4 results
Naktodemasis bowni: New ichnogenus and ichnospecies for adhesive meniscate burrows (AMB), and paleoenvironmental implications, Paleogene Willwood Formation, Bighorn Basin, Wyoming
- Jon J. Smith, Stephen T. Hasiotis, Mary J. Kraus, Daniel T. Woody
-
- Journal:
- Journal of Paleontology / Volume 82 / Issue 2 / March 2008
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 20 May 2016, pp. 267-278
-
- Article
- Export citation
-
Adhesive meniscate burrows (AMB) are common in alluvial paleosols of the Paleogene Willwood Formation, Bighorn Basin, Wyoming. AMB are sinuous, variably oriented burrows composed of a nested series of distinct, ellipsoidal packets containing thin, tightly spaced menisci subparallel to the bounding packet. Menisci are non-pelleted and texturally homogeneous with each other and the surrounding matrix. AMB were constructed most likely by burrower bugs (Hemiptera: Cydnidae), cicada nymphs (Hemiptera: Cicadae), and less likely by scarabaeid (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae) or carabid beetles (Coleoptera: Carabidae), based on burrow morphology and comparison to similar structures produced by these organisms in modern soils. Extant burrowing insects excavate backfilled burrows in well-rooted A and upper B horizons of soils generally below field capacity depending on soil type. This study demonstrates that AMB are distinct morphologically from such previously described ichnofossils as Beaconites, Laminites, Scoyenia, Taenidium, and Ancorichnus. Naktodemasis bowni, a new ichnogenus and ichnospecies, represents burrows composed of nested ellipsoidal packets backfilled with thin, tightly spaced, menisci subparallel to the bounding packet. The presence of N. bowni indicate periods of subaerial exposure associated with pedogenic modification under moderately to well-drained soil conditions, or during periods of better drainage in imperfectly drained soils. N. bowni, therefore, can differentiate alluvial paleoenvironments from marine and lacustrine paleoenvironments, as well as periods of subaerial exposure of sediments deposited in aquatic settings.
ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEWS AND CASE STUDIES: “Make No Little Plans”: Developing Biodiversity Conservation Strategies for the Great Lakes
- Douglas R. Pearsall, Mary L. Khoury, John Paskus, Dan Kraus, Patrick J. Doran, Scott P. Sowa, Rachael Franks Taylor, Lauri K. Elbing
-
- Journal:
- Environmental Practice / Volume 15 / Issue 4 / December 2013
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 21 January 2014, pp. 462-480
- Print publication:
- December 2013
-
- Article
- Export citation
-
The Laurentian Great Lakes represent the world's largest freshwater ecosystem and contain irreplaceable biodiversity. Lakewide Action and Management Plans (LAMPs) hold the highest potential for ecosystem management in the Great Lakes but have not specifically addressed biodiversity status or strategies for conservation. For four Great Lakes, recently completed biodiversity conservation strategies (blueprints) have assessed the status and threats to biodiversity and recommended strategies for conservation and restoration; a blueprint is under way also for Lake Superior. Here, we compare the completed blueprints and explore challenges to conservation planning for large ecosystems. We also assess whether earlier blueprints are being adopted and offer suggestions for more effective implementation. All of the blueprints focus on biodiversity in the lakes and coastal areas, and some include tributaries and migratory species. Biodiversity status was rated as fair (out of desirable range but restorable) in each lake, with some exceptions and considerable spatial variability. Aquatic invasive species ranked as a top threat to biodiversity in all four blueprints. Other highly ranked threats included incompatible development, climate change, terrestrial invasive species, dams and barriers, and non-point-source pollutants. The recommended strategies are characterized by six themes: coastal conservation, invasive species, connectivity and hydrology, fish restoration, nearshore water quality, and climate change. Each blueprint highlights high-priority strategies, but successful protection and restoration of Great Lakes biodiversity require revisiting these priorities in an adaptive approach.
Environmental Practice 15:462–480 (2013)
Controls on fluvial systems in the Siwalik Neogene and Wyoming Paleogene
- Brian J. Willis, Anna Kay Behrensmeyer, Thomas M. Bown, Mary Kraus, John S. Bridge, Imran Khan
-
- Journal:
- The Paleontological Society Special Publications / Volume 6 / 1992
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 26 July 2017, p. 315
- Print publication:
- 1992
-
- Article
-
- You have access Access
- Export citation
-
The 3-km thick Neogene Siwalik Group (Himalayan foredeep in northern Pakistan) and the 2-km thick Paleogene Fort Union/Willwood Formations (Bighorn Basin, Wyoming) both preserve long records of fluvial deposition adjacent to rising mountain belts. Depositional environments and associated habitats change with spatially varying physiography and deposition by river systems that may differ greatly in size, sediment loads, depositional rates, drainage of adjacent floodplains, and taphonomy of organic remains. At times, some environments may not be preserved; for example, avulsion of channels to low areas removes more deposits of channel-distal environments as avulsions increase relative to net sediment aggradation rates. Recognition of such large-scale biases is important because they represent time scales over which long term paleoecological change is reconstructed, and requires knowledge of how drainage systems changed in time and space within these evolving basins.
