The Alligator (Grand Canyon), is a -elevation summit, a large ridgeline butte, connected to, and below Mohave Point (South Rim), approximately northwest of

Grand Canyon Village Grand Canyon Village is a census-designated place (CDP) located on the South Rim of the Grand Canyon, in Coconino County, Arizona, United States. Its population was 2,004 at the 2010 Census. Located in Grand Canyon National Park, it is whol ...

Grand Canyon The Grand Canyon (, yuf-x-yav, Wi:kaʼi:la, , Southern Paiute language: Paxa’uipi, ) is a steep-sided canyon carved by the Colorado River in Arizona, United States. The Grand Canyon is long, up to wide and attains a depth of over a m ...

. The ridgeline trends north, and the lower elevation cliff, the tail of the

alligator An alligator is a large reptile in the Crocodilia order in the genus ''Alligator'' of the family Alligatoridae. The two extant species are the American alligator (''A. mississippiensis'') and the Chinese alligator (''A. sinensis''). Additiona ...

, turns northwest. The Alligator landform is about from the west-flowing

Colorado River The Colorado River ( es, Río Colorado) is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and northern Mexico. The river drains an expansive, arid drainage basin, watershed that encompasses parts of ...

, and

Granite Gorge Granite () is a coarse-grained (phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies undergro ...

. The Alligator lies between the Monument Creek (Grand Canyon) drainage, west, and the Salt Creek (Grand Canyon) drainage, east, both short, south tributaries to the

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...

. The Alligator is composed of bright red-orange

Supai Group The Supai Group is a slope-forming section of red bed deposits found in the Colorado Plateau. The group was laid down during the Pennsylvanian to Lower Permian. Cliff-forming interbeds of sandstone are noticeable throughout the group. The Su ...

(four members), (cliff-former, cliffs, and slope-former, slopes), upon a red, Redwall Limestone, large cliff. Also being a cliff-former, the curving "tail-of-the-alligator" is a flat-topped platform of the Redwall Limestone.

Geology

The Alligator landform is composed of two basic rock units: the prominence-Supai Group (roughly thick), and below, Redwall Limestone (approximately thick). Because both are cliff-formers (and therefor shelf-formers), the high-point of The Alligator is on the upper platform (shelf) of the

, the highly resistant Esplanade Sandstone. The curved tail of The Alligator is the bottom platform, sitting on top of the highly resistant Redwall Limestone. As the tail curves, a smaller, secondary cliff-platform (above the Redwall), is composed of Supai unit 2, the also resistant Manakacha Formation. (The Redwall base, also sits on a shorter cliff (and platform), of Tonto Group, no. 3, the Muav Limestone). The rest of the Tonto Group sits on the Granite Gorge at the Colorado River with the walls of Vishnu Basement Rocks.

References

External links

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Aerial view, The Alligator (Grand Canyon) Mountainzone
Grand Canyon Landforms of Coconino County, Arizona