Congealed magma, along with fragmental volcanic and wallrock materials, can be preserved in the feeding conduits of a volcano upon cessation of activity.

These preserved rocks form crudely cylindrical masses, from which project radiating dikes; they may be visualised as the fossil remains of the innards of a volcano (the so-called "volcanic plumbing system") and are referred to as volcanic plugs or necks.

The igneous materials in a plug may have a range of composition similar to that of associated lava or ash, but may also include fragments and blocks of denser, coarser grained rocks-- higher in iron and magnesium, lower in silicon--thought to be samples of the Earth's deep crust or upper mantle plucked and transported by the ascending magma.

Many plugs and necks are largely or wholly composed of fragmental volcanic material and of fragments of wallrock, which can be of any type. Plugs that bear a particularly strong imprint of explosive eruption of highly gas-charged magma are called diatremes or tuff-breccia.

Volcanic plugs are believed to overlie a body of magma, which could be either still largely liquid or completely solid depending on the state of activity of the volcano. Plugs are known, or postulated, to be commonly funnel shaped and to taper downward into bodies increasingly elliptical in plan or elongated to dike-like forms.

Typically, volcanic plugs and necks tend to be more resistant to erosion than their enclosing rock formations. Thus, after the volcano becomes inactive and deeply eroded, the exhumed plug may stand up in bold relief as an irregular, columnar structure. One of the best known and most spectacular diatremes in the United States is Ship Rock in New Mexico, which towers some 1,700 feet above the more deeply eroded surrounding plains.

Volcanic plugs, including diatremes, are found elsewhere in the western United States and also in Germany, South Africa, Tanzania, and Siberia.

2. Maars
3. Non-volcanic craters
4. Submarine Volcanoes