A new species of heterobranch gastropods, the hammerhead Chelidonura radwanskii sp. nov., found in the socalled Pleurotoma-clays of middle Miocene (Langhian) age in the environs of Korytnica, southern Holy Cross Mountains, Poland, is described. It is the first fossil representative of Chelidonura A. Adams, 1850. This tiny gastropod is named in honour of the late Professor Andrzej Radwański.
During fieldwork in the early 1990s at the then still active quarry near Nasiłów, on the left bank of the River Vistula (Wisła), accompanied by Professor Andrzej Radwański, some lobster remains were collected. A fragmentary anterior portion of a decapod crustacean carapace, recovered from a level about 2 m below the Cretaceous–Paleogene (K/Pg) boundary, in a siliceous chalk unit locally referred to as ‘opoka’, constitutes the oldest record of the thaumastocheliform genus Dinochelus Ahyong, Chan and Bouchet, 2010, D. radwanskii sp. nov. The other, more complete, individual is from c. 3 m above the K/Pg boundary, coming from marly gaizes or ‘siwak’; this is ascribed to a new species of Hoploparia M’Coy, 1849, H. nasilowensis sp. nov., the first to be recorded from Danian (lower Paleocene) strata. Although both ‘opoka’ and ‘siwak’ facies in the Nasiłów area are very rich in diverse biota, including some brachyurans, no macruran remains had so far been recorded from the region.
The decapod fauna from the Badenian (middle Miocene) deposits of western Ukraine comprises in total 31 taxa: 20 species, 9 taxa left in open nomenclature, and 2 determined at family level. Thirteen of these taxa are reported for the first time from the territory of Ukraine. Among them are the first records of Trapezia glaessneri Müller, 1976 in the Fore-Carpathian Basin and Pachycheles sp. in Paratethys. One taxon (Petrolisthes sp. A) probably represents a new species. The occurrence of this significant decapod fauna is restricted almost exclusively to the Upper Badenian (i.e., early Serravallian) coralgal reefs of the Ternopil Beds. The taxonomic composition of the decapods indicates that the Late Badenian depositional environment was a shallow marine basin dominated by reefs that developed in warm-to-tropical waters of oceanic salinity. The decapod assemblage from the Ternopil Beds is similar in its taxonomic composition to numerous decapod faunules from fossil reefs of Eocene to Miocene age from the Mediterranean realm and of Miocene age from Paratethys. In contrast, decapod remains are very scarce in Badenian siliciclastic deposits (Mikolaiv Beds) and are represented by the most resistant skeletal elements, i.e., dactyli and fixed fingers. This scarcity was caused by the high-energy environment, with frequent episodes of redeposition, which disintegrated and abraded the decapod remains.
The study presents fifteen oxygen-bearing secondary minerals of bismuth from the north-eastern part of the Variscan Karkonosze granitoid pluton in the northern zone of the Bohemian massif. The minerals were investigated by optical, electron microprobe, classic chemical, XRD, IR absorption and fluid inclusion methods. The late, very low temperature epithermal solutions most probably caused formation of sillénite, kusachiite, bismoclite, bismutite, beyerite, kettnerite, pucherite, schumacherite, namibite and eulytite. Solutions dominated by supergene (meteoric) waters were the parents for bismite, russellite, koechlinite, ximengite and walpurgite. The paper also contains information on early research on the investigated minerals.
The Lower Jurassic to Aalenian carbonate-clastic Dudziniec Formation exposed in the autochthonous unit of the Tatra Mountains (Kościeliska Valley) hosts neptunian dykes filled with various deposits. The development of the fissures took place in multiple stages, with the same fractures opening several times, as is indicated by their architecture, occurrence of internal breccias and arrangement of the infilling sediments. Various types of internal deposits were derived in a different manner and from different sources. Fine carbonate sediments, represented by variously coloured pelitic limestones, calcilutites and fine calcarenites, most probably come from uplifted and corroded carbonate massifs (possibly from the allochthonous units of the High-Tatric succession). Products of weathering, both in dissolved form and as small particles, were washed into the sedimentary basin of the autochthonous unit, and redeposited within the dykes. The sandy varieties of the infillings, represented by red, ferruginous calcareous sandstones, come directly from the host rocks or from loose sediments present on the sea bottom at the time of fracturing. The most probable age of the infilling sediments is Sinemurian to Pliensbachian. The occurrence of dykes of this age is yet another feature confirming that the sedimentary development of the Lower Jurassic sandy-carbonate facies in the autochthonous unit was strongly influenced by synsedimentary tectonic activity, such as block-faulting.
