Etherington Fm, Mount Head Area, Alberta (Carboniferous of Canada)

Where: Alberta, Canada (50.4° N, 114.6° W: paleocoordinates 8.5° N, 37.2° W)

• coordinate estimated from map

• local area-level geographic resolution

When: Etherington Formation (Rundle Group), Chesterian (339.4 - 318.1 Ma)

• formation-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: deep subtidal; lithified, fine-grained, medium, sandy dolomite and lithified, fine-grained, medium, sandy, cherty/siliceous limestone

• Three members of the formation are described but the faunal list does not indicate where the fossils were collected.

•From table V: "Lower Part: Green Shale; cryptocrystalline to finely crystalline and fine-grained limestone and dolomite. Middle Part: Fine to medium-grained, cherty arenaceous and medium-crystalline limestone; medium-crystalline, porous dolomite. Upper Part: Fine-grained, arenaceous dolomite, cryptocrystalline and finely crystalline dolomite, chert nodules."

•From text: "The lower part of the Rtherington formation consists of five cyclical alternations of green shale and carbonate rocks. The shales form the basal parts fo the unit, being thick and fisile in the lower two units and interbedded with thin limestone and dolomite in the upper units. The upper parts of the units are massive-bedded carbonate, split by more agrillaceous bands of shale. The middle par the the Etheringont formation in the southern and central parts of the Mount Head area contains finely laminated, cross bedded, cherty arenaceous limestone overlin by medium-crystalline dolomite and dolomitic limestone. Thin green shales and mre argillaceous beds are interclated in the lower beds. In the north, on Flat Creek, the middle part consists of several thick beds of medium- to coarsely crystalline limestonse which grade upward into finely crystalline limestone and dolomite. The beds are arenaceous, the quarts grains being coarser and more abundant in the base. The upper part of the Ethington formation consists of fine- to medium- frained dolomite, massive bedded, finely arenaceous and cherty, and cryptocrystalline to finely crystalline cherty dolomite. The quartz content of these beds in considerably greater and the grains larger in the north and northwest parts of the area than in the remainder."

Primary reference: R. J. W. Douglas and P. Harker. 1958. Mississippian succession in Mount Head area, Alberta. Jurassic and Carboniferous of Western Canada 177-189 [N. Heim/N. Heim]more details

Purpose of describing collection: general faunal/floral analysis

PaleoDB collection 62329: authorized by Noel Heim, entered by Noel Heim on 18.07.2006

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)

Taxonomic list

unclassified
  -
Strophomenata
 Productida - Productidae
 Productida - Linoproductidae
 Orthotetida - Orthotetidae
Orthotetes kaskaskiensis McChesney 1860
Rhynchonellata
 Spiriferida - Spiriferidae
"Spirifer leidyi" = Anthracospirifer leidyi Norwood and Pratten 1855
 Athyridida - Retziidae
 Athyridida - Athyrididae
 Rhynchonellida - Camarotoechiidae
Camarotoechia sp. Hall and Clarke 1893
 Terebratulida - Cranaenidae
Girtyella sp. Weller 1911
Stenolaemata
 Cryptostomata - Fenestellidae
Bivalvia
 Pectinida - Pectinoidae
Pecten sp. Müller 1776 scallop