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GEOLOGY
The whole district forms part of the great trap region of
the Deccan. Throughout Ahmednagar the trap rock is distinctly stratified and
,as in the rest of the Deccan, the alternative belts of basalt and
amygdaloid preserve a striking parallelism to each other .
Prismatic disposition is observed more markedly and
perfectly in the basalt strata than in the amygdaloids. Perfect columns are
generally small, of four, five, or six sides, but the prismatic structure
sometimes manifests itself in basaltic and amygdaloidal columns many feet in
diameter, In the face of the hill at Kothul, a small village in shrigonda
twenty four miles south of Ahmednagar ,there is thick stratum of close
grained gray homogeneous basalt wich is crowned by temple of Khandoba.
In the water-courses near Kadus in Parner are
columns of basalt of bluish gray colour, compact texture, vitreous hue, and
sharp fracture. At Harichandra there is sheet of rock which has the appearance
of a pavement of pentangular slabs which are doubtless the terminal
planes of basaltic columns.
Round or oval masses of compact basalt, with concentric
layers like the coasts of an onion, known as nodular basalt are widely diffused
and form another characteristic of Deccan trap formation.
The basaltic dykes are all vertical and do not occasion
any disturbance or dislocation in the strata through which they pass. The most
remarkable example is the dyke which runs vertically from east to west
through the hill-fort of Harichandragad.
Another distinctive feature is the
occurrence of strata of red ochreous rock underlining thick strata of
basalt or amygdaloid. At Baragaon-Nandur in the Rahuri subdivision it is found
many thick as a porphyritic stratum with embedded crystals of lime and is used
as a building stone.
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Another distinctive feature of the Deccan
trap formation is the occurrence of immense quantities of loose basalt stones
of all sizes which look as if they had been showered on the land :also of
rock piled into heaps as if by the labour of man. Pot holes in
the rocky river beds are of frequent occurrence. Those above the falls of the
Pravara , at village of Rauda in the Akole Subdivision, and at Kund-Mahuli in
the Kukadi river a short distance from the village Nighoj in the Parner
subdivision, are specially note worthy on account of their number and size. |
POT
HOLES ,NIGHOJ