Bell Canyon Formation

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Bell Canyon Formation
Stratigraphic range: Guadalupian
Type Formation
Unit of Delaware Mountain Group
Underlies Castile Formation
Overlies Cherry Canyon Formation
Thickness200–300 m (660–980 ft)
Lithology
Primary Sandstone, siltstone
Other Limestone
Location
Coordinates 31°56′09″N104°43′25″W / 31.9359°N 104.7237°W / 31.9359; -104.7237
Region New Mexico
Texas
Country United States
Type section
Named forBell Canyon
Named byDeFord and Lloyd
Year defined1940
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Bell Canyon Formation (the United States)
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Bell Canyon Formation (Texas)

The Bell Canyon Formation is a geologic formation found in the Delaware Basin of southeastern New Mexico and western Texas. It contains fossils characteristic of the Guadalupian Age of the Permian Period. [1]

Contents

Description

The formation consists mostly of marine sandstone and siltstone, but with five interfingering tongues of gray limestone. These extend from the Capitan reef into what was then deep, anoxic water 300–500 meters (980–1,640 ft) deep of the Permian Basin. Total thickness of the formation is 200–300 meters (660–980 ft). [2]

Fossils

The formation's Lamar Limestone Member of Guadalupe Mountains National Park has produced fossil holocephalan teeth. [3]

History of investigation

The unit was first designated as a formation by DeFord and Lloyd in 1940, who raised the Delaware Mountain Formation to group rank and designed its previously informal members as formations. [4] [5]

Footnotes

  1. Kues & Giles 2004, p. 100.
  2. Kues & Giles 2004, pp. 125–127.
  3. Hunt, Santucci & Kenworthy 2006, p. 64.
  4. DeFord & Lloyd 1940.
  5. King 1942.

References