Correlations among hydrocarbon microseepage, soil chemistry, and uptake of micronutrients by plants, Bell Creek oil field, Montana

Chelate-extractable iron and manganese concentrations in soils over and around the Bell Creek oil field suggest that compared to low average background values, there are moderate amounts of these elements directly over the production area and higher concentrations distributed in an aureole pattern around the periphery of the field. Adsorbed and organically bound iron and manganese appear to be readily taken up by plants resulting in anomalously high levels of these elements in leaves and needles over the oil field and suggesting correlation with corresponding low concentrations in soils. Iron and manganese appear to have bypassed the soil formation process where, under normal oxidizing conditions, they would have ultimately precipitated as insoluble oxides and hydroxides.     

Palaeoecology and significance of barnacles in the mid-Pliocene Balanus Bed of Tobago,West Indies

The Balanus Bed of the Rockly Bay Formation (mid-Pliocene) of Tobago is a sequence of orange-brown sands with laterally equivalent muds. The invertebrate macrofauna is dominated by the balanid barnacle Megabalanus tintinnabulum (Linnaeus) sensu lato, with associated oysters, pectinaceans, gastropods, bryozoans, regular echinoids, and rare crabs and sharks. Vertical burrows in muddier substrates are good evidence that this assemblage was living littorally or shallowly sublittorially. Previous analyses of the Rockly Bay Formation of the type area have erroneously suggested that it represents a lenticular deposit. It is now recognized to be a transgressive unit, unconformable on the underlying Mesozoic basalts. The sediment of the Balanus Beds was derived from the in situ weathering of basalts, producing a gradation from sandy (near shore) to muddy substrates. Balanids grew singly on the weathering basalt, but suitable substrates for attachment in the muddy environment were rare, so barnacles are found clustered in close association. The primary substrates for attachment in the muddy environment were disarticulated balanid plates, mollusc valves and small pebbles. Although the base of the Formation is not seen in Rockly Bay, a basal conglomerate overlain by a horizon of dissociated valves of the large ark Anadara patricia (Sowerby) is exposed in nearby Little Rockly Bay. Apart from the two fossiliferous horizons mentioned, the Formation is barren of marine microinvertebrates. The Rockly Bay Formation appears to have formed in response to the mid-Pliocene rise in sea level. Horizons dominated by balanids may be useful indicators of sea-level rise, at least in the Neogene, Darwin's ‘Age of Barnacles’.     

Llandovery Crinoidea of the British Isles,including description of a new species from the Kilbride Formation (Telychian) of western Ireland

A new species of cladid(?) crinoid, Segmentocolumnus (col.) clarksoni, based on distinctive, disarticulated stem material, is described from the Upper Llandovery Kilbride Formation. Hitherto, this unit has yielded two taxa based on single, nearly complete crinoids. In contrast, S. (col.) clarksoni is known from numerous specimens, including common long pentagonal, pentameric, heteromorphic pluricolumnals with symplectial articulations, broad pentagonal lumina and narrow claustra. A related morphospecies is known from the Ashgill (Upper Ordovician) of Ireland. The fossil echinoderms of the Llandovery (Lower Silurian) are poorly known globally. Where present in this interval, echinoderms are more commonly preserved as disarticulated ossicles and rarely as complete specimens. Complete crinoids have now been identified from nine horizons in the Llandovery of the British Isles, making this one of the better known pelmatozoan faunas from this time interval. However, only two of these occurrences have yielded as many as five or more identifiable taxa. Seven of the nine occurrences are Upper Llandovery (Telychian). Genera are typical of the Silurian or (Upper Ordovician + Silurian); the only remnant Ashgill taxon that did not survive the Llandovery was the morphogenus Segmentocolumnus (col.) Donovan, an ‘extinction’ that probably owes more to taxonomic method than any evolutionary pattern. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Rhuddanian (Silurian,lower llandovery) pelmatozoan fauna from south-west Wales

Only two crinoid faunas of Rhuddanian or early Aeronian age have been described hitherto, both from North America. A Rhuddanian pelmatozoan fauna from Haverfordwest, Dyfed, south-west Wales includes the cheirocrinid rhombiferan cystoid Homocystites? sp., plus the following crinoid species: the calceocrinid disparids Calceocrinus turnbulli sp. nov. and Calceocrinus? sp.; the dendrocrinid cladid Dendrocrinus? gasworksensis sp. nov.; the patelliocrinid monobathrid Macrostylocrinus? sp. indet.; columnals of the rhodocrinitid(?) diplobathrid Floricolumnus (col.) sp. cf. F. (col.) girvanensis Donovan and Clark; the rhodocrinitid diplobathrid Chaosocrinus ornatus sp. nov.; and two indeterminate crinoid species. At the familial level this fauna shows strong similarities with coeval, but more diverse, crinoid assemblages from North America, suggesting that endemism did not develop until later in the Silurian.