A study of the depositional environment of the Poison Canyon Sandstone (Brushy Basin Member of the Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation) in the Mariano mine was undertaken to determine the relation of uranium occurrence to the depositional environment. An analysis of the sedimentary structures, paleocurrent measurements, isopach data, and electric-log shapes has led to the interpretation that the Poison Canyon Sandstone in the Mariano Lake mine vicinity is a sequence of bed-load deposits of a fluvial system. Paleocurrent measurements taken in the mine and at three outcrops of the Poison Canyon confirm findings from earlier work that indicated eastward current flow. The dominance of tabular cross-beds, channel scours, and trough cross-beds, the geometry of the Poison Canyon s ndstones, and the chaotic sedimentary structures corroborate deposition in a braided-stream environment.

The Poison Canyon sandstones may be subdivided into two lithofacies. A cross-bedded unit is characterized by large-scale tabular cross-beds, scour surfaces, medium to coarse grain size, poor sorting, angular to subangular grains, an abundance of feldspar grains, and clay rip-up clasts. A second unit is dominated by laminar bedding, fine grain size, moderate sorting, subrounded grains, and an abundance of quartz. The source area for the sands had been dominated by plutonic rocks. These facies cannot be separated on the basis of electric-log shape. Uranium ore occurs in both facies but is more abundant in the cross-bedded unit.

The complexities of the braided-stream system greatly complicate any study of the interrelation of the uranium and the depositional environment. Obvious conclusions are that the grain size does not greatly influence the emplacement of the uranium, that the orebody at the Mariano mine is epigenetic, and that the sheetlike nature of the Poison Canyon sandstones suggests that the limiting factors on the ore boundaries are geochemical rather than stratigraphic.

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