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Mesa Rica Sandstone
The Mesa Rica Sandstone is a geologic formation in Oklahoma and New Mexico. It preserves fossils dating back to the Cretaceous period. Description The Mesa Rica Sandstone consists of crossbedded white to buff sandstone. The sandstone is massive and medium- to coarse-grained. It is a very mature sandstone, consisting of almost pure quartz and kaolin, which may reflect its provenance as reworked sediments of the Morrison Formation, or may be due to a slow rate of deposition that permitted meteoric water (water originating as rain or snow) to circulate through the sediments for an unusually long time. In some locations, there is minor quartz-pebble conglomerate at the base of the formation, which lies on the Tucumcari Shale or Glencairn Formation. It is overlain by the Pajarito Formation and has a thickness of up to . The formation was laid down in a low- accommodation deltaic environment. Fossils Dinosaur remains diagnostic to the genus level are among the fossils that h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Formation (stratigraphy)
A geological formation, or simply formation, is a body of rock having a consistent set of physical characteristics (lithology) that distinguishes it from adjacent bodies of rock, and which occupies a particular position in the layers of rock exposed in a geographical region (the stratigraphic column). It is the fundamental unit of lithostratigraphy, the study of strata or rock layers. A formation must be large enough that it can be mapped at the surface or traced in the subsurface. Formations are otherwise not defined by the thickness (geology), thickness of their rock strata, which can vary widely. They are usually, but not universally, tabular in form. They may consist of a single lithology (rock type), or of alternating beds of two or more lithologies, or even a heterogeneous mixture of lithologies, so long as this distinguishes them from adjacent bodies of rock. The concept of a geologic formation goes back to the beginnings of modern scientific geology. The term was used by ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Morrison Formation
The Morrison Formation is a distinctive sequence of Late Jurassic, Upper Jurassic sedimentary rock found in the western United States which has been the most fertile source of dinosaur fossils in North America. It is composed of mudstone, sandstone, siltstone, and limestone and is light gray, greenish gray, or red. Most of the fossils occur in the green siltstone beds and lower sandstones, relics of the rivers and floodplains of the Jurassic period. It is centered in Wyoming and Colorado, with outcrops in Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, the panhandles of Oklahoma and Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Idaho. Equivalent rocks under different names are found in Canada. It covers an area of 1.5 million square kilometers (600,000 square miles), although only a tiny fraction is exposed and accessible to geologists and Paleontology, paleontologists. Over 75% is still buried under the prairie to the east, and much of its western paleogeographic extent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sandstone Formations Of The United States
Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) because they are the most resistant minerals to weathering processes at the Earth's surface. Like uncemented sand, sandstone may be any color due to impurities within the minerals, but the most common colors are tan, brown, yellow, red, grey, pink, white, and black. Since sandstone beds often form highly visible cliffs and other topography, topographic features, certain colors of sandstone have been strongly identified with certain regions. Rock formations that are primarily composed of sandstone usually allow the percolation of water and other fluids and are porosity, porous enough to store large quantities, making them valuable aquifers and petroleum reservoirs. Quartz-bearing sandstone can be changed into quartzite through metamorphism ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
List Of Fossiliferous Stratigraphic Units In Oklahoma
This article contains a list of fossil-bearing stratigraphic units in the state of Oklahoma, U.S. Sites See also * Paleontology in Oklahoma References * List of Formations in the National Geologic Map Database {{DEFAULTSORT:Fossiliferous stratigraphic units in Oklahoma Oklahoma Stratigraphic units A stratigraphic unit is a volume of rock of identifiable origin and relative age range that is defined by the distinctive and dominant, easily mapped and recognizable petrographic, lithologic or paleontologic features (facies) that characterize ... Stratigraphy of Oklahoma Oklahoma geography-related lists United States geology-related lists ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Purgatoire Formation
The Purgatoire Formation is an abandoned (1987) Cretaceous period geologic formation classification. The classification was used in Colorado, New Mexico, and Oklahoma, with mentions in older geologic literature in neighboring states.Griggs and Read, 1959. Units previously classified as members of the abandoned formation, including Lytle, Mesa Rica, Pajarito, Romeroville, and Glencairn, have been generally elevated to formation rank. Particularly, significant divisions of the Purgatoire classification, Lytle and Glencairn, were realized as having characteristics of formations in their own right as well as representing the greatest disconformity in the Lower Cretaceous sediments of the Western Interior Seaway. Rather than including these promoted formations in an elevated Purgatoire Group, the Mesa Rica, Pajarito, and Romeroville were placed in a definition of the Dakota Group local to the Dry Cimarron. See also * List of fossiliferous stratigraphic units in Colorado * Pa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mortoniceras
''Mortoniceras'' is an ammonoid genus belonging to the superfamily Acanthocerataceae, named by Meek in 1876, based on ''Ammonites vespertinu'', named by Morton in 1834. ''Mortoniceras'' is the type genus of the Mortoniceratinae, one of 4 subfamilies in the Brancoceratidae which is part of the Acanthocerataceae (renamed Acanthoceratoidea to conform with the ICZN ruling on superfamily endings) Distribution ''Mortoniceras'' is found in middle and upper Albian sediments, at the end of the Lower Cretaceous in Algeria, Angola, Armenia, Belgium, Canada (British Columbia), Colombia ( Hiló Formation), Ecuador, France, Germany, Iran, Japan, Madagascar, Mexico, Mozambique, Nigeria, South Africa, Spain, Suriname, Switzerland, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, the United States (California, New Mexico, Texas, Oregon), and Venezuela. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ammonite
