Fossiliferous limestone is any type of

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms wh ...

, made mostly of calcium carbonate (CaCO₃) in the form of the

mineral In geology and mineralogy, a mineral or mineral species is, broadly speaking, a solid chemical compound with a fairly well-defined chemical composition and a specific crystal structure that occurs naturally in pure form.John P. Rafferty, ed. ...

calcite Calcite is a carbonate mineral and the most stable polymorph of calcium carbonate (CaCO3). It is a very common mineral, particularly as a component of limestone. Calcite defines hardness 3 on the Mohs scale of mineral hardness, based on scra ...

aragonite Aragonite is a carbonate mineral, one of the three most common naturally occurring crystal forms of calcium carbonate, (the other forms being the minerals calcite and vaterite). It is formed by biological and physical processes, including pre ...

, that contains an abundance of

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...

s or fossil traces. The fossils in these rocks may be of

macroscopic The macroscopic scale is the length scale on which objects or phenomena are large enough to be visible with the naked eye, without magnifying optical instruments. It is the opposite of microscopic. Overview When applied to physical phenomena ...

microscopic The microscopic scale () is the scale of objects and events smaller than those that can easily be seen by the naked eye, requiring a lens or microscope to see them clearly. In physics, the microscopic scale is sometimes regarded as the scale be ...

size. The sort of macroscopic fossils often include

crinoid Crinoids are marine animals that make up the Class (biology), class Crinoidea. Crinoids that are attached to the sea bottom by a stalk in their adult form are commonly called sea lilies, while the unstalked forms are called feather stars or coma ...

stems,

brachiopod Brachiopods (), phylum Brachiopoda, are a phylum of trochozoan animals that have hard "valves" (shells) on the upper and lower surfaces, unlike the left and right arrangement in bivalve molluscs. Brachiopod valves are hinged at the rear end, ...

gastropods The gastropods (), commonly known as snails and slugs, belong to a large taxonomic class of invertebrates within the phylum Mollusca called Gastropoda (). This class comprises snails and slugs from saltwater, from freshwater, and from land. ...

, and other hard shelled

mollusk Mollusca is the second-largest phylum of invertebrate animals after the Arthropoda, the members of which are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 85,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized. The number of fossil species is es ...

remains. In some cases,

microfossil A microfossil is a fossil that is generally between 0.001 mm and 1 mm in size, the visual study of which requires the use of light or electron microscopy. A fossil which can be studied with the naked eye or low-powered magnification, ...

s such as siliceous diatom shells in deposition may convert over time to

opal Opal is a hydrated amorphous form of silica (SiO2·''n''H2O); its water content may range from 3 to 21% by weight, but is usually between 6 and 10%. Due to its amorphous property, it is classified as a mineraloid, unlike crystalline forms ...

and

chert Chert () is a hard, fine-grained sedimentary rock composed of microcrystalline or cryptocrystalline quartz, the mineral form of silicon dioxide (SiO2). Chert is characteristically of biological origin, but may also occur inorganically as a ...

, providing the only inferred evidence of

bioactivity In pharmacology, biological activity or pharmacological activity describes the beneficial or adverse effects of a drug on living matter. When a drug is a complex chemical mixture, this activity is exerted by the substance's active ingredient or ...

preserved in limestone. Fossiliferous limestone is termed biosparite limestone under the

Folk classification The Folk classification, in geology, is a technical descriptive classification of sedimentary rocks devised by Robert L. Folk, an influential sedimentary petrologist and Professor Emeritus at the University of Texas. Folk's sandstone (clastic) c ...

sedimentary rock Sedimentary rocks are types of rock that are formed by the accumulation or deposition of mineral or organic particles at Earth's surface, followed by cementation. Sedimentation is the collective name for processes that cause these particle ...

Lagerstätte A Lagerstätte (, from ''Lager'' 'storage, lair' '' Stätte'' 'place'; plural ''Lagerstätten'') is a sedimentary deposit that exhibits extraordinary fossils with exceptional preservation—sometimes including preserved soft tissues. These for ...

are a class of fossil bearing rocks that includes fossiliferous limestone.

Use

Fossils in general provide geologic clues to the environment of deposition, rock formation, and the types of biological activities present at the time.

