Book review: A Pocket Guide to Geological Field Recording, by Alan Richardson

Jon Trevelyan (UK)

This is a brief guide explaining how the reader may collect meaningful data at outcrop level and make provisional identifications of common lithologies. It is not intended as a comprehensive field geology textbook and assumes that readers have already studied geological theory (and, as such, is probably most useful of the undergraduate, but could be interesting for anyone interested in geology).

As you would expect, it covers a number of topics, including an outline procedure for working on an outcrop, the necessary field equipment and records, and measuring things like strike, the dip of surfaces, and the plunge of linear features. In particular, there are extended sections on describing folds and faults, and about recording metamorphic rocks.

It contains many useful diagrams and on the back cover is a rock guide to grain size, roundness, sorting and so on. As I say above, I would recommend it to an undergraduate or student setting out on their geological education. However, it is an interesting read for anyone fascinated by geology.

A Pocket Guide to Geological Field Recording, by Alan Richardson, Kingswinford, West Midlands (2015), 39 pages (paperback)