About This Item

Share This Item

The AAPG/Datapages Combined Publications Database

GCAGS Transactions

Abstract


Gulf Coast Association of Geological Societies Transactions
Vol. 28 (1978), Pages 33-45

Distribution and Geometry of an Oolite-Shoal Complex--Lower Cretaceous Sligo Formation, South Texas (1)

D. G. Bebout, R. A. Schatzinger (2)

ABSTRACT

An elongate complex of mobile oolite shoals and stable grain flats occur in the top 50 to 100 feet of the Lower Cretaceous Sligo Formation, South Texas. The shoal complex is approximately 90 miles long parallel to, and about 40 miles inland of, the Cretaceous shelf edge. Individual shoals are approximately 10 miles wide and are oriented perpendicular to the trend of the entire complex.

Oolite grainstone occurs as a narrow band on the seaward side of each shoal. Landward of the oolite bars, oolites mixed with carbonate mud on stabilized grain flats to form oolite packstones. Further landward, the sediments comprise increasing amounts of pellet, intraclast, and algal wackestone and packstone and lesser amounts of grainstone. Seaward of the oolite grainstone is a fringe of skeletal grainstone.

Successive landward shifts of younger oolite grainstone units support the interpretation of the Sligo as a transgressive shoal complex analogous to the present-day Joulters Cay on the eastern side of the Great Bahama Bank. The oolite-shoal complex occurs on a low structural feature -- the Pearsall arch -- which effectively divides the broad Sligo shelf into an inner and outer part.


Pay-Per-View Purchase Options

The article is available through a document delivery service. Explain these Purchase Options.

Watermarked PDF Document: $14
Open PDF Document: $24