Needle Rock Natural Area

Needle Rock is an intrusive of rhyodacite volcanic plug located in the Needle Rock Natural Area, 5.6km east-northeast (bearing 68°) of the Town of Crawford in Delta County, Colorado, United States. It stands 800ft tall above the floor of the Smith Fork of the Gunnison River valley. It originated as the throat of a large volcano about 28 million years ago in the Miocene geological epoch, when molten rock intruded between existing sedimentary rocks. The plug may represent the eroded conduit of a laccolith.