--> Abstract: The Bell Canyon Formation (Wordian-Capitanian) of the Guadalupian Series (Middle Permian): Correlation Problems from the Guadalupe Mountains to the Apache Mountains, by Merlynd K. Nestell and Bruce R. Wardlaw; #90089 (2009)

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The Bell Canyon Formation (Wordian-Capitanian) of the Guadalupian Series (Middle Permian): Correlation Problems from the Guadalupe Mountains to the Apache Mountains

Merlynd K. Nestell1 and Bruce R. Wardlaw2
1Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, The University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, TX 76019-0049
2U. S. Geological Survey, 12201 Sunrise Valley Drive MS 926A, Reston, VA 20192

The six named limestone members (Hegler, Pinery, Rader, McCombs, Lamar, and Reef Trail) of the Bell Canyon Formation (Wordian-Capitanian, Guadalupian, Middle Permian) were established in the Guadalupe Mountains of West Texas. Recognition of these members and their corresponding nominal usage away from this area (e.g., in the Apache or Glass Mountains) is certainly questionable and caution should be used. However, biostratigraphic correlations using conodonts, fusulinaceans, and radiolarians may be used as a framework that can aid in constraining potential lithostratigraphic correlations. Extensive bed by bed sampling of several stratigraphic sections in the northwestern part of the Apache Mountains has established a conodont succession in strata that are equivalent biostratigraphically to significant intervals within the Bell Canyon in the Middle Permian stratotype area. For example, in the Guadalupe Mountains Middle Permian Global Stratotype section, the lower boundary of the Capitanian Stage (GSSP) is defined at a changeover from the Wordian conodont species Jinogondolella aserrata to the Capitanian species J. postserrata.

Stratigraphically, this changeover is found within the Pinery Limestone Member near the top of a prominent topographic feature within Guadalupe Mountains National Park known as Nipple Hill. This important conodont species transition has also recently been found in strata in the Apache Mountains in lithofacies different from those present in the Pinery Limestone Member on Nipple Hill. The fusulinacean Yabeina texana, whose occurrence marks the basal part of the Lamar Limestone Member in the Guadalupe Mountains area, has been found in several thin debris beds in one section in the Apache Mountains and would mark the biostratigraphic base of Lamar age-equivalent strata. Although the lithofacies of these beds are similar to those of the Yabeina texana-bearing beds at the type locality near McKittrick Canyon in the Guadalupe Mountains, the overlying lithostratigraphic succession is not comparable to that of the Lamar Limestone and Reef Trail Members in their type areas.

Some thick debris beds in the Bell Canyon succession in the Apache Mountains have been considered in guidebooks as “Rader slides” similar to the well known one in the Guadalupe Mountains, but they are clearly not all temporally equivalent. For example, a prominent thick debris slide near the base of a Reef Trail-equivalent succession in the Apache Mountains contains the fusulinaceans Paraboultonia splendens, Y. texana, Reichelina lamarensis, Codonofusiella extensa, and Polydiexodina capitanensis, well known markers for several Bell Canyon Formation members in the Guadalupe Mountains. The succession between this debris flow and strata referable to the Castile Formation contains P. splendens at two levels, making this stratigraphic interval partially equivalent to the Reef Trail Member in the Guadalupe Mountains.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90089©2009 AAPG Southwest Section Meeting, Midland, Texas, April 26-29, 2009