We describe a new echinoid assemblage, composed of specimens of Bolbaster sp., Cyclaster danicus (Schlüter, 1897), Diplodetus vistulensis (Kongiel, 1950) and Linthia? sp. in a distinctive phosphatic preservation, from the so-called Greensand, a marly glauconitic sandstone horizon at the base of the Danian succession in the Kazimierz Dolny area (central Poland). This assemblage presumably is of early Danian age, with Cyclaster danicus occurring in the lower Danian of Denmark and southern Sweden. The specimens are preserved as internal moulds, composed of phosphatised glauconitic sandstone, occasionally with some test material adhering. The genesis of these moulds involved the following steps: (1) infilling of tests of dead echinoids with glauconitic sand; (2) penetration of the infills by coelobiotic deposit-feeding organisms that produced burrows along the inner test surface; (3) early-diagenetic cementation of infills by calcium phosphate; and (4) exhumation and intraformational reworking of specimens, leading to abrasion, fragmentation and loss of test material in some individuals. Co-occurring are unphosphatised moulds of Echinocorys ex gr. depressa (von Eichwald, 1866) and Pseudogibbaster cf. depressus (Kongiel in Kongiel and Matwiejewówna, 1937), which may represent a younger (middle to late Danian) assemblage. Additionally, the presence of derived late Maastrichtian echinoids, e.g., Temnocidaris (Stereocidaris) ex gr. herthae (Schlüter, 1892), Pleurosalenia bonissenti (Cotteau, 1866) and Hemicara pomeranum Schlüter, 1902, is confirmed for the Greensand, based on new material and re- examination of previously recorded specimens. In summary, members of three echinoid assemblages of different age and preservation occur together in the Greensand. Our results are compatible with former interpretations of this unit as a condensed, transgressive lag with mixed faunas of different age and provenance. However, they are incompatible with the hypothesis that phosphatised Danian fossils preserved in the Greensand are derived from a facies equivalent, now gone, of the lower Danian Cerithium Limestone in eastern Denmark, because all moulds are composed of phosphatised glauconitic sandstone that is utterly different from the calcareous dinocyst-dominated, fine crystalline matrix of the Cerithium Limestone.
Remains of decapod crustaceans of the family Alpheidae Rafinesque, 1815 and bony fish of the family Gobiidae Bonaparte, 1832 co-occur at a number of localities in the Korytnica Basin (Holy Cross Mountains) and in a newly exposed section along a stream near Niskowa (Outer Carpathians), both in southern Poland. These remains (alpheid major right-sided cheliped tips and gobiid otoliths) are interpreted as documenting a commensal partnership that existed in the shallowest zones of the middle Miocene Fore-Carpathian Basin in southern Poland under environmental conditions that must have been comparable to those of the present-day tropical/ subtropical Indo-West Pacific and Caribbean.
A huge isolated accumulation, more than 3 m thick and 10 m wide, of densely packed, uncrushed brachiopods has been found in Józefka Quarry within the Middle/Upper Devonian Szydłówek Beds deposited in a relatively deep environment of an intrashelf basin (Kostomłoty facies zone, western Holy Cross Mountains, Poland). The low-diversity assemblage is strongly dominated by the atrypide Desquamatia globosa jozefkae Baliński subsp. nov. and, to a lesser degree, by the rhynchonellide Coeloterorhynchus dillanus (Schmidt, 1941), which constitute 72.8% and 22.1% of the fauna, respectively. Less frequent are specimens representing the genera Hypothyridina, Schizophoria and Phlogoiderynchus. According to the conodont fauna found within the coquina bed, the stratigraphic position of the shell accumulation is close to the Givetian/ Frasnian boundary. The brachiopods are associated with numerous crinoids and less frequent bryozoans, receptaculitids (Palaeozoic problematica), sponges and solitary corals. Although it is difficult to entirely exclude the autochthonous nature of the brachiopod coquina member, its allochthonous origin and redeposition of the brachiopod shells to the deep basin by gravity flows is much more probable. Such conclusion is supported by the following facts: (1) the position of the complex in a succession of deep-marine basinal facies impoverished in oxygen; (2) its lateral thinning-out and composite internal stratification; (3) the lensshaped geometry of the coquina bed in the section perpendicular to the bedding dip; (4) high variability of the sediments preserved within the shells; and (5) the preferred orientation of the shells. The brachiopods mixed with crinoidal debris were probably transported by low-velocity, high-density, gravity-induced debris flows. Lack of fossils typical of the Middle Devonian shallows, such as massive stromatoporoids, amphiporoids and tabulates, indicates that the source area of the bioclastic material was not located in the shallowest part of the shelf, but most probably on a submarine sea-mount to the north of present-day Józefka, as suggested by earlier investigators. The triggering mechanism of the allochthonous deposition was an earthquake rather than storm activity. The enormous thickness of the brachiopod complex is probably caused by the sinking of bioclastic material, transported in succeeding depositional multi-events, in a soft, muddy bottom, typical of the Szydłówek Beds deposition.
