Distinguishing brackish lacustrine from brackish marine deposits in the stratigraphic record: A case study from the late Miocene and early Pliocene Bouse Formation, Arizona and California, USA

Bright, Jordon; Cohen, Andrew S.; Starratt, Scott W.

doi:10.1016/j.earscirev.2018.08.011

Cited by 17 publications

(18 citation statements)

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“…The Bouse Formation in the studied area formed at the margin of a tidal strait near the north end of the Gulf of California oblique rift as indicated by marine and brackish-water fossils and a wide range of tidal sedimentary structures (e.g., Buising, 1990;Turak, 2000;McDougall, 2008;McDougall & Miranda-Martinez, 2014;Dorsey et al, 2018;Garnder & Dorsey, in press). Although some authors favour an isolated inland-lake model for the Bouse Formation in the study area (Spencer & Patchett, 1997;House et al, 2008;Spencer et al, 2008Spencer et al, , 2013Bright et al, 2016Bright et al, , 2018a2018b), the lacustrine model is incompatible with abundant evidence for intertidal, marine to brackish-water fossils and trace fossils, and widespread tideinfluenced sedimentary structures (Buising, 1990;Turak, 2000;O'Connell et al, 2017;Dorsey et al, 2018;Garnder & Dorsey, in press).…”

Section: Regional Geologymentioning

confidence: 93%

“…The Bouse Formation deposits display tidal cyclicity similar to that of the modern Gulf of California (Marinone, 1997;O'Connell et al, 2017), and the tectonic setting and basin geometries are well constrained (Dorsey et al, 2018;Garnder & Dorsey, in press). Published analyses, however, are incomplete, and some studies favour a lacustrine origin for the Bouse Formation in its southern exposures along the lower Colorado River region (e.g., Spencer & Patchett, 1997;House et al, 2008;Spencer et al, 2013;Bright et al, 2016Bright et al, , 2018aBright et al, , 2018b. Spencer et al (2008) (grey).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Mixed carbonate-siliciclastic tidal sedimentation in the Miocene to Pliocene Bouse Formation, palaeo-Gulf of California

O’Connell¹,

Dorsey²,

Hood³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Mixed carbonate-siliciclastic deposits provide unique insights into hydrodynamic processes that control sedimentation in tidal systems. This study presents sedimentologic an¬¬d ichnologic data from the upper Miocene¬ to lower Pliocene Bouse Formation, which accumulated during regional transgression at the margin of a tidal strait near the north end of the ancestral Gulf of California. The basal carbonate member of the Bouse Formation records deposition in a tide-influenced, compositionally mixed carbonate-siliciclastic system dominated by salt marsh, tidal flat, and channel environments. The basal carbonate member is an overall deepening up succession of facies associations (FA) comprising: FA1 siliciclastic-rich heterolithic facies, lime mudstone with desiccation cracks, and plant debris rich carbonate silt interpreted as siliciclastic-rich tidal flats; FA2 well-sorted gravels, siliciclastic-rich sandy strata, lime mudstone with desiccation cracks, and sandy microbial micrite interpreted as tidal-channel deposits; FA3 carbonate-rich heterolithic lime mudstone to well sorted, crossbedded bioclastic grainstone interpreted as intertidal to shallow subtidal deposits; and FA4 lime mudstone interpreted as shallow to deep subtidal low-energy deposits that record the end of tidal conditions in the basin. Trace fossils include marine forms Gyrolithes, Teichichnus, Thalassinoides, and non-diagnostic forms Arenicolites, Cochlichnus, Conichnus, Lockeia, Planolites, Skolithos, and Treptichnus (known from marine, brackish, and freshwater environments). The diminutive size of trace fossils reflects brackish conditions created by mixing of freshwater and seawater. This study provides evidence for a late Miocene to early Pliocene humid climate in southwestern North America, in stark contrast to the modern hyperarid climate. Factors that controlled the relative percent of mixed carbonate and siliciclastic sediment include siliciclastic input from local rivers, in situ carbonate production, current energy, degree of tidal mixing, and relative sea level. Pronounced facies variability at bedform, outcrop, and basin scale documented in this study appears to be an important characteristic of mixed carbonate-siliciclastic deposits in tidal depositional systems.

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Section: Regional Geologymentioning

confidence: 93%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mixed carbonate-siliciclastic tidal sedimentation in the Miocene to Pliocene Bouse Formation, palaeo-Gulf of California

O’Connell¹,

Dorsey²,

Hood³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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“…However, these sedimentary structures have also been reported from numerous ancient lacustrine settings where they can form by flashy fluvial discharge along shorelines and into the littoral zones of lakes as fluvial flow competency decreases via dissipation and flow expansion and via interactions with waves (e.g. Greenwood and Sherman, 1986;Ilgar and Nemec, 2005;Smith et al, 2015;Andrews and Hartley, 2015;O'Connell et al, 2017;Bright et al, 2018;Dorsey et al, 2018;Shchepetkina et al, 2019). In contrast to the discrete intervals in which such rippled facies are reported in lacustrine strata (op.…”

Section: Features Indicative Of Periodically Reversing or Flashy (Frementioning

confidence: 97%

“…We have not determined periodicities of the Nonesuch tidal bundles to see if they match tidal spectra for 1 Ga but such spectra require additional evidence to be conclusive. For example, Fourier transformations on laminae and foreset couplets preserved in the Neogene Bouse Formation, California, USA, yielded power spectra interpreted by some workers as daily-monthly tidal rhythmites (O'Connel et al 2017) and by others as decadal-scale climatic lacustrine cycles (Bright et al 2018). A tidal interpretation was confirmed by the presence of herring-bone cross strata (Dorsey et al 2019).…”

