strain orientation in the potsdam sandstone, Northern New York, from in situ measurements. Journal of Geophysical Research , vol 81, No. 17, 3013-3017
Husinec, Antun, 2020a
"Potsdam Sandstone" on YouTube
https://youtu.be/LhvHYVSsG6I Time: 13:37 minutes. 22 Aug 2020
This video was filmed for the Sedimentology Virtual Lab, St. Lawrence University during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Husinec, Antun, 2020b
“Potsdam Sandstone Eolian Deposits" on YouTube
https://youtu.be/fN7hOY9l7y4 Time: 7:47 minutes. Sept 4, 2020
This video was filmed as a part of the Sedimentology Virtual Lab series during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Husinec, Antun and J. Allan Donaldson, 2014
Lower Paleozoic Sedimentary Succession of the St. Lawrence River Valley, New York and Ontario, in : Geology of the Northwestern Adirondacks and St. Lawrence River Valley (pp.1-28) 86th NEGSA Annual Meeting Field Guidebook, Chapter: A-1. Publisher: New York State Geological Association
Landing, E., Salad Hersi, O., Amati, L., Westrop, S.R., Franzi, D.A., 2019
Early Paleozoic rifting and reactivation of a passive-margin rift: Insights from detrital zircon provenance signatures of the Potsdam Group, Ottawa graben: Comment. GSA Bulletin; March/April 2019; v. 131; no. 3/4; p. 695–698; https://doi.org/10.1130/B35104.1; published online 25 January 2019.
Li L. And, Ji S., 2020
A new interpretation for formation of
orthogonal joints in quartz sandstone. Journal of Rock Mechanics and
Geotechnical Engineering
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jrmge.2020.08.003
“an
anatomic investigation on the orthogonal joints in the Potsdam
sandstone of Cambrian age at Ausable Chasm (New York State, USA) and
Beauharnois (Quebec, Canada.”
Lowe, David G., 2014.
Stratigraphy and Terrestrial to Shallow Marine Environments of the Potsdam Group in the Southwestern Ottawa Embayment. In Geology of the Northwestern Adirondacks and St. Lawrence River Valley, New York State Geological Association 86th annual meeting guidebook, pp. 183–203
Lowe, David G., 2016
Lower Ordovician Potsdam Group in the Ottawa Embayment and Provenance of the Cambrian – Lower. Ordovician Potsdam Group in the Ottawa. Embayment and Quebec Basin. David G. Lowe. Doctoral Thesis submitted to the University of Ottawa
http://hdl.handle.net/10393/35303
http://dx.doi.org/10.20381/ruor-261
Lowe, David G, and R.W.C. Arnott, 2016
Composition and Architecture of Braided and Sheetflood-Dominated Ephemeral Fluvial Strata In the Cambrian–Ordovician Potsdam Group: A Case Example of the Morphodynamics of Early Phanerozoic Fluvial Systems and Climate Change. Journal of Sedimentary Research, v. 86, i. 6, p. 587-612, Published in June 2016, doi:10.2110/jsr.2016.39
Lowe, D.G., Arnott, R.W.C., Chiarenzelli, J.R., and Rainbird, R.H., 2018,
Early Paleozoic rifting and reactivation of a passive-margin rift: Insights from detrital zircon provenance signatures of the Potsdam Group, Ottawa graben: Geological Society of America Bulletin, v. 130, no. 7/8, p. 1377–1396, https:// doi .org /10.1130 /B31749 .1 .
Lowe, D.G., Arnott, R.W.C., Chiarenzelli, J.R., and Rainbird, R.H., 2019,
Early Paleozoic rifting and reactivation of a passive-margin rift: Insights from detrital zircon provenance signatures of the Potsdam Group, Ottawa graben: Reply. Geological Society of America Bulletin, March/April 2019, v. 131, no. 3/4, pages 699-703; published online January 25, 2019. https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/gsa/gsabulletin/article/131/3-4/699/568492/Early-Paleozoic-rifting-and-reactivation-of-a
Lowe, David G.; Arnott, R.W.C.; Nowlan, G.; McCracken, A.D., 2017
Lithostratigraphic and allostratigraphic framework of the Cambrian-Ordovician Potsdam Group and correlations across Early Paleozoic southern Laurentia. Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences 2017, 54(5): 550-585, https://doi.org/10.1139/cjes-2016-0151
MacNaughton, Robert B. , James W. Hagadorn, Robert H. Dott Jr, 2019
Cambrian wave-dominated tidal-flat deposits, central Wisconsin, USA
Sedimentology, Volume 66, Issue5, August 2019, Pages 1643-1672
https://doi.org/10.1111/sed.12546
McMahon,William J., A. G. Liu, B. H. Tindal, and M. G. Kleinhans, 2020
Ediacaran life close to land: coastal and shoreface habitats of the Ediacaran macrobiota, the central Flinders Ranges, South Australia . Journal of Sedimentary Research, 2020, v. 90, 1463–1499 https://doi.org/10.2110/jsr.2020.029
[Attributed to] Selleck, B., Arnott, R.W.C. and Sanford, B. V., 2010
Potsdam Formation Field Excursion, July 22-25, 2010, Thousand Island Region and St. Lawrence Lowlands. Colgate University.
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