Looking up at Entrance to Marble Canyon - panoramio

Marble Canyon is a

canyon A canyon (from ; archaic British English spelling: ''cañon''), or gorge, is a deep cleft between escarpments or cliffs resulting from weathering and the erosive activity of a river over geologic time scales. Rivers have a natural tendency to ...

surrounding Tokumm Creek just above its confluence with the Vermilion River, at the north end of

Kootenay National Park Kootenay National Park is a national park of Canada located in southeastern British Columbia. The park consists of of the Canadian Rockies, including parts of the Kootenay and Park mountain ranges, the Kootenay River and the entirety of the ...

in the

Canadian Rockies The Canadian Rockies (french: Rocheuses canadiennes) or Canadian Rocky Mountains, comprising both the Alberta Rockies and the British Columbian Rockies, is the Canadian segment of the North American Rocky Mountains. It is the easternmost part ...

of British Columbia, Canada. South of Marble Canyon on Highway 93 is Numa Falls on the Vermillion River. As described by '' Canadian Alpine Journal'' in 1913, " okumm Creekjoins Vermillion River through a magnificent gorge, or box canyon, so narrow that at several places the fissure, for it seems little more than a crack in the rock strata, is bridged by great boulders that have become wedged across it. It was a feature well worth seeing."

Cambrian Lagerstatte

A major new find was announced in early 2014 of fossilized

Cambrian The Cambrian Period ( ; sometimes symbolized Ꞓ) was the first geological period of the Paleozoic Era, and of the Phanerozoic Eon. The Cambrian lasted 53.4 million years from the end of the preceding Ediacaran Period 538.8 million years ago ( ...

soft-bodied organisms in or near Marble Canyon that rival or even surpass the nearby

Burgess Shale The Burgess Shale is a fossil-bearing deposit exposed in the Canadian Rockies of British Columbia, Canada. It is famous for the exceptional preservation of the soft parts of its fossils. At old (middle Cambrian), it is one of the earliest fos ...

fossil site in size and preservation. The report said that 22% of the observed species found in the initial excavation were new to science. Additionally, several species previously known only from Chinese Lagerstätten, created millions of years earlier, were also found at the site. The exact location of the site was kept confidential to avoid damage to the site.

Species discoveries

Based on Caron ''et al.'' (2014) unless otherwise noted. Fossils first described from Marble Canyon are written as bold. * '' Cambroraster falcatus'' * '' Titanokorys gainesi'' * ''

Hurdia ''Hurdia'' is an extinct genus of hurdiid radiodont that lived 505 million years ago during the Cambrian Period. As a radiodont like ''Peytoia'' and ''Anomalocaris'', it is part of the ancestral lineage that led to euarthropods. Description ' ...

'' * '' Tokummia katalepsis'' * '' Branchiocaris'' sp. * '' Perspicaris'' * '' Fibulacaris nereidis'' * '' Pakucaris apatis'' * '' Balhuticaris voltae'' * '' Tuzoia cf. burgessensis'' * '' Surusicaris elegans'' * '' Yawunik kootenayi'' * ''

Alalcomenaeus ''Alalcomenaeus'' is one of the most widespread and longest-surviving arthropod genera of the Early and Middle Cambrian. Known from over 300 specimens in the Burgess Shale and the Chengjiang biota. it is a member of the group Megacheira. Morphol ...

'' sp. * '' Mollisonia plenovenatrix'' (=''M. symmetrica'' in Caron ''et al.'' 2014) * '' Sidneyia inexpectans'' * '' Liangshanella cf. burgessensis'' * '' Naraoia compacta'' * ''

Naraoia ''Naraoia'' is a genus of small to average size (about 2-4½ cm long) marine arthropods within the family Naraoiidae, that lived from the early Cambrian to the late Silurian period. The species are characterized by a large alimentary system and ...

'' (''

Misszhouia ''Misszhouia'' is a genus of small to average sized (up to long) marine arthropods within the Naraoiidae family, that lived during the early Cambrian period. The only species presently known is ''Misszhouia longicaudata'' (the genus is mon ...

'') ''canadensis'' (=''M. cf. longicaudata'' in Caron ''et al.'' 2014) * '' Elrathina cf. marginalis'' * '' Bathyuriscus'' sp. * '' Kootenia cf. burgessensis'' * '' Zacanthoides'' sp. * ''

Ehmaniella ''Ehmaniella'' is a genus of trilobite known from the Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale. 392 specimens of ''Ehmaniella'' are known from the Greater Phyllopod bed, where they comprise 0.74% of the community. Ehmaniella's major characteristics are a ...

'' * '' Itagnostus interstrictus'' * '' Ptychagnostus cf. praecurrens'' * '' Peronopsis'' * '' Marrella splendens'' * '' Primicaris cf. larvaformis'' * '' Molaria spinifera'' * '' Selkirkia'' tubes * '' Metaspriggina walcotti'' * '' Banffia'' * '' Oesia disjuncta'' (''

Margaretia dorus ''Margaretia'' is a frondose organism known from the middle Cambrian Burgess shale and the Kinzers Formation of Pennsylvania. Its fronds reached about 10 cm in length and are peppered with a range of length-parallel oval holes. It was orig ...

'') * '' Kootenayscolex barbarensis'' (=''

Burgessochaeta ''Burgessochaeta'' is an extinct genus of polychaete annelids from the Middle Cambrian. Its fossils have been found in the Burgess Shale in British Columbia, Canada. A total of 189 specimens of ''Burgessochaeta'' are known from the Greater Phyll ...

cf. setigera'' in Caron ''et al.'' 2014) * '' Prototreta'' n. sp. aff. ''P. interrupta'' * '' Eoobolus'' sp. * '' Linnarssonia'' sp. * '' Mellopegma'' sp. aff. ''M. georginense'' * ''Haplophrentis cf. carinatus''

References

Canyons and gorges of British Columbia Canadian Rockies East Kootenay Kootenay National Park {{BritishColumbia-geo-stub