AWi-34-2, Highway 59 (Paleocene of the United States)

Where: Wilcox County, Alabama (32.0° N, 87.0° W: paleocoordinates 34.9° N, 67.0° W)

• coordinate based on nearby landmark

• small collection-level geographic resolution

When: McBryde Limestone Member (Clayton Formation), Danian (66.0 - 61.6 Ma)

• Mid-Danian age for McBryde Limestone, based on planktonic foraminifera of zone P1c (or P1b to P1c) and calcareous nannofossil zone NP3 (Mancini, 1984; Schulte & Speijer, 2009).

• group of beds-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: deep subtidal ramp; lithified carbonate

• Schulte & Speijer (2009): The lowered fossil content in the McBryde Limestone Member, as compared to the Turritella Rock (described as a shallow, inner neritic setting), as well as the significantly smaller grain-size of the components, and decreased amounts of coarse silicic detritus, suggest a more distal depositional environment. Open-marine conditions are also indicated by the presence of nautiloids, and more common planktic foraminifera in the marl intervals. In the sandy bioclastic limestones, fossils appear to be reworked from nearshore settings (e.g., algae) and the large grain size of the constituents suggests a high-energy environment, probably above storm wave or even wave base (i.e., <25 m). The condensed claystone intervals around the maximum flooding surfaces may have been deposited below storm wave base, probably in a water depth exceeding 30 m.

•Lithology not given for this collection, but the vast majority of the McBryde Limestone is likely deep subtidal.

Size class: mesofossils

Primary reference: L. D. Toulmin. 1977. Stratigraphic Distribution of Paleocene and Eocene Fossils in the Eastern Gulf Coast Region. Geological Survey of Alabama, Monograph 13(1):1-602 [M. Patzkowsky/K. Layou/P. Mannion]more details

Purpose of describing collection: biostratigraphic analysis

PaleoDB collection 2852: authorized by Mark Patzkowsky, entered by Karen Layou on 21.07.1999

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)

Taxonomic list

Show authors, comments, and common names
Cephalopoda
 Nautilida - Hercoglossidae
Hercoglossa ulrichi
Bivalvia
 Carditida - Carditidae
Venericardia sp.
Venericardia sp. Lamarck 1801 clam
originally entered as "Venericardia spp."
 Ostreida - Ostreidae
Ostrea crenulimarginata
Ostrea crenulimarginata Gabb 1860 oyster