Section: Periodically Repetitive Sedimentary Structuresmentioning

confidence: 99%

A marine origin for the late Mesoproterozoic Copper Harbor and Nonesuch Formations of the Midcontinent Rift of Laurentia

Jones

Prave

Raub

et al. 2020

Precambrian Research

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The c. 1.1 Ga Copper Harbor and Nonesuch formations of the Keweenawan Supergroup exposed along the Canadian-United States shorelines of Lake Superior are part of the surface exposures of the Laurentian Midcontinent Rift. These units have long been considered non-marine in origin and have figured prominently in ideas regarding the evolution of microbial life and the redox conditions of Earth's ocean-atmosphere system at the close of Mesoproterozoic time. However, these rocks also host hydrothermal metal deposits, the emplacement of which may have compromised primary geochemical signals that are used to underpin those ideas. Here we highlight new sedimentological observations to provide an independent framework for assessing the depositional setting and geochemistry of those strata. We show that the totality of sedimentological features leads to the conclusion that parts of the upper Copper Harbor Formation and the entirety of the Nonesuch Formation were deposited along tide-and waveinfluenced shorelines and in shallow-marine settings under evaporitic conditions. Evidence for this interpretation includes the abundance of flaser, wavy, linsen and pinstripe bedding, ubiquity of reactivation surfaces and mud drapes associated with all ripple forms, superposed sets of ripple cross-lamination showing bimodal (herring-bone) sediment transport directions, desiccation cracks and metre-scale hummocky cross-stratification. Further, evaporite fabrics and pseudomorphs after gypsum in the upper 200 m of the Copper Harbor Formation and in numerous stratigraphic positions within the Nonesuch Formation indicate that the water body was saline, not fresh. The emerging palaeogeographic image is one of a large, shallow-marine embayment with fringing sabkha-like shorelines. Ideas about late Mesoproterozoic biospheric evolution and Earth's surface redox and oxygenation that rely on the Nonesuch Formation and Copper Harbor stromatolites having been deposited within a lacustrine setting require reassessment.

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“…The Bouse Formation in the southern Blythe Basin has been variably interpreted to record deposition in either a large saline lake (Spencer and Patchett, 1997;Spencer et al, 2008Spencer et al, , 2013Pearthree and House, 2014;Bright et al, 2016Bright et al, , 2018aBright et al, , 2018bGootee et al, 2019) or a shallow-marine tidal strait or estuary (Buising, 1990;Turak, 2000;McDougall, 2008;McDougall and Miranda Martínez, 2014 Sherrod and Tosdal, 1991). "36bbb" is a water well in which Bouse Forma tion was recorded to a depth of 92 m and did not penetrate the base of the Bouse Formation (Metzger et al, 1973).…”

Section: ■ Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tectonostratigraphic record of late Miocene–early Pliocene transtensional faulting in the Eastern California shear zone, southwestern USA

et al. 2021

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The Eastern California shear zone (ECSZ; southwestern USA) accommodates ~20%–25% of Pacific–North America relative plate motion east of the San Andreas fault, yet little is known about its early tectonic evolution. This paper presents a detailed stratigraphic and structural analysis of the uppermost Miocene to lower Pliocene Bouse Formation in the southern Blythe Basin, lower Colorado River valley, where gently dipping and faulted strata provide a record of deformation in the paleo-ECSZ. In the western Trigo Mountains, splaying strands of the Lost Trigo fault zone include a west-dipping normal fault that cuts the Bouse Formation and a steeply NE-dipping oblique dextral-normal fault where an anomalously thick (~140 m) section of Bouse Formation siliciclastic deposits filled a local fault-controlled depocenter. Systematic basinward thickening and stratal wedge geometries in the western Trigo and southeastern Palo Verde Mountains, on opposite sides of the Colorado River valley, record basinward tilting during deposition of the Bouse Formation. We conclude that the southern Blythe Basin formed as a broad transtensional sag basin in a diffuse releasing stepover between the dextral Laguna fault system in the south and the Cibola and Big Maria fault zones in the north. A palinspastic reconstruction at 5 Ma shows that the southern Blythe Basin was part of a diffuse regional network of linked right-stepping dextral, normal, and oblique-slip faults related to Pacific–North America plate boundary dextral shear. Diffuse transtensional strain linked northward to the Stateline fault system, eastern Garlock fault, and Walker Lane, and southward to the Gulf of California shear zone, which initiated ca. 7–9 Ma, implying a similar age of inception for the paleo-ECSZ.

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Distinguishing brackish lacustrine from brackish marine deposits in the stratigraphic record: A case study from the late Miocene and early Pliocene Bouse Formation, Arizona and California, USA

Cited by 17 publications

References 291 publications

Mixed carbonate-siliciclastic tidal sedimentation in the Miocene to Pliocene Bouse Formation, palaeo-Gulf of California

Mixed carbonate-siliciclastic tidal sedimentation in the Miocene to Pliocene Bouse Formation, palaeo-Gulf of California

A marine origin for the late Mesoproterozoic Copper Harbor and Nonesuch Formations of the Midcontinent Rift of Laurentia

Tectonostratigraphic record of late Miocene–early Pliocene transtensional faulting in the Eastern California shear zone, southwestern USA

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