P - OPC 989, Woodbridge, Middlesex Co., NJ (Cretaceous of the United States)

Also known as Sample P, OPC 989 - Clay pit of the Valentine Fire Brick Company, on Main Street, 1/2 mile from Amboy Avenue, Woodgridge, Middlesex County, New Jersey (Woodbridge Clay Member of the Raritan Formation)

Where: Middlesex County, New Jersey (40.6° N, 74.3° W: paleocoordinates 34.0° N, 38.5° W)

• coordinate based on nearby landmark

• outcrop-level geographic resolution

When: Woodbridge Clay Member (Raritan Formation), Cenomanian (100.5 - 93.9 Ma)

• In this area the oldest division of the Cretaceous is the Raritan. In an early report, the Raritan Formation was divided into 7 "beds", which may be seen in many outcrops, but can't be followed any great distance. The thickness of this section is 111 inches, and 23 samples were collected.

• member-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: terrestrial; lithology not reported

• The climate during the Raritan time ranged from subtropical to temperate. The few invertebrate fossils known from the formation at that time were believed to have lived in brackish waters. The fauna described by Stephenson (1954) and collected in a clay pit of the Sayre and Fisher Brick Company contained a new genus, nine new species and one new subspecies, and definitely belonged to a group of organisms which inhabited shallow marine water. Therefore, it appears that shallow marine conditions existed while at least part of the Raritan Formation was being deposited.
• The sediments of this area in New Jersey consist of sands, clays, beds of glauconite, limestones, and calcarceous sands. For the most part, the Raritan Formation is made up of alternating beds of clays and sands with local lignitic sediments and gravels. Near Woodbridge and Sayreville, New Jersey, the Raritan Formation consists of white clay which weathers red and grades laterally and vertically into dark-grey lignitic clay. The base of this dark clay is not exposed, but it is believed to be the bottom of the Woodbridge Clay Member. At Sayreville the upper portions of the Woodbridge Clay Member of the Raritan Formation contain impure siderite nodules.

Size class: microfossils

Preservation: original sporopollenin

Collection methods: surface (in situ), chemical,

• Fossil preservation in the Raritan sediments is fair to excellent.

Primary reference: A. Kimyai. 1966. New plant microfossils from the Raritan Formation (Cretaceous) in New Jersey. micropaleontology 12(4):461-476 [R. Lupia/T. Naeher/T. Naeher]more details

Purpose of describing collection: taxonomic analysis

PaleoDB collection 34114: authorized by Rick Lupia, entered by Tiffany Naeher on 18.08.2003, edited by Brooke Wilborn

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)

Taxonomic list

Show authors, comments, and common names
Dinophyceae
 Gonyaulacales - Goniodomaceae
Hystrichosphaeridium multicornutum n. sp.
Marchantiopsida
 Sphaerocarpales -
Aequitriradites insolitus n. sp.