Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T13:16:57.647Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Relative sea-level changes and the development of a Cambrian transgression

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2009

T. McKie
T. McKie
Affiliation:
Badley, Ashton and Associates Limited, Winceby House, Winceby, Horncastle, Lincolnshire LN9 6PB, U.K.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The Lower Cambrian in northwest Scotland is one example of a Lower Palaeozoic ‘orthoquartzite-carbonate’ succession deposited on a slowly subsiding, peneplained Precambrian basement during a period of relative sea-level rise. This particular setting led to the development of a very wide, low gradient shelf which was extremely sensitive to minor sea-level changes. The basal quartz arenite section (Lower Member-Pipe Rock) is a transgressive, tide-dominated systems tract, but lacks a systematic parasequence architecture because of three factors: a fluvial sediment flux was insufficient to induce shoreline progradation, accommodation space was limited during sea-level falls (which are commonly expressed by widespread erosional surfaces), and sediment yield to the shelf by transgressive reworking was a major contributor towards the preserved stratigraphy. The storm-dominated Fucoid Beds represent a condensed section and also show the effects of rapid and widespread facies belt oscillations because of the low shelf gradient. An overlying highstand systems tract is also lacking, partly due to the absence of a large fluvial sediment yield and also due to lowstand and transgressive reworking. An erosively based tidal sandsheet at the top of the Fucoid Beds, interpreted to be a lowstand systems tract, therefore rests directly on the condensed section of the underlying sequence. This was in turn reworked into linear tidal sandbanks (Salterella Grit) during slow sea-level rise, prior to the next major transgression. The limited accommodation space therefore introduced a preservational bias towards deepening-upward trends on a parasequence and sequence scale. The oscillations in facies belts, episodic subareal exposure and the potential to remove substantial portions of systems tracts suggests that Lower Palaeozoic ‘orthoquartzite’ successions may exhibit regular and abrupt vertical shifts in depositional environment which, given their subtle lithological character, may require detailed analysis to identify. Such successions may also display incomplete development of several components of transgressive-regressive sequence architecture.

Type
Articles
Information
Geological Magazine , Volume 130 , Issue 2 , March 1993 , pp. 245 - 256
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1993

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aitken, J. D. 1978. Revised models of depositional Grand Cycles, Cambrian of the southern Rocky Mountains. Canadian Petroleum Geology Bulletin 28, 515–42.Google Scholar
Allen, J. R. L. 1980. Sand waves: a model of origin and internal structure. Sedimentary Geology 26, 281–328.Google Scholar
Belknap, D. F. & Kraft, J. C. 1981. Preservation potential of transgressive coastal lithosomes on the U.S. Atlantic shelf. Marine Geology 42, 429–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bond, G. C, Kominz, M. A. & Grotzinger, J. P. 1988. Cambro-Ordovician eustacy: evidence from geophysical modelling of subsidence in Cordilleran and Appalachian passive margins. In New Perspectives in Basin Analysis (eds Kleinspehn, K. L. and Paola, G.), pp. 129–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bryant, I. D. & Smith, M. P. 1990. A composite tectonic-eustatic origin for shelf sandstones at the Cambrian-Ordovician boundary of North Greenland. Journal of the Geological Society 147, 795–809.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cant, D. J. & Hein, F. J. 1986. Depositional sequences in ancient shelf sediments: some contrasts in style. In Shelf Sands and Sandstone Reservoirs (eds Knight, R. J. and McLean, J. R.), pp. 303–12. Canadian Society of Petroleum Geologists Memoir no. 11.Google Scholar
