Playa lake

Schutt B (2000) Holocene paleohydrology of playa lakes in northern and central Spain a reconstruction based on the mineral composition of lacustrine sediments. Quatem Int 73 1 7-27... 

Valero-Garces BL, Delgado-Huertas A, Navas A, Machin J, Gonzalez-Samperiz P, Kelts K (2000) Quaternary palaeohydrological evolution of a playa lake Salada Mediana, central Ebro Basin, Spain. Sedimentology 47 1135-1156... 

Castaneda C, Herrera J, Casterad MA (2005) Facies identification within the playa-lakes of the Monegros desert, Spain, from field and satellite data. Catena 63 39-63... 

Desborough, G. A. 1978. A biogenic-chemical stratified lake model for the origin of oil shale of the Green River Formation An alternative to the playa-lake model. Geological Society of America Bulletin, 89, 961-971. 

Surdam, R. C. Wolfbauer, C. A. 1975. Green River Formation, Wyoming A playa-lake complex. Geological Society of America Bulletin, 86, 336-345. 

During the summer of 1997, water samples were collected and analyzed for herbicides from 32 Playa Lakes of the High Plains that receive drainage from both cotton and corn agriculture in West Texas (Figure 30.1). The major cotton herbicides detected in the water samples were diuron, fluometuron, metolachlor, norflurazon, and prometryn. Atrazine and propazine also were routinely detected in samples from the Playa Lakes. 

In a study of Playa Lakes in the High Plains of Texas (Thurman et al., 2000), atrazine was detected in 72% of the samples (mean concentration of 1.3 pig/L), and propazine was detected in 59% of the samples. The common degradation product, DEA (Figure 30.12), was found in 63% of the samples with a mean concentration of 0.36 pig/L. Atrazine was responsible for the majority of DEA. 

Prometryn also was detected frequently in the Playa Lakes sampling in Texas (Thurman et al., 2000). The degradation product of prometryn, deisopropylprometryn, was detected in nearly every sample that contained prometryn. 

Thurman, E.M., K.C. Bastian, and Tony Mollhagan (2000). Occurrence of cotton herbicides and insecticides in Playa Lakes of the high plains of west Texas. Sci. Total Environ., 248 189-200. 

Figure 2 Major hydrologic features of hydrologically closed basins (after Eugster and Hardie, 1975) (reproduced with permission of the Geological Society of America from Geol Soc. Am. Bull 1975, 86, 319-334). Flow lines have been added here beneath the playa lake to indicate the possibility of salinity-driven density circulation, and the interaction between fresh meteoric groundwaters and recirculating evolved brines (sources Duffy and...

Arakel A. V. and Hongjun T. (1994) Seasonal evaporite sedimentation in desert playa lakes of the Karinga Creek drainage system, central Austraha. In Sedimentology and Geochemistry of Modem and Ancient Saline Lakes (eds. R. W. Renaut and W. M. Last). Society for Sedimentary Geology (SEPM), Tulsa, pp. 91-100. 

Eugster H. P. and Hardie L. A. (1975) Sedimentation in an ancient playa-lake complex the Wilkins Peak Member of the Green River Formation of Wyoming. Geol. Soc. Am. Bull. 86, 319-334. 

Soils and waters affected by emissions from smelters, power plants. Soils and waters affected by mining wastes and by-products. Some playa lake sediments. Soils and dusts derived from naturally As-enriched rocks and sediments. Waters that have leached As from As-rich rocks, soils, and sediments. Pesticides, other industrial chemicals. By-products or wastes from chemical manufacturing or other industrial processes. 

Chemical analysis (Reheis et al, 2002) of the <50 p.m fraction of the dusts that originate from the dry Owens Lake bed indicate that they contain quite high levels of a variety of metals or metalloids including iron (several percent) zinc (tens of thousands of ppm), manganese and lead (hundreds of ppm) arsenic, chromium, nickel, and lithium (tens of ppm), and uranium (several ppm). Given the oxidized conditions of the playa lake surface, it is likely that arsenic, chromium, and... 

These results suggest that evaporative playa lake sediments and dusts generated from dry lake beds can be potentially significant sources of reactive, alkaline material with high levels of soluble, potentially toxic trace metals and metalloids. Further studies are needed to determine whether such dusts pose a substantial health hazard to those exposed to them on a regular basis. 

Reeves Jr., C.C. (1978) Economic significance of playa lake deposits. Special Publication 2, International Association of Sedimentologists. Oxford Blackwell Scientific Publications, pp. 279-290. 

A playa lake, following Briere (2000), is an arid-zone feature, transitional between playa and (perennial) lake, neither dry more than 75% of the time, nor wet more than 75% of the time. When dry, the basin qualifies as a playa. Playa lakes may be broadly equivalent to ephemeral lakes and saline lakes, in some regional terminologies. 

Briere, P.R. (2000) Playa, playa lake, sabkha Proposed definitions for old terms. Journal of Arid Environments 45, 1-7. 

Langford, R.P. (2003) The Holocene history of the White Sands dune field and influences on eolian deflation and playa lakes. Quaternary International 104, 31-39. 

Russell, I.C. (1885) Playa-lakes and playas. U.S. Geological Survey, Monograph 11, 81-86. 

Valyashko, M.G. (1972) Playa lakes - a necessary stage in the development of a salt-bearing basin. In Richter-Bemberg, G. (Ed.) Geology of Saline Deposits. Paris UNESCO, pp. 41-51. 

Magnesite precipitates at depths of a few decimetres below the sediment-water interface, such as in the ephemeral salt pans of Recent playa lakes in north-east Spain, where precipitation is enhanced... 

Arakel, A.V., Jacobson, G. Layons, W.B. (1990) Sediment-water interaction as a control on geochemical evolution of playa lake systems in the Australian arid interior. Hydrobiologia, 197, 1-12. 

PuEYO Mur, J.J. Ingles Urpinell, M. (1987) Magnesite formation in recent playa lakes, Los Monegros, Spain. In Diagenesis of Sedimentaiy sequences (Ed. Marshall, J.D.), Spec. Publ. geol. Soc. London, 36, 119-122. 

Iodine occurs frequently as potassium or sodium iodide in subsurface brines associated with oil and gas deposits in the United States, notably in Oklahoma (150-1200mgkg ) (Cotton 1978), California (30-70 mg kg ), Michigan (30mgkg ) and in playa lakes in the western United States (14mgkg i) (Lyday 1985). 

Gypcrete A conglomeratic surficial sedimentary crust cemented by secondary gypsum or anhydrite. Often formed under strongly evaporative conditions, it is common in playa lake beachrock (see also caliche, calcrete, silcrete, ferricrete). 

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