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The AAPG/Datapages Combined Publications Database

CSPG Bulletin

Abstract


Bulletin of Canadian Petroleum Geology
Vol. 14 (1966), No. 4. (December), Pages 600-600

Notes on Late Cambrian and Early Ordovician Biostratigraphy of Southeast British Columbia [Abstract]

G. O. Raasch1, C. J. Bruce1

ABSTRACT

Investigations by Shell Canada field parties in the White River Area, southeastern British Columbia in 1963, and in related areas of Alberta and British Columbia, have made it possible to demonstrate a biostratigraphic zonation for the McKay-Glenogle-Skoki succession. The McKay, which is subdivided physically into six units, comprises the (Franconian) Elvinia, Conaspis, Ptychaspis-Prosaukia, and the (Trempealeauan) Saukia Zones, as well as Lower Ordovician Zones A, B, D, E and G, of the Cordilleran Standard succession set up by Rueben J. Ross Jr. (1952) in the Garden City Formation of eastern Utah.

Five discrete graptolite zones and subzones are recognized in the Glenogle Shale succession.

The graptolitic shales containing the Isograptus forcipiformis assemblage were found to intertongue with shelly limestones bearing the fauna of Zone L of the Utah sequence, which constitutes the lowest zone of the Whiterock Stage of Cooper (1956). Occurring together in the Zone L equivalent in the lower part of the Skoki Formation are the diagnostic brachiopods Orthidiella and Paucicostella along with the trilobite Ectenonotus westoni (Billings). The assemblage is designated the "Orthidiella-Ectenonotus Zone."

Above the Orthidiella-Ectenonotus Zone and at the top of the Skoki are Zone M-h equivalent faunas, designated the "Kanoskia-Palliseria Zone."

The problem of the relationship of such controversial "stages" as Whiterockian Table Headian to the Canadian (Beekmantown) and Chazyan of the standard succession is discussed. The writers conclude that the Whiterockian as modified by Ross (1964) is older than the type Chazy, and younger than the Cassinian, defined by Flower (1964) as the youngest stage of the Canadian. They recommend recognition of the Whiterockian (amended) as a closing, post-Cassinian stage of the Canadian Series, an interpretation supported by the presence of the Zone M brachiopod Anomalorthis in the latest Beekmantown Providence Island Formation of New York.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND ASSOCIATED FOOTNOTES

1 Shell Canada Ltd., Calgary and Edmonton, Alberta

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