Chow, N. & James, N. P. 1987. Cambrian Grand Cycles: a northern Appalachian perspective. Geological Society of America Bulletin 98, 418–29.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dalrymple, R. W., Narbonne, G. M. & Smith, L. 1985. Eolian action and the distribution of Cambrian shales in North America. Geology 13, 607–10.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Donnelly, T. H., Shergold, J. H., Southgate, P. N. & Barnes, F. J. 1990. Events leading to global phosphogenesis around the Proterozoic/Cambrian boundary. In Phosphorite Research and Development (eds Northold, A. J. G. and Jarvis, I.), pp. 273–87. Geological Society Special Publication 52.Google Scholar
Dott, R. H. & Byers, C. W. 1981. SEPM research conference on modern shelf and ancient cratonic sedimentation - the orthoquartzite-carbonate suite revisited. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology 51, 329–47.Google Scholar
Dott, R. H., Byers, C. W., Fielder, S. R., Stenzel, S. R. & Winfree, K. E. 1986. Aeolian to marine transition in Cambro-Ordovician cratonic sheet sandstones of the northern Mississippi valley, USA. Sedimentology 33, 345–68.Google Scholar
Droser, M. L. 1991. Ichnofabric of the Paleozoic Skolithos ichnofacies and the nature and distribution of Skolithos Pipe Rock. Palaios 6, 316–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fedo, C. M. & Cooper, J. D. 1990. Braided fluvial to marine transition: the basal Lower Cambrian Wood Canyon Formation, Southern Marble Mountains, Mojave Desert, California. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology 66, 220–34.Google Scholar
Haddox, C. A. & Dott, R. H. 1990. Cambrian shoreline deposits in northern Michigan. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology 60, 697–716.Google Scholar
Hallam, A. & Swett, K. 1966. Trace fossils from the Lower Cambrian Pipe Rock of the north-west Highlands. Scottish Journal of Geology 2, 101–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haworth, R. T., Hipkin, R., Jacobi, R. D., Kane, M., Lefort, J. P., Max, M. D., Miller, H. G. & Wolff, F. 1988. Geophysical framework and the Appalachian-Caledonide connection. In The Caledonian-Appalachian Orogen (eds Harris, A. L. and Fettes, D. J.), pp. 3–20. Geological Society Special Publication 38.Google Scholar
Howarth, M. J. 1982. Tidal currents on the continental shelf. In Offshore Tidal Sands (ed. Stride, A. H.), pp. 10–26. London: Chapman and Hall.Google Scholar
Kumar, N. 1973. Modern and ancient barrier sediments: new interpretations based on stratal sequence in inlet-filling sands and on recognition of nearshore storm deposits. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 220, 247–340.Google Scholar
McKie, T. 1989. Barrier island to tidal shelf transition in the early Cambrian Eriboll Sandstone. Scottish Journal of Geology 25, 273–93.Google Scholar
McKie, T. 1990 a. Tidal and storm influenced sedimentation from a Cambrian transgressive passive margin sequence. Journal of the Geological Society 147, 785–94.Google Scholar
McKie, T. 1990 b. A model for marine shelf storm deposition in the Lower Cambrian Fucoid Beds of northwest Scotland. Geological Magazine 127, 45–53.Google Scholar
McKie, T. 1990 c. Tidal sandbank evolution in the Lower Cambrian Salterella Grit. Scottish Journal of Geology 26, 77–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McKie, T. & Donovan, S. K. 1992. Lower Cambrian echinoderm ossicles from the Fucoid Beds, northwest Scotland. Scottish Journal of Geology 28, 49–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Matthews, S. C. & Cowie, J. W. 1979. Early Cambrian transgression. Journal of the Geological Society 136, 133–5.Google Scholar
Mazzulo, J. M. & Ehrlich, R. 1983. Grain-shape variation in the St Peter Sandstone: a record of eolian and fluvial sedimentation of an early Palaeozoic sheet sand. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology 53, 105–19.Google Scholar
Mitchum, R. M. & Van Wagoner, J. C. 1991. High frequency sequences and their stacking patterns: sequence stratigraphie evidence of high frequency eustatic cycles. Sedimentary Geology 70, 131–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mount, J. M. 1982. Storm-surge-ebb origin of hummocky cross-stratified units of the Andrews Mountain Member, Campito Formation (Lower Cambrian), White-Inyo Mountains, Eastern California. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology 52, 941–58.Google Scholar
Oertel, G. F. 1985. The barrier island system. Marine Geology 63, 1–18.Google Scholar
Palmer, A. R. & James, N. P. 1980. The Hawke Bay Event: a circum-Iapetus regression near the Lower-Middle Cambrian boundary. In The Caledonides in the USA (ed. Wones, D. R.), pp. 15–18. Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University Memoir no. 2.Google Scholar
