The Grünbach Formation is an

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

geological formation 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 exp ...

that dates to the lower

Campanian The Campanian is the fifth of six ages of the Late Cretaceous Epoch on the geologic timescale of the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS). In chronostratigraphy, it is the fifth of six stages in the Upper Cretaceous Series. Campanian s ...

age of the

Late Cretaceous The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretaceous Period is divided in the geologic time scale. Rock strata from this epoch form the Upper Cretaceous Series. The Cretaceous is named after ''creta'', the ...

. it forms part of the

Gosau Group The Gosau Group (German: ''Gosau-Gruppe'') is a geological stratigraphic group in Austria, Germany and western Slovakia whose strata date back to the Late Cretaceous to Eocene.Höfling, 1985McCann, 2008 It is exposed in numerous sporadic isolated ...

, and represents a

marine regression A marine regression is a geological process occurring when areas of submerged seafloor are exposed above the sea level. The opposite event, marine transgression, occurs when flooding from the sea covers previously-exposed land. Evidence of marine ...

event, representing a coastal/brackish environment, being underlain by the marine carbonate Maiersdorf Formation and overlain by the deep marine siliciclastic Piesting Formation. The main lithology is

clay Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4). Clays develop plasticity when wet, due to a molecular film of water surrounding the clay par ...

marl Marl is an earthy material rich in carbonate minerals, clays, and silt. When hardened into rock, this becomes marlstone. It is formed in marine or freshwater environments, often through the activities of algae. Marl makes up the lower part o ...

siltstone Siltstone, also known as aleurolite, is a clastic sedimentary rock that is composed mostly of silt. It is a form of mudrock with a low clay mineral content, which can be distinguished from shale by its lack of fissility.Blatt ''et al.'' 1980, p ...

and

sandstone 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) ...

, with a minor conglomerate component.

Coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when dea ...

seams have also been noted. It is notable for its fossils including those of dinosaurs and plants.

Vertebrate paleofauna

All remains have been found at a single locality, which is a thin marl seam in the Konstantin mining tunnel, within the Felbering Mine in the Neue Welt area north west of Muthmannsdorf in Lower Austria. The initial remains were discovered in 1859 after an ornithopod tooth was found in a piece of coal in a dump outside the mine by Professor

Ferdinand Stoliczka Ferdinand Stoliczka (Czech written Stolička, 7 June 1838 – 19 June 1874) was a Moravian palaeontologist who worked in India on paleontology, geology and various aspects of zoology, including ornithology, malacology, and herpetology. He died of ...

, and the productive seam discovered thereafter. The first material was described by

Emanuel Bunzel Emanuel Bunzel (1828–1895), was an Austrian paleontologist. Biography Emanuel Bunzel was born in Prague, Kingdom of Bohemia (today the Czech Republic), in 1828. In 1871, he described a skull fragment found in an Austrian coal mine in 1859 by ...

in 1871 and then additional material was described by

Harry Seeley Harry Govier Seeley (18 February 1839 – 8 January 1909) was a British paleontologist. Early life Seeley was born in London on 18 February 1839, the second son of Richard Hovill Seeley, a goldsmith, and his second wife Mary Govier. When his fat ...

in 1881. Due to mining activity in the area ceasing at the end of the 19th century, no additional remains have been recovered since.

Squamates

Crocodyliformes

Choristoderes

Turtles

Pterosaurs

Non-avian dinosaurs

Flora

Most of these specimens were recovered from mining dumps near Grünbach am Schneeberg in lower Austria. The flora of the formation is considered to represent that of a high humidity subtropical climate, typical of the Euro-Sinian

phytogeographical region A phytochorion, in phytogeography, is a geographic area with a relatively uniform composition of plant species. Adjacent phytochoria do not usually have a sharp boundary, but rather a soft one, a transitional area in which many species from both r ...

Bryophytes

Lycopodiophyta

Pteridophytes

Gymnosperms

Angiosperms

Monocots

Dicots

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Grunbach Formation Geologic formations of Austria Upper Cretaceous Series of Europe Campanian Stage Cretaceous Austria Paleontology in Austria