The Ruidoso plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
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Ruidoso’s center stands about 6,740 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 6,510 ft to 7,840 ft, a difference of 1,330 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Sierra Blanca Peak, about 11,920 ft, 8 miles west-northwest.
The section below crosses 7 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 4×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Sandstone, carbonate, evaporite. Age: Permian, 273 to 290 million years old. About 6 mi of the line.
Limestone, dolostone. Age: Permian, 260 to 290 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Granitic, syenitic. Age: Eocene to Pliocene, 2.6 to 56 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Andesite, dacite. Age: Late Eocene to Early Miocene, 16 to 38 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Shale. Age: Late Cretaceous, 72 to 100 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Sandstone, carbonate. Age: Permian, 260 to 290 million years old. About 0.7 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale. 1 smaller unit along the line are not listed.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Ruidoso reaches the Gulf of America by way of Cedar Creek, the Rio Ruidoso, the Rio Hondo, the Pecos and the Rio Grande: about 1,310 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Paz Ramirez Lake, Amistad Reservoir, Red Bluff Reservoir and Lake McMillan.
410 miles of the trip are on the Pecos.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Ruidoso; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