Paul, C. R. C. 1979. Caledonian echinoderms of the British Isles. In The Caledonides of the British Isles - Reviewed (eds Harris, A. L., Holland, C. H. and Leake, B. E.), pp. 453–6. Geological Society Special Publication 8.Google Scholar
Peach, B. N. & Horne, J. 1892. The Olenellus Zone in the northwest Highlands of Scotland. Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society XLVIII, 227–43.Google Scholar
Peach, B. N., Horne, J., Gunn, W., Clough, C. T., Hinxman, L. W. & Teal, J. J. H. 1907. The Geological Structure of the Northwest Highlands of Scotland (ed. SirGeikie, A.), Memoir of the Geological Survey of Great Britain, 668 pp.Google Scholar
Posamentier, H. W., Jervey, M. T. & Vail, P. R. 1988. Eustatic controls on clastic deposition. I. Conceptual framework. In Sea-level Changes: An Integrated Approach (ed. Wilgus, C. K.), pp. 109–24. Society of Economic Palaeontologists and Mineralogists Special Publication 42.Google Scholar
Posamentier, H. W. & Vail, P. R. 1988. Eustatic controls on clastic deposition. II. Sequence and systems tracts models. In Sea-level changes: an Integrated Approach (ed. Wilgus, C. K.), pp. 125–54. Society of Economic Palaeontologists and Mineralogists Special Publication 42.Google Scholar
Russell, M. J. & Allison, I. 1985. Agalmatolite and the maturity of the sandstones in the Appin and Argyle Groups and Eriboll Sandstone. Scottish Journal of Geology 21, 113–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schumm, S.A. 1968. Speculations concerning palaeo-hydrologic controls on terrestrial sedimentation. Bulletin of the Geological Society of America 79, 1573–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simpson, E. L. & Eriksson, K. A. 1990. Early Cambrian progradational and transgressive sedimentation patterns in Virginia: an example of the early history of a passive margin. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology 60, 84–100.Google Scholar
Swett, K., Klein, G. De V. & Smit, D.E. 1971. A Cambrian tidal sandbody-the Eriboll Sandstone of northwest Scotland. Journal of Geology 79, 400–15.Google Scholar
Swett, K. & Smit, D. E. 1972. Palaeogeography and depositional environments of the Cambro-Ordovician shallow marine facies of the north Atlantic. Geological Society of America Bulletin 83, 3223–48.Google Scholar
Tavener-Smith, R. 1982. Prograding coastal facies association in the Vryhead Formation (Permian) at Effingham Quarries near Durban, South Africa. Sedimentary Geology 32, 111–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vail, P. R., Mitchum, R. M. & Thomson, S. 1977 a. Seismic stratigraphy and global changes in sea level. Part 4. Global cycles of relative sea level. In Seismic Stratigraphy - Applications to Hydrocarbon Exploration (ed. Payton, C. W.), pp. 83–98. American Association of Petroleum Geologists Memoir no. 26.Google Scholar
Vail, P. R., Mitchum, R. M. & Thomson, S. 1977 b. Seismic stratigraphy and global changes of sea level. Part 3. Relative changes of sea level from coastal onlap. In Seismic Stratigraphy - Applications to Hydrocarbon Exploration (ed. Payton, C. W.), pp. 125–54. American Association of Petroleum Geologists Memoir no. 26.Google Scholar
Van Houten, F. B. & Arthur, M. A. 1989. Temporal patterns among Phanerozoic oolitic ironstones and oceanic anoxia. In Phanerozoic Ironstones (eds Young, T. P. and Taylor, W. E. G.), pp. 33–49. Geological Society Special Publication 46.Google Scholar
Van Wagoner, J. C, Mitchum, R. M., Campion, K. M. & Rahmanian, V. D. 1990. Siliciclastic Sequence Stratigraphy in Well Logs, Cores, and Outcrops. AAPG Methods in Exploration Series, no. 7, 55 pp.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Van Wagoner, J. C, Posamentier, H. W., Mitchum, R. M., Vail, P. R., Sarg, J. F., Loutit, T. S. & Hardenbol, J. 1988. An overview of the fundamentals of sequence stratigraphy and key definitions. In Sea-Level Changes: an Integrated Approach (ed. Wilgus, C. K.), pp. 39–46. Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists Special Publication 42.Google Scholar
Yochelson, E. L. 1983. Salterella (Early Cambrian: Agmata) from the Scottish Highlands. Palaeontology 26, 253–60.Google Scholar
Young, T. P. 1989. Eustatically controlled ooidal ironstone deposition: facies relationships of the Ordovician open-shelf ironstones of western Europe. In Phanerozoic Ironstones (eds Young, T. P. & Taylor, W. E. G.), pp. 51–63. Geological Society Special Publication 46.Google Scholar