Ammonoids are a group of extinct marine mollusc animals in the subclass Ammonoidea of the class Cephalopoda. These molluscs, commonly referred to as ammonites, are more closely related to living coleoids (i.e., octopuses, squid and cuttlefish) than they are to shelled nautiloids such as the living ''Nautilus'' species. The earliest ammonites appeared during the Devonian, with the last species vanishing during the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event. Ammonites are excellent index fossils, and linking the rock layer in which a particular species or genus is found to specific geologic time periods is often possible. Their fossil shells usually take the form of planispirals, although some helically spiraled and nonspiraled forms (known as heteromorphs) have been found. The name "ammonite", from which the scientific term is derived, was inspired by the spiral shape of their fossilized shells, which somewhat resemble tightly coiled rams' horns. Pliny the Elder ( 79 AD near Pomp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charirichnium
An ichnofacies is an assemblage of trace fossils that provides an indication of the conditions that their formative organisms inhabited. Concept Trace fossil assemblages are far from random; the range of fossils recorded in association is constrained by the environment in which the trace-making organisms dwelt. Palaeontologist Adolf Seilacher pioneered the concept of ichnofacies, whereby the state of a sedimentary system at its time of deposition could be deduced by noting the trace fossils in association with one another. Significance Ichnofacies can provide information about water depth, salinity, turbidity and energy. In general, traces found in shallower water are vertical, those in deeper water are more horizontal and patterned. This is partly because of the relative abundance of suspended food particles, such as plankton, in the shallower waters of the photic zone, and partly because vertical burrows are more secure in the turbulent conditions of shallow water. In dee ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clayton Lake State Park
Clayton Lake State Park is a state park of New Mexico, United States, featuring a recreational reservoir and a fossil trackway of dinosaur footprints. It is located north of Clayton, New Mexico, Clayton, close to New Mexico's border with Colorado, Oklahoma, and Texas. The park is accessed via New Mexico State Road 455. The landscape is characterized by rolling grasslands, volcanic rocks, and sandstone bluffs, set on the western edge of the Great Plains. The park area was a stopover point for travelers along the Cimarron Cutoff of the Santa Fe Trail. Visitor activities include picnicking, camping, and fishing at the lake, as well as viewing one of the most extensive dinosaur trackways in North America. Clayton Lake was created by the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish in 1955 as a fishing lake and winter waterfowl resting area. A dam was constructed across Seneca Creek (New Mexico/Oklahoma), Seneca Creek, which is actually a series of seeps except after heavy rains. During t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Colorado
Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains. Colorado is the eighth most extensive and 21st most populous U.S. state. The 2020 United States census enumerated the population of Colorado at 5,773,714, an increase of 14.80% since the 2010 United States census. The region has been inhabited by Native Americans and their ancestors for at least 13,500 years and possibly much longer. The eastern edge of the Rocky Mountains was a major migration route for early peoples who spread throughout the Americas. "''Colorado''" is the Spanish adjective meaning "ruddy", the color of the Fountain Formation outcroppings found up and down the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains. The Territory of Colorado was organized on February 28, 1861, and on August 1, 1876, U.S. President Ulyss ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dinosaur Tracks
A trace fossil, also known as an ichnofossil (; from el, ἴχνος ''ikhnos'' "trace, track"), is a fossil record of biological activity but not the preserved remains of the plant or animal itself. Trace fossils contrast with body fossils, which are the fossilized remains of parts of organisms' bodies, usually altered by later chemical activity or mineralization. The study of such trace fossils is ichnology and is the work of ichnologists. Trace fossils may consist of impressions made on or in the substrate by an organism. For example, burrows, borings (bioerosion), urolites (erosion caused by evacuation of liquid wastes), footprints and feeding marks and root cavities may all be trace fossils. The term in its broadest sense also includes the remains of other organic material produced by an organism; for example coprolites (fossilized droppings) or chemical markers (sedimentological structures produced by biological means; for example, the formation of stromatolites). H ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Genus
Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family (taxonomy), family. In binomial nomenclature, the genus name forms the first part of the binomial species name for each species within the genus. :E.g. ''Panthera leo'' (lion) and ''Panthera onca'' (jaguar) are two species within the genus ''Panthera''. ''Panthera'' is a genus within the family Felidae. The composition of a genus is determined by taxonomy (biology), taxonomists. The standards for genus classification are not strictly codified, so different authorities often produce different classifications for genera. There are some general practices used, however, including the idea that a newly defined genus should fulfill these three criteria to be descriptively useful: # monophyly – all descendants ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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