Huntersville Chert | |
---|---|
Stratigraphic range: Emsian to Eifelian | |
Type | Formation |
Sub-units | Bobs Ridge Sandstone Member |
Underlies | Marcellus Shale, Onondaga Limestone, Tioga Bentonites |
Overlies | Oriskany Formation |
Lithology | |
Primary | chert |
Other | siltstone, sandstone, limestone, dolomite |
Location | |
Region | Appalachia and Southeastern United States |
Country | United States |
Extent | Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia |
Type section | |
Named for | Huntersville, West Virginia |
Named by | Price, 1929 |
The Huntersville Chert or Huntersville Formation is a Devonian geologic formation in the Appalachian region of the United States. It is primarily composed of mottled white, yellow, and dark grey chert, and is separated from the underlying Oriskany Sandstone by an unconformity. [1] The Huntersville Chert is laterally equivalent to the Needmore Shale, which lies north of the New River. It is also laterally equivalent to a sandy limestone unit which is often equated with the Onondaga Limestone. to the west and the Needmore Shale to the east. [1] These formations are placed in the Onesquethaw Stage of Appalachian chronostratigraphy, roughly equivalent to the Emsian and Eifelian stages of the broader Devonian system. [2] [1]
Most Huntersville Chert outcrops are located in southeastern West Virginia and southwestern Virginia, though well logs indicate that it was present deep underground in other states in the region. It represents a deep-water environment during a major transgression event. The chert has a mottled appearance due to a heterogenous structure of pure and discolored chert. The darker chert is heavily fractured and contains impurities such as glauconite pellets, silty and argillaceous grains, organic material, or dolomite and calcite crystals. The chert is at least partially biogenic, as some chert facies are primarily composed of hollow sponge spicules filled with hydrocarbons. [3] Aeolian dust blowing in from hot, dry areas may also be responsible for some of the silica forming the chert. [4] Compared to equivalent formations, the composition of the Huntersville Chert is at least 50% chert. [2]
The uppermost layers of the Huntersville Chert are glauconitic sandstones rich in shells of spiriferid brachiopods. [1] These layers have been named as the Bobs Ridge Sandstone member. [2] They are directly overlain by a prominent ash bed, the Tioga Bentonite. The Bobs Ridge Sandstone and Tioga Bentonite indicate uplift and volcanic activity in the region, respectively. [3] The Tioga Bentonite, sometimes called the Tioga Ash Bed or Metabentonite, lies at the base of the Marcellus Shale. [2]
The Onondaga Limestone is a group of hard limestones and dolomites of Devonian age that forms geographic features in some areas in which it outcrops; in others, especially its Southern Ontario portion, the formation can be less prominent as a local surface feature.
The geology of Tennessee is as diverse as its landscapes. Politically, Tennessee is broken up into three Grand Divisions: East, Middle, and West Tennessee. Physically, Tennessee is also separated into three main types of landforms: river valley plain, highlands and basins, and mountains.
Bald Eagle Mountain – once known locally as Muncy Mountain – is a stratigraphic ridge in the Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians of central Pennsylvania, United States, running east of the Allegheny Front and northwest of Mount Nittany. It lies along the southeast side of Bald Eagle Creek and south of the West Branch Susquehanna River, and is the westernmost ridge in its section of the Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians. The ridge line separates the West Branch Susquehanna Valley from the Nippenose and White Deer Hole valleys, and Bald Eagle Valley from Nittany Valley.
The San Juan Basin is a geologic structural basin located near the Four Corners region of the Southwestern United States. The basin covers 7,500 square miles and resides in northwestern New Mexico, southwestern Colorado, and parts of Utah and Arizona. Specifically, the basin occupies space in the San Juan, Rio Arriba, Sandoval, and McKinley counties in New Mexico, and La Plata and Archuleta counties in Colorado. The basin extends roughly 100 miles (160 km) N-S and 90 miles (140 km) E-W.
The Hamilton Group is a Devonian-age geological group which is located in the Appalachian region of the United States. It is present in New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio, West Virginia, northwestern Virginia and Ontario, Canada, and is mainly composed of marine shale with some sandstone.
The Devonian Mahantango Formation is a mapped bedrock unit in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Maryland. It is named for the North branch of the Mahantango Creek in Perry and Juniata counties in Pennsylvania. It is a member of the Hamilton Group, along with the underlying the Marcellus Formation Shale. South of Tuscarora Mountain in south central Pennsylvania, the lower members of this unit were also mapped as the Montebello Formation. Details of the type section and of stratigraphic nomenclature for this unit as used by the U.S. Geological Survey are available on-line at the National Geologic Map Database.
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The Marcellus Formation or the Marcellus Shale is a Middle Devonian age unit of sedimentary rock found in eastern North America. Named for a distinctive outcrop near the village of Marcellus, New York, in the United States, it extends throughout much of the Appalachian Basin.
The Banff Formation is a stratigraphical unit of Devonian age in the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin.
The Devonian Old Port Formation is a mapped bedrock unit in Pennsylvania, USA. Details of the type section and of stratigraphic nomenclature for this unit as used by the U.S. Geological Survey are available on-line at the National Geologic Map Database. Current nomenclature usage by U.S. Geological Survey restricts the name Old Port Formation to Pennsylvania, but correlative units are present in adjacent states.
The Gravelbourg Formation is a stratigraphical unit of Bajocian age in the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin.
The Devonian Foreknobs Formation is a mapped bedrock unit in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia.
The Rockwell Formation is a late Devonian and early Mississippian mapped bedrock unit in West Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania, in the United States.
The Devonian Brallier Formation is a mapped bedrock unit in Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia, and Virginia.
The Oriskany Sandstone is a Middle Devonian age unit of sedimentary rock found in eastern North America. The type locality of the unit is located at Oriskany Falls in New York. The Oriskany Sandstone extends throughout much of the Appalachian Basin.
The Cleveland Shale, also referred to as the Cleveland Member, is a shale geologic formation in the eastern United States.
The Tomstown Dolomite or Tomstown Formation is a geologic formation in Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia. It preserves fossils dating to the Cambrian Period.
The Graneros Shale is a geologic formation in the United States identified in the Great Plains as well as New Mexico that dates to the Cenomanian Age of the Cretaceous Period. It is defined as the finely sandy argillaceous or clayey near-shore/marginal-marine shale that lies above the older, non-marine Dakota sand and mud, but below the younger, chalky open-marine shale of the Greenhorn. This definition was made in Colorado by G. K. Gilbert and has been adopted in other states that use Gilbert's division of the Benton's shales into Carlile, Greenhorn, and Graneros. These states include Kansas, Texas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, and New Mexico as well as corners of Minnesota and Iowa. North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, and Montana have somewhat different usages — in particular, north and west of the Black Hills, the same rock and fossil layer is named Belle Fourche Shale.
The Blairmore Group, originally named the Blairmore Formation, is a geologic unit of Early Cretaceous age in the Western Canada Sedimentary Basin that is present in southwestern Alberta and southeastern British Columbia. It is subdivided into four formations: Cadomin Formation, Gladstone, Beaver Mines and Ma Butte, all of which are defined by type sections, most of which contain plant fossils. In some areas the Blairmore contains significant reservoirs of natural gas.
The Tioga Bentonites are a series of ash bed layers occurring in three Sedimentary basins in the eastern and midwestern United States. The primary basin they are found in is the Appalachian Basin, as well as the Illinois Basin and the Michigan Basin. Due to an unconformity these ash beds are not present in the southern Appalachians.