Recent Sediments of the Central California Continental Shelf. Part A. Introduction and Grain Size Data.

The report covers the area from Pigeon Point south to Sand Hills Bluffs. With this report, the Continental Shelf of California from Russian River to Monterey Bay will have been studied. This project included 39 offshore samples, and 9 from the beach. Beach samples were obtained with a pipe coring device. Bottom samples were obtained with an orangepeel grab from the shore to 300-foot depths. Location of each sample was obtained by radar bearings on shore landmarks depths were obtained by an echo-sounding depth finder. The orangepeel grab took about 15 centimeters of surface material. About 1 liter by volume of each sample was saved, and stored moist until analysis. The total distribution was analyzed, and the samples contained a wide spread of grain sizes. Both sieving and pipette analyses were made. Grain-size information for each sample is presented as a histogram and as a cumulative frequency curve. Quartile and percentile values, or grain-size values at a given weight percent, are used for calculating the statistical measures - sorting coefficient, quartile skewness, and kurtosis. These are plotted uncontoured on basemaps. Author