For the first time, articulated shells of Anomia ephippium Linnæus, 1758, the bivalve species widely distributed in the Egerian–Late Badenian (latest early Oligocene to late middle Miocene) in the Central Paratethys, are described and illustrated. The most astonishing fact is the presence of a heavily calcified byssus that anchored the animal to hard substrates, which is still preserved inside the byssal notch. The investigated material derives from the Badenian (middle Miocene) Niskowa Formation in the Nowy Sącz Basin, a small intramontane basin situated in the Polish Outer Carpathians. Apart from articulated shells and left valves, the collected material contains some dozen of calcified byssi fixed to rigid substrate, SEM images of which are presented. Examination of the A. ephippium specimens stored in the Polish Academy of Sciences, Museum of the Earth in Warsaw revealed other Paratethyan records of anomiid calcified byssi attached to other specimens of A. ephippium. Finally, the paper provides an overview of the previous studies on the representatives of the genus Anomia Linnæus, 1758 from the Central Paratethys and its specific assignment.
A new ichnogenus and ichnospecies (Solealites ovalis) of etching trace is preserved on the surfaces of clasts from the Savignone Conglomerate (Oligocene) in the Palaeogene Piemonte Basin in NW Italy. It is a shallow, oval depression with a central elevation, which was produced probably by limpet gastropods and served as their home scar, but other gastropods or even sea anemones are not excluded as the trace makers. The conglomerate is interpreted as a deposit of a fan delta, whose clasts have been bioeroded in an intertidal and shallow subtidal shore zone and redeposited to the deeper sea.
The lower (but not lowermost) part of the Upper Cretaceous Anaipadi Formation of the Trichinopoly Group in the area between Kulatur, Saradamangalam and Anaipadi, in the south-western part of the Cauvery Basin in southeast India yielded rich inoceramid and ammonite faunas. The ammonites: Mesopuzosia gaudama (Forbes, 1846), Damesites sugata (Forbes, 1846), Onitschoceras sp., Kossmaticeras (Kossmaticeras) theobaldianum (Stoliczka, 1865), Lewesiceras jimboi (Kossmat, 1898), Placenticeras kaffrarium Etheridge, 1904, and Pseudoxybeloceras (Schlueterella) sp., are characteristic of the Kossmaticeras theobaldianum Zone. The absence of Peroniceras (P.) dravidicum (Kossmat, 1895) indicates the presence of only lower part of this zone, referred to the nominative Kossmaticeras theobaldianum Subzone at the localities studied. The inoceramids present are Tethyoceramus madagascariensis (Heinz, 1933) and Cremnoceramus deformis erectus (Meek, 1877), recorded for the first time from the region. The latter dates the studied interval as early early Coniacian, and allows, for the first time, direct chronostratigraphic dating of the Tethyoceramus madagascariensis Zone, and consequently also of the Kossmaticeras theobaldianum Subzone. As inoceramids occur in the middle part of the ammonite-rich interval, the Kossmaticeras theobaldianum Subzone may be as old as latest Turonian and not younger than early early Coniacian. The base of the Coniacian lies in the lower, but not lowermost part of the Anaipadi Formation. Both inoceramids and ammonites represent taxa known from Madagascar and South Africa.
The Cao Bang Basin is the northernmost of the basins related to the Cao Bang-Tien Yen Fault Zone in northern Vietnam. The basin is filled with a thick series of continental deposits. However, the exact age of the sedimentary basin infill has been under discussion for a long time. Because of new published data, the authors have decided to revisit this basin. Palynological data has allowed us to assign the Cao Bang Basin infill to the Lower Oligocene PC1 complex of the Shangcun Fm. (southern China). Among the saccate grains of gymnosperms, the domination of Cathaya and Pinus was observed, whereas angiosperms are represented by Carya, Celtis, Hammamelidaceae, Ulmus and also Pterocarya, Quercus, the Castanea–Castanopsis–Lithocarpus group, and the Loranthaceae. Among pteridophytes occur Laevigatosporites, Osmundaceae, and Pteris. The sedimentological features of the Cao Bang Basin are distinct from those of other basins from the Cao Bang-Tien Yen Fault Zone. The basin is filled with a wide variety of clastic deposits, from some of coarse-grained, alluvial-fan origin, through sandy beds of fluvial origin up to fine, organic-rich lacustrine deposits. The coarse-grained lithofacies are built of clasts derived mainly from local sources. The sandstones from the basin equally are submature or immature. They contain a lot of lithoclasts, the composition of which depends on the sample location within the basin. The potential source area is composed of older sedimentary units and of granitic rocks. The geochemical samples studied reflect the geochemical composition of silicic source rocks with only a minor contribution of basic components. The succession that fills the basin is interpreted as a typical fill for relatively long-lasting evolving half-graben or strike-slip basins. Moreover, the basin is partly occupied by a subsequent present-day sedimentary basin of Quaternary age.
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