Index fossils Biostratigraphy is the branch of stratigraphy which focuses on correlating and assigning relative ages of rock strata by using the fossil assemblages contained within them.Hine, Robert. “Biostratigraphy.” ''Oxford Reference: Dictionary of Bio ...

are more helpful in providing geologic references or reference markers. When polished as tiles or slabs, fossil bearing rocks are used as attractive building facades and pavements. They are also carved as ornamental stones, and used in jewelry making. Limestone etched section KopeFm new

Common rock types

Carboniferous limestone Carboniferous Limestone is a collective term for the succession of limestones occurring widely throughout Great Britain and Ireland that were deposited during the Dinantian Epoch of the Carboniferous Period. These rocks formed between 363 ...

Coquina Coquina () is a sedimentary rock that is composed either wholly or almost entirely of the transported, abraded, and mechanically sorted fragments of the shells of mollusks, trilobites, brachiopods, or other invertebrates. The term ''coquina'' ...

Coral rag Corals are marine invertebrates within the class (biology), class Anthozoa of the phylum Cnidaria. They typically form compact Colony (biology), colonies of many identical individual polyp (zoology), polyps. Coral species include the important C ...

Coral sand Corals are marine invertebrates within the class Anthozoa of the phylum Cnidaria. They typically form compact colonies of many identical individual polyps. Coral species include the important reef builders that inhabit tropical oceans and se ...

Fossil beach A fossil beach, also known as a paleo-beach, fossil strandline or raised beach, is an ancient oceanic or lacustrine beach preserved in fossil form due to a change in water level or sea level, or because of a shift in terrain elevation. It is often ...

Shelly limestone Shelly limestone is a highly fossiliferous limestone, composed of a number of fossilized organisms such as brachiopods, bryozoans, crinoids, sponges, corals and mollusks. It varies in color, texture and hardness. Coquina is a poorly indurated fo ...

Keystone Keystone or key-stone or ''variation'', may refer to: * Keystone (architecture), a central stone or other piece at the apex of an arch or vault * Keystone (cask), a fitting used in ale casks Business * Keystone Law, a full-service law firm * D ...

Less fossil bearing types

Lithographic limestone Lithographic limestone is hard limestone that is sufficiently fine-grained, homogeneous and defect free to be used for lithography. Geologists use the term "lithographic texture" to refer to a grain size under 1/250 mm. The term "sublithog ...

* Marl * Millstone *

Plattenkalk Plattenkalk is a very finely grained limestone chemically precipitated in a stratified water column under conditions where bioturbation does not occur. The reasons for the quiet depositional environment and the processes of sediment accumulation v ...

Tufa Tufa is a variety of limestone formed when carbonate minerals precipitate out of water in unheated rivers or lakes. Geothermally heated hot springs sometimes produce similar (but less porous) carbonate deposits, which are known as traverti ...

Geological layers

Alum Bluff Formation The Alum Bluff Group is a geologic group in the states of Georgia, Florida, and Alabama. It preserves fossils dating back to the Neogene period. Age Period: Paleogene to Neogene Epoch: Late Oligocene to Early Miocene Faunal stage: Chattian ...

* Angoumian *

Arenig In geology, the Arenig (or Arenigian) is a time interval during the Ordovician period and also the suite of rocks which were deposited during this interval. History The term was first used by Adam Sedgwick in 1847 with reference to the "Areni ...

Bioclast Bioclasts are skeletal fossil fragments of once living marine or land organisms that are found in sedimentary rocks laid down in a marine environment—especially limestone varieties around the globe. some of which take on distinct textures and col ...

Biostratigraphy Biostratigraphy is the branch of stratigraphy which focuses on correlating and assigning relative ages of rock strata by using the fossil assemblages contained within them.Hine, Robert. “Biostratigraphy.” ''Oxford Reference: Dictionary of Bio ...

Blue Lias The Blue Lias is a geological formation in southern, eastern and western England and parts of South Wales, part of the Lias Group. The Blue Lias consists of a sequence of limestone and shale layers, laid down in latest Triassic and early Jurassi ...

Carnian The Carnian (less commonly, Karnian) is the lowermost stage of the Upper Triassic Series (or earliest age of the Late Triassic Epoch). It lasted from 237 to 227 million years ago (Ma). The Carnian is preceded by the Ladinian and is followe ...

