Alexandria Formation - Needs Camp (Pliocene of South Africa)

Where: South Africa (33.0° S, 27.6° E: paleocoordinates 33.1° S, 27.1° E)

• coordinate based on nearby landmark

• outcrop-level geographic resolution

When: Alexandria Formation, Pliocene (5.3 - 2.6 Ma)

• STRATIGRAPHIC RELATIONS: From Alexandria Formation, which unconformably overlies Late Cretaceous Sundays River Fm in places, and is overlain by eolian calcarenites. AGE: Much discussed, although not clearly in text, to range from Miocene to Pleistocene, but also possible Eocene (see Haughton pers. comm., cited in text). Assigned here to a Pliocene age, based on more recent publications (King, 1972). STRATIGRAPHIC POSITION: From unknown position within formation.

• group of beds-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: coastal; poorly lithified, shelly/skeletal, calcareous limestone and lithified, shelly/skeletal, calcareous sandstone

• ENVIRONMENT: Shallow marine, probably siliciclastic (calcareous, and high in bioclastic material) facies.
• SPECIFIC LITHOLOGY: Compact, gritty limestones and calcareous sandstones containing abundant, mainly fragmented shells. LITHIFICATION: Poorly lithified, based on facies description, which is distinguished from "ccompact crystalline" and "porous, loosely-cemented" adjacent descriptions.

Size class: macrofossils

Collection methods: COLLECTOR: Unknown collector. REPOSITORY: Unknown repository.

Primary reference: A. Ruddock. 1966. The Tertiary limestone of the southern coastal regions of Cape Province, South Africa. Sedimentary Basins of the African Coasts 49-62 [A. Hendy/A. Hendy]more details

Purpose of describing collection: general faunal/floral analysis

PaleoDB collection 77479: authorized by Austin Hendy, entered by Austin Hendy on 13.01.2008

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)

Taxonomic list

• COVERAGE: Exhaustive for gastropoda and bivalvia, and also mentioning foraminifera, brachiopoda, bryozoa, crustacea, and sharks. NOMENCLATURE: Not an authoritative publication, and with relatively antiquated nomenclature, commonly not assigned to species resolution.
unclassified
  -
Rhynchonellata
 Terebratulida - Kraussinidae
? Kraussina sp. Davidson 1859
Bivalvia
 Ostreida - Ostreidae
 Ostreida - Malleidae
"Melina cf. gaudichaudi" = Isognomon (Melina)
"Melina cf. gaudichaudi" = Isognomon (Melina) oyster
 Arcida - Glycymerididae
Glycymeris pilosa Linnaeus 1767 clam
Gastropoda
 Neogastropoda - Volutidae
Cirripedia
  -
Chondrichthyes
 Odontaspidida - Isuridae
Oxyrhina sp. Agassiz 1838 mackerel shark
 Lamniformes - Lamnidae
Carcharodon sp. Smith 1838 white shark
Bryozoa
  -
Bryozoa indet. Ehrenberg 1831
Foraminifera
 Textulariacea - Textulariidae
Textularia cf. gramen dOrbigny 1846
Tubothalamea
 Miliolida -
Foraminifera
 Discorbacea - Eponididae
Pulvinulina sp. Carpenter et al. 1862
Globothalamea
 Rotaliida - Anomalinidae
Anomalina sp. d'Orbigny 1826