Mesozoic Rocks

There are rocks from the Mesozoic that outcrop within the Municipality, with different origins, depending on how they were formed.

They can be Marine deposits, originated during the Cretaceous, when our Municipality was submerged under the waters of a sea that came in from the East. The Nogales region was, in particular, the seashore of this sea.

There are also Igneous rocks, corresponding either to the Laramide Orogeny, of the Nevada Orogeny, which are two time periods that have been named that way by geologists, during which our region was submitted to an intense vulcanism.

In lesser degree, we also have metamorphic rocks, which formed under either sedimentary or igneous processes, and later were subjected to enormous compression and temperature, which changed them in part, but without melting them again.

Within the city of Nogales, the rocks corresponding to this age are a granitic body (orange colored rocks, with grainy texture), extending along the southern part of the city.

This outcrop covers Colonia Granja as well as part of the Cananea road, and is only interrupted by the Quaternary alluvion that forms the Arroyo Los Nogales