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Hasiotis, Stephen T., Brian F. Platt, Mark Reilly, Kathryn Amos, Simon Lang, David Kennedy, Jonathan A. Todd, and Ellinor Michel, 2012, Actualistic studies of the spatial and temporal distribution of terrestrial and aquatic organism traces in continental environments to differentiate lacustrine from fluvial eolian, and marine deposits in the geologic record, in O. W. Baganz, Y. Bartov, K. Bohacs, and D. Nummedal, eds., Lacustrine sandstone reservoirs and hydrocarbon systems: AAPG Memoir 95, p. 433–489.

DOI:10.1306/13291400M953457

Copyright copy2012 by The American Association of Petroleum Geologists.

Actualistic Studies of the Spatial and Temporal Distribution of Terrestrial and Aquatic Organism Traces in Continental Environments to Differentiate Lacustrine from Fluvial, Eolian, and Marine Deposits in the Geologic Record

Stephen T. Hasiotis,1 Brian F. Platt,2 Mark Reilly,3 Kathryn Amos,4 Simon Lang,5 David Kennedy,6 Jonathan A. Todd,7 Ellinor Michel8

1University of Kansas, Department of Geology, Lawrence, Kansas, U.S.A.
2University of Kansas, Department of Geology, Lawrence, Kansas, U.S.A.
3Department of Archaeology, Flinders University, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia; Present address: Centre for Tectonics, Resources and Exploration (TRaX), Australian School of Petroleum, The University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
4Centre for Tectonics, Resources and Exploration (TRaX), Australian School of Petroleum, The University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
5Centre for Tectonics, Resources and Exploration (TRaX), Australian School of Petroleum, The University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia; Present address: Woodside Energy, Ltd., Perth, Western Australia, Australia
6Department of Geoscience, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, U.S.A.
7Natural History Museum, Department of Zoology, London, United Kingdom
8Natural History Museum, Department of Zoology, London, United Kingdom

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Stephen T. Hasiotis thanks Dag Nummedal, Yuval Bartov, and especially Terry Baganz for encouraging him strongly to contribute to this important AAPG Memoir. Fieldwork for this research was conducted with the Nyanza Project, a tropical lakes research program at Lake Tanganyika (National Science Foundation grants ATM0223920 and ATM9619458). He also acknowledges support from the University of Kansas General Research Fund for research in Lake Tanganyika (GRF-2301364 and GRF-2301454) and in Australia, Ellinor Michel acknowledges support from National Science Foundation grant DEB9303281 and BIR9113362. David Kennedy acknowledges support from the Geological Society of America, the Wilson Raynor Thompson Memorial Scholarship, and the University of Arizona Department of Geosciences Fellowship. The Lake Eyre research was conducted by the Lake Eyre Basin Analogues Research Group (Australian School of Petroleum, University of Adelaide) and funded by Anadarko, BG Group, BHP Billiton, BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil, Shell and Woodside. Kathryn Amos' contribution to this manuscript forms TRaX Record No. 118. We also thank S. Kidman amp Company, Ltd., for access to Anna Creek and The Peake Stations. We also acknowledge the traditional landowners of the Lake Eyre region. We thank the contributions of colleagues who have taken part in discussions about these systems, particularly Carmen Krapf, Tobi Payenberg, Mario Werner, Saju Menacherry, Vic Waclawik, Marianne Sandstrom, and John Fisher. We are grateful to the Tanzanian Fisheries Research Institute for use of their facilities and equipment, as well as the University of Dar es Salaam. We also thank George Kazumbe for his invaluable assistance during our many dives. We thank Lisa Park and Kerrie Bann for comments and suggestions to greatly improve the manuscript.

ABSTRACT

Actualistic studies of modern continental environments and the spatial and temporal distribution of terrestrial and aquatic organisms are summarized and synthesized to understand how to better interpret the significance of trace fossils to differentiate lacustrine from fluvial, eolian, and marine deposits in the geologic record. The purpose of this approach is to develop an understanding of the physicochemical factors that control the occurrence, diversity, abundance, and tiering of organism behavior and parallels what is known for benthic and other trace-making organisms in marine environments. The distribution of traces observed in Lake Tanganyika and Lake Eyre, an overfilled lake in a tropical rift basin setting and an underfilled lake in an arid midlatitude ephemeral playa setting, respectively, are described, synthesized, and compared with the Mermia, Coprinisphaera, Termitichnus, Skolithos, and Scoyenia ichnofacies models proposed for continental environments. The comparisons show that all the models are inappropriate for the fluvial-lacustrine settings of Lake Tanganyika and Lake Eyre because the models do not support the environmental uniqueness or distinctive collection of traces across these environments, nor do they provide sufficient interpretive power. The multiple ichnocoenoses for each subenvironment observed in the balanced-filled and underfilled lacustrine systems more accurately record the environmental uniqueness and distinctive collection of traces found in each environment. Ichnocoenoses are better suited for continental depositional systems and their environments because they reflect the nature of processes and distribution of life in continental settings, which are inherently heterogeneous spatially and temporally. Ichnocoenoses also provide sufficient interpretive power for trace-fossil associations formed under different physicochemical conditions for each type of environment. General trends in trace-fossil diversity, abundance, distribution, and tiering are predicted for alluvial (fluvial), lacustrine, and eolian environments so that new models based on the distribution of ichnocoenoses and their sedimentary and pedogenic characteristics from outcrop and core can be constructed.

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