20 
SANTA MARIA OIL DISTRICT, CALIFORNIA. 
range from gentle to fairly steep, being in many places determined 
by the dip. PI. IX, A (p. 80) shows excellent examples of the strike 
ridges, dip slopes, and even sky lines of these hills. The ridges di¬ 
verging from Mount Lospe are given prominence by the hard flint of 
which they are formed, and the sharp outlines of the slopes along the 
coast southward from Point Sal are caused by the resistant igneous 
rocks there exposed. 
South of the Casmalia Hills the sea has cut into soft formations 
and along structural lines, so as to leave the Point Sal Ridge jutting 
out as a promontory. The same is true on a smaller scale south of 
Purisima Point, the seaward extension of Burton Mesa, and south 
of the west end of the Santa Ynez Range. The coast north of each of 
these headlands runs northward, with only a gentle curve away from 
the point, until the indentation south of the next range is reached. 
The east-west coast lines follow structural features; the north-south 
lines truncate them. Faults are not concerned in any of the north- 
south features along this part of the coast. 
North of the Casmalia Hills the coast forms a straight north-south 
line bordering the lowland that opens out at the mouth of the Santa 
Maria Valley as far as the deep indentation at the base of the San 
Luis Range, which exhibits the best example of this type of coastal 
structure. The latter range lies in the San Luis quadrangle and has 
been described in the folio covering that region. 0 
SOLOMON HILLS. 
Although the Casmalia Hills drop into insignificance in the vicinity 
of Graciosa and Harris canyons, their general line of topographic 
relief continues with a more easterly course toward the San Rafael 
Mountains, the whole being in fact a spur of this range. The Solo¬ 
mon Hills are a group of low, rolling hills covering a wide area between 
the Santa Maria and Los Alamos valleys. From a distance the area 
looks like an undulating plateau sloping away on all sides except the 
east to wide, slightly inclined or flat valleys. 
The features of the topography of the Solomon Hills are shown 
in PI. XI (p. 98). From a point near at hand the individual hills 
and valleys of irregular round and square forms assume bold outlines. 
The angular slope of hills capped with low-dipping beds of sand and 
having steep, squarish flanks is very characteristic of the region. 
Many ridges have fairly flat summits, which slope gently, with a long, 
even sky line, and are due to surface cappings of sand hardened by iron 
oxide. Such a capping has in places the appearance of a resistant 
bed forming the ridge top and determining the slope by its low dip. 
Mount Solomon has an elevation of 1,338 feet and other peaks rise 
a Geologic Atlas U. S., folio 101, U. S. Geol. Survey, 1904. 