The Siwalik Group was deposited by large rivers that filled a basin extending at least 1000 km along its axis and 150–250 km away from the mountain front. Despite the scale of these rivers relative to Siwalik exposures, transitions between different fluvial systems have been recognized. For example, a 1-km thick sequence bridging the boundary between Chinji and Nagri formations records displacement of a smaller river system (width < 2 km; depth 5-10 m; discharge 1000-1500 m3/s) by a larger system (width <5 km; depth 15-30 m; discharge at least 5,000-10,000 m3/s), with an associated upsection increase (30 to 70%) in the proportion of channel sandstones, increased mean sediment accumulation rates (150 to 300 m/my), decrease in poorly drained floodplain deposits and well developed paleosols, marked decrease in abundance of faunal remains, and a major change in faunal composition. Stratigraphically higher (Dhok Pathan Fm.), there is a lateral transition between deposits of dissimilar, coeval river systems with corresponding differences in local paleoenvironments and vertebrate taphonomy. Although upsection changes in environments and vertebrate faunas may generally reflect extrabasinal controls such as tectonism and climate change, our studies emphasize the importance of recognizing deposits from different contemporaneous river systems before inferring such large-scale controls on paleoenvironmental change through time.
The Bighorn Basin is an intermountain foreland basin extending 200 km along its axis and about 80 km across. A large portion of this basin is exposed, and thus it is possible to reconstruct the distribution of river systems and the spatial paleoenvironments in more detail than in the Siwaliks. The Bighorn Basin was traversed along its axis by an early Eocene, north-south flowing river that was joined by smaller rivers flowing transverse to the axis. The proportion of channel sandstones decreases upsection (50 to 25%) from the Fort Union to the Willwood Fm. The proportion of channel sandstones and the abundance of well developed paleosols decrease with increasing net sediment aggradation rates. Although channel deposits are concentrated along the basin axis in a more complex way in some stratigraphic intervals, it is unclear to what extent these changes reflect deposition by different rivers versus extrinsically controlled changes within individual river systems.
Floodplains and paleosols in the Wyoming Eocene sequence: implications for the taphonomy and paleoecology of faunas
- Thomas M. Bown, Mary J. Kraus, Andres Aslan
-
- Journal:
- The Paleontological Society Special Publications / Volume 6 / 1992
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 26 July 2017, p. 31
- Print publication:
- 1992
-
- Article
-
- You have access Access
- Export citation
-
The Willwood Fm. of the southern Bighorn Basin of Wyoming, U.S.A., comprises 700 m of lower Eocene alluvial molasse, nearly all of which contains relict pedogenic features. These rocks are grouped into pedofacies–alluvial sediment prisms, thick with immature paleosols proximal to streams and thinner with mature paleosols distally. Pedofacies are bounded by either trunk-stream channel or crevasse-splay deposits, which represent time-stratigraphic markers. The floodplain widths of the Willwood rivers varied from 15 to 20+ km. Paleosols occur throughout the Willwood Formation and the most mature paleosols required about 60 Ka to form whereas the least mature, required 0.5 to 1.0 Ka. Paleosol thicknesses vary from about 0.3–8.0 m and are directly related to net sediment accumulation rate (NSAR) and profile maturity. Pedofacies also reflect NSAR controls; pedofacies are continuously superposed, 15–35-m-thick, and represent time intervals of 30–60 Ka.
In the earliest Eocene, paleosol maturity rose sharply, and NSAR plummeted (Fort Union Fm./Willwood Fm. contact), after which maturity gradually declined (and NSAR rose) throughout the early Eocene. This decline was punctuated by two episodes of severe decline, each corresponding with major increases in NSAR, increased tectonism, and episodes of faunal turnover (“Biohorizons” A and B). Above the biohorizons, species earlier tied to particular paleosol maturities were replaced by closely related though more generalized species with no marked paleosol preferences. Time-stratigraphic reconstruction of the Willwood Fm. shows that “Biohorizons” B and C record the same faunal event; B the extinctions, and C the immigrations.
The 1,300 Willwood fossil vertebrate localities, which are distributed throughout the entire formation, occur in the surface horizons of cumulative alluvial paleosols. All fossil accumulations in paleosols are attritional and formed during pedogenesis. The most complete remains occur in immature paleosols, whereas the most abundant remains are found in mature paleosols. Within the large-scale Willwood ecologic setting, studies of discrete (m's to tens of m's thick) stratigraphic intervals suggest that the paleontology and sedimentology of these intervals can be significantly influenced by lateral differences in paleosol hydromorphy (soil wetness) and maturity (lateral position of a fossil-bearing paleosol with respect to an ancient river channel). These smaller-scale controls on fossil occurrences are important for distinguishing between real and apparent changes in faunal compositions over time and emphasize the value of three-dimensional stratigraphic analysis for interpreting paleontologic events.
Supported by National Geographic Society grant 3985-89.