Garvey & Hasiotis Ichnofossils (Carboniferous of Australia)

Also known as Ichnofossil assemblage from the Lower Carboniferous Snowy Plains Formation, Mansfield Basin, Australia

Where: Victoria, Australia (37.0° S, 146.2° E: paleocoordinates 40.9° S, 141.9° E)

When: Home Station Sandstone Member (Snowy Plains Formation), Tournaisian (358.9 - 346.7 Ma)

Environment/lithology: fluvial; lithified mudstone and lithified, massive, burrowed sandstone

• Laminated mudstone-sandstone lithofacies- Most common lithofaces on Fish Hill, which is characterised by laterally continuous planar laminations. There are also rare wavy discontinuous laminations and planar cross-bedding towards the top of the sequence. Desiccation cracks are periodically exposed. This bed is interpreted as being characteristic of a low-energy floodplain environment, and is assigned to the Rusophycus ichnocoenosis. Fuersichnus commerfordi isp. n., Sagittichnus lincki, Cruziana problematic, Platicytes lioparadus isp. n, and Rusophycus eutendorfensis, R. jenningsi, and R. biloba were recorded.

•Thin-bedded rippled sandstone lithofacies -Minor beds of fine calcareous and noncalcareous sandstone, with all beds < 200 m in thickness. Beds are laterally continuous with sharp boundaries, and are characterised by uniform fine to very-fine grained sandstone. Small-scale trough cross-bedding often occurs, while small-scale planar cross-bedding and discontinuous wavy lamination is also present. Mudcracks and clasts occur in some of the beds. This bed is interpreted as a moderate energy channel deposit, and assigned to the Margaritichnus ichnocoenosis. Rusophycus isp., Cruziana problematica, Palaeophycus tubularis, and Margaritichnus mansfield isp. n. were recorded.

•Thick-bedded sandstone lithofacies -Consists of very fine to fine grained, red, purple and brown sandstone with small shale lenses. The beds exhibit an over-all coarsening upwards in grain size. Occasional discontinuous wavy lamination, trough cross-bedding and small-scale planar cross-bedding occurs. Represents a high-energy river channel environment. This bed is interpreted as a high energy river channel environment, and assigned to the Cruziana ichnocoenosis. Rusophycus isp. and Cruziana probelmatica were recorded.

Size class: macrofossils

Preservation: trace

Collection methods: bulk,

Primary reference: J. M. Garvey and S. T. Hasiotis. 2008. An ichnofossil assemblage from the Lower Carboniferous Snowy Plains Formation, Mansfield Basin, Australia. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 258(4):257-276 [R. Plotnick/R. Plotnick]more details

Purpose of describing collection: paleoecologic analysis

PaleoDB collection 94366: authorized by Roy Plotnick, entered by Roy Plotnick on 17.02.2010

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)

Taxonomic list

• earlier reports on fish fauna
Platicytes lioparadus
  -
Platicytes lioparadus Garvey and Hasiotis 2008
 Ichnofossils -
Sagittichnus lincki Seilacher 1953
Fuersichnus commerfordi Garvey and Hasiotis 2008
Rusophycus sp. Hall 1852
Rusophycus jenningsi Fenton and Fenton 1937
Rusophycus biloba Vanuxem 1842
Cruziana problematica Schindewolf 1921
Margaritichnus mansfieldi Garvey and Hasiotis 2008