The Cook Mountain problem: Stratigraphic reality and semantic confusion
- Frontera Exploration Consultants, San Antonio, TX (United States)
Historical inconsistency as to what constitutes the Cook Mountain Formation illustrates the semantic confusion resulting from extending surface-derived stratigraphic names into the subsurface without a full understanding of basin architecture. At the surface, the Cook Mountain Formation consists of fossilerous marine shale, glaucony and marl, and marginal-marine sandstone and shale between the nonmarine Sparta Formation sandstones below and the nonmarine Yegua Formation sandstones and lignitic shales above. Fossils are abundant, including the benthic foraminifer Ceratobulimina eximia. As subsurface exploration began, the first occurrence of Ceratobulimina eximia {open_quotes}Cerat{close_quotes} was used as the top of the marine {open_quotes}Cook Mountain Shale{close_quotes} below the Yegua section. Downdip, the overlying Yegua was found to become a sequence of marine shales and marginal-marine sandstones, the lower part of which yielded {open_quotes}Cerat{close_quotes}. Because of this, the lower sandstones were called {open_quotes}Cook Mountain{close_quotes} in many fields. At the Yegua shelf margin, {open_quotes}Cerat{close_quotes} is absent. Different exploration teams have used their own definitions for {open_quotes}Cook Mountain{close_quotes}, leading to substantial confusion.
- OSTI ID:
- 45193
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-941065-; TRN: 95:001437-0016
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 44. annual convention of the Gulf Coast Association of Geological Societies and the 41st annual convention of the Gulf Coast Section of the Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists, Austin, TX (United States), 5-7 Oct 1994; Other Information: PBD: 1994; Related Information: Is Part Of Gulf Coast Association of Geological Societies: Transactions. Volume 44; Major, R.P. [ed.]; PB: 847 p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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