Royal Creek Sec. 1, at 192-197 meters above basee (Devonian of Canada)

Where: Yukon, Canada (64.8° N, 135.2° W: paleocoordinates 0.1° S, 41.7° W)

• coordinate stated in text

• local area-level geographic resolution

When: Road River Formation, Pragian (410.8 - 407.6 Ma)

• Lenz (1977) tentatively assigns this part of the section to the Early Pragian; however, he later (in Frýda, Blodgett & Lenz 2002) calls it Middle Pragian. Brachiopod biozone: Davidsoniatrypa johnsoni; Conodont biozone: Spathognathodus sulcatus; Graptolite biozone: Monograptus yukonensis.

• group of beds-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: shallow subtidal; lithified carbonate and lithified shale

• During the Late Silurian and Early Devonian, the Royal Creek area lay at the margin of a deep-water embayment. The transition from shallow to deep water was relatively abrupt, with very thick shallow-water (including intertidal and shallow subtidal), sparsely fossiliferous carbonates accumulating on the large platform immediately to the east, southeast, and south of the study area, and deep-water, graptolite-rich shales and calcareous shales of the Road River Group accumulating in a northwest-facing trough that joined to the Blackstone River and Richardson troughs (Lenz, 1972 ; Norford, 1997 ). In the transitional zone, perhaps no more than one kilometer in width, brachiopods flourished, and trilobites, bryozoans, corals and gastropods were relatively common (Lenz, 1977a, 1977b, 1982 ). Sea-level fluctuations through this time period are evidenced in the area by tongues of the deeper water facies trangressing over the shallower-water carbonates, alternating with tongues of the latter facies prograding over deeper water facies. During times of shallow-water deposits prograding over deeper water facies, coupled with a relatively steep slope margin (still visible in a few localities), benthic organisms found themselves in a very unstable environment and, perhaps triggered by earth tremors, cascaded into deeper waters. As a result, the most richly fossiliferous carbonates are predominantly debris-flow deposits, in which shallower and deeper dwelling benthic faunas within any debris-flow bed are entirely intermixed. (From Blodgett, Frýda & Lenz 2001.)
• Debris flow

Size class: macrofossils

Preservation: replaced with silica

Reposited in the GSC

• Lenz's 655'-675' is taken to be equivalent, as there is no other subsection in Lenz (1977) that overlaps with this. It likely was remeasured in the subsequent 25 years. This list is a portion of collection 24933 from Lenz 1999, which is an overview of these collections.

Primary reference: J. Frýda, R. B. Blodgett, A.C. Lenz and S. Manda. 2008. New porcellioidean gastropods from Early Devonian of Royal Creek Area, Yukon Territory, Canada, with notes on their early phylogeny. Journal of Paleontology 82(3):595-603 [P. Wagner/P. Wagner]more details

Purpose of describing collection: general faunal/floral analysis

PaleoDB collection 80385: authorized by Pete Wagner, entered by Pete Wagner on 16.04.2008

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)

Taxonomic list

• Augmented by data from Fryda, Blodgett & Lenz (2002: New Early Devonian gastropods from the families Scoliostomatidae (new family) and Crassimarginatidae (new family), Royal Creek Area, Yukon Territory, Canada. Journal of Paleontology 76:246 – 255.)
Gastropoda
 Murchisoniina - Porcelliidae
"Porcellia (Paraporcellia) sp." = Paraporcellia, Porcellia (Porcellia) yukonensis n. sp., Perryconcha pulchra
"Porcellia (Paraporcellia) sp." = Paraporcellia Blodgett and Johnson 1992 snail
Porcellia (Porcellia) yukonensis n. sp. Frýda et al. 2008 snail
Perryconcha pulchra Frýda et al. 2008 snail