This Geology Trivia Rocks—Literally!
1.
What is unusual about pumice?
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Answer:
It Floats
2.
What direction does a compass needle point to?
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Answer:
Magnetic North
3.
What is the name of the limestone formation that rises from a cave floor?
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Answer:
Stalagmite
4.
How many sides of a peninsula are surrounded by water?
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Answer:
3
5.
If an organic material is converted into stone, it becomes what?
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Answer:
Petrified
6.
What deposit of sediment forms where a stream enters a standing body of water such as a lake?
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Answer:
Delta
7.
What is the best definition of the term "rock"?
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Answer:
1 Or More Minerals Physically Combined
8.
What are ridges of rock debris caused by glacial action called?
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Answer:
Moraines
9.
When does magma become lava?
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Answer:
When It Is Exposed To Oxygen In The Air Or Water
10.
Which scale is used to describe a mineral's hardness?
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Answer:
Mohs'
11.
Where is the type location for the Mississippian Period?
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Answer:
The United States
12.
Yosemite National Park is an easily recognizable part of what batholiths?
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Answer:
Sierra Nevada
13.
What is the most photographed, painted, and scaled mountain in the world?
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Answer:
Mt. Fuji
14.
What percentage of the earth's water is drinkable?
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Answer:
1%
15.
What mountains separate Europe from Asia?
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Answer:
Ural
16.
Which rock would test positive to an acid test?
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Answer:
Limestone
17.
Although beaches can be comprised of any particle, the majority of them consist of what?
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Answer:
Quartz
18.
Fluids with a high viscosity resist what?
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Answer:
Flow
19.
Mary Anning was the first to discover complete fossils of which prehistoric marine reptile?
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Answer:
Ichthyosaur
20.
How many geysers is Yellowstone National Park home to?
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Answer:
500
21.
In which U.S. state was the prehistoric proglacial lake Glacial Lake Missoula located?
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Answer:
Montana
22.
What is the Hawaiian name for smooth-flowing basaltic lava, often appearing twisted and rope-like?
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Answer:
Pahoehoe
23.
What is the length, in miles, of the San Andreas Fault?
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Answer:
800
24.
What is the name of any body of igneous rock named for the Roman god of the underworld?
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Answer:
Pluton
25.
What is the name of the fossil resin that is often used in jewelry making?
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Answer:
Amber
26.
What are solids contained in the gas that issues from a volcano called?
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Answer:
Tephra
27.
What type of fault is the San Andreas Fault?
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Answer:
Strike-Slip
28.
What type of speleothems found in limestone caves grow upward from the floor?
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Answer:
Stalagmites
29.
Who published the groundbreaking book "Principles of Geology" in 1830?
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Answer:
Sir Charles Lyell
30.
To tell how many times a glacier has flowed, what should be counted?
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Answer:
Recessional Moraines
31.
Which earthquake energy waves travel the fastest?
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Answer:
P
32.
Which earthquake energy wave causes the most damage?
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Answer:
L
33.
The Jurassic period was found in which era?
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Answer:
Mesozoic
34.
Which mineral is usually found with gold?
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Answer:
Magnetite
35.
Besides Wyoming, where else in the world would one find active geysers?
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Answer:
New Zealand
36.
Which is the number one bituminous coal state in the U.S.?
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Answer:
West Virginia
37.
During which geologic period was the Alpine orogeny?
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Answer:
Tertiary
38.
Where is the type section for the Ordovician Period found?
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Answer:
Wales
39.
Where is the type location for the Pennsylvanian Period?
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Answer:
The United States
40.
Where is the type section for the Jurassic Period?
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Answer:
Switzerland
41.
Into which body of water does the Danube River empty?
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Answer:
The Black Sea
42.
What was IGY?
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Answer:
International Geophysical Year
43.
When was the International Geophysical Year?
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Answer:
1957-58
44.
Quartz has a hardness of what number?
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Answer:
7
45.
In evolution, which period gave rise to the first mammals?
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Answer:
Permian
46.
Where is North America's stable platform of rocks, a requirement for being a continent?
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Answer:
The Great Plains
47.
Karst topography is most likely to occur in which type of rock?
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Answer:
Limestone
48.
According to glaciologists, what did the water from the present day Great Lakes area drain into 14,000 years before present?
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Answer:
The Mississippi River
49.
Which element makes up 50% of the earth's crust?
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Answer:
Oxygen
50.
Which North American gulf is also known as the Sea of Cortez?
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Answer:
The Gulf Of California
51.
What period of time do scientists know as a nycthemeron?
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Answer:
24 Hours
52.
What is created during an orogeny?
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Answer:
Mountains
53.
The Tennessee River is considered to be the main tributary of which river?
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Answer:
The Ohio
54.
In which desert would the highest sand dunes be found?
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Answer:
Sahara
55.
What river runs into Victoria Falls?
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Answer:
The Zambezi
56.
Which volcano is the only active spewer on the European mainland?
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Answer:
Vesuvius
57.
From which state does the continental divide enter Canada?
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Answer:
Montana
58.
From which state does the continental divide enter Mexico?
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Answer:
New Mexico
59.
What is the tallest mountain in Canada?
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Answer:
Mount Logan
60.
Which part of the United States has the greatest cluster of estuaries?
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Answer:
Northeast
61.
What is the mass of the earth in short tons?
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Answer:
6 Sextillion, 588 Quintillion Short Tons
62.
Which type of lava is typically rope-like in appearance?
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Answer:
Pa-Hoe-Hoe
63.
During which epoch did a land connection between Siberia and Alaska form?
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Answer:
Miocene
64.
How many miles long is the Grand Canyon?
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Answer:
277 Miles
65.
How many gallons of water do the Great Lakes contain?
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Answer:
6 Quadrillion
66.
In which U.S. state is Crater Lake located?
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Answer:
Oregon
67.
In what year did Krakatoa erupt after being dormant for 200 years?
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Answer:
1883
68.
In which U.S. state does the Columbia basalt plateau appear?
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Answer:
Washington
69.
Petrified wood is an example of what type of petrification fossil?
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Answer:
Permineralized
70.
The conversion of kerogen to petroleum is known by what name?
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Answer:
Maturation
71.
What era in Earth's history is known as the Age of Reptiles due to the dominance that this group achieved during this time?
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Answer:
Mesozoic
72.
What is the name for snow crystals that melt and refreeze into granular particles on glaciers?
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Answer:
Firn
73.
What is the name for the semiarid region that surrounds most deserts?
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Answer:
Steppe
74.
What is the name of a glacier that is formed when two or more valley glaciers flow together?
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Answer:
Piedmont Glacier
75.
What is the name of the reddish soils of the humid tropics?
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Answer:
Latosols
76.
What is the term for when pieces of glaciers break off and form icebergs?
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Answer:
Calve
77.
What is the term used to classify igneous rocks that are light in both color and gravity?
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Answer:
Sialic
78.
What is the very sticky form of clay till called?
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Answer:
Gumbo
79.
What percentage of known volcanoes are subaerial, meaning they erupt into the atmosphere?
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Answer:
80%
80.
What percentage of rock-forming minerals are silicates?
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Answer:
90%
81.
What was the most common type of rock to be found during the Precambrian Period?
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Answer:
Gneiss
82.
In which country is Fiordland, which contains the Milford Sound fiord, located?
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Answer:
New Zealand
83.
Which volcano in Iceland was once thought to be a gateway to the underworld?
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Answer:
Hekla
84.
Who published the book "The Theory of the Earth" in 1795?
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Answer:
James Hutton
85.
Whose concept of erosion cycle dominated geology for 50 years after its release?
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Answer:
William Morris Davis
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