Chalk Group The Chalk Group (often just called the Chalk) is the lithostratigraphic unit (a certain number of rock strata) which contains the Upper Cretaceous limestone succession in southern and eastern England. The same or similar rock sequences occur ac ...

Ediacara biota The Ediacaran (; formerly Vendian) biota is a taxonomic period classification that consists of all life forms that were present on Earth during the Ediacaran Period (). These were composed of enigmatic tubular and frond-shaped, mostly sessil ...

Elk Point Group The Elk Point Group is a stratigraphic unit of Early to Middle Devonian age in the Western Canada and Williston sedimentary basins. It underlies a large area that extends from the southern boundary of the Northwest Territories in Canada to North ...

Eramosa The Eramosa is a Silurian stratigraphic unit exposed along the Niagara Escarpment in Ontario and western New York State. In the late nineteenth century it was an important source of building stone in Hamilton, Ancaster and Waterdown, and in t ...

Galena Group The Galena Group or Galena Limestone refers to a sedimentary sequence of Ordovician limestone that was deposited atop the Decorah Shale The Decorah Shale is a fossiliferous shale that makes up the lowermost formation in the Galena Group. The Deco ...

Hirnantian The Hirnantian is the final internationally recognized stage of the Ordovician Period of the Paleozoic Era. It was of short duration, lasting about 1.4 million years, from to Ma (million years ago). The early part of the Hirnantian was char ...

* La Tour-Blanche Anticline *

Mannville Group The Mannville Group is a stratigraphical unit of Cretaceous age in the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin. It takes the name from the town of Mannville, Alberta, and was first described in the ''Northwest Mannville 1'' well by A.W. Nauss in 19 ...

Madison Group The Madison Limestone is a thick sequence of mostly carbonate rocks of Mississippian age in the Rocky Mountain and Great Plains areas of the western United States. The rocks serve as an important aquifer as well as an oil reservoir in places. Th ...

Mareuil Anticline The Mareuil Anticline, also called Mareuil-Meyssac Anticline, is a structural high within the sediment, sedimentary sequence of the northeastern Aquitaine Basin. The northwest-southeast trending anticline was caused by tectonic movements probably s ...

Marcellus Formation The Marcellus Formation or the Marcellus Shale is a Middle Devonian age unit of sedimentary rock found in eastern North America. Named for a distinctive outcrop near the village of Marcellus, New York, in the United States, it extends througho ...

Morrison Formation The Morrison Formation is a distinctive sequence of Upper Jurassic sedimentary rock found in the western United States which has been the most fertile source of dinosaur fossils in North America. It is composed of mudstone, sandstone, siltstone, ...

Orsten The Orsten fauna are fossilized organisms preserved in the Orsten lagerstätten of Cambrian (Late Miaolingian to Furongian) rocks, notably at Kinnekulle and on the island of Öland, all in Sweden. The initial site, discovered in 1975 by Klaus M ...

Ostracod Beds The Mannville Group is a stratigraphical unit of Cretaceous age in the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin. It takes the name from the town of Mannville, Alberta, and was first described in the ''Northwest Mannville 1'' well by A.W. Nauss in 194 ...

Redknife Formation The Redknife Formation is a Stratigraphy, stratigraphical unit of Devonian Geochronology, age in the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin. It takes the name from Redknife River, a tributary of the Mackenzie River, and was first described in the ban ...

Red River Formation The Red River Formation is a stratigraphical unit of Late Ordovician age in the Williston Basin. It takes the name from the Red River of the North, and was first described in outcrop in the Tyndall Stone quarries and along the Red River Valley b ...

Rock-cut basin A rock-cut basin is a natural cylindrical depression cut into stream or river beds, often filled with water. Such plucked-bedrock pits are created by kolks; powerful vortices within the water currents which spin small boulders around, eroding out ...

* Stoddart Group *

Tithonian In the geological timescale, the Tithonian is the latest age of the Late Jurassic Epoch and the uppermost stage of the Upper Jurassic Series. It spans the time between 152.1 ± 4 Ma and 145.0 ± 4 Ma (million years ago). It is preceded by t ...

Wenlock Group The Wenlock Group (Wenlockian), in geology, is the middle series of strata in the Silurian (Upper Silurian) of Great Britain. This group in the typical area in the Welsh border counties contains the following formations: Much Wenlock Limestone For ...

White Limestone Formation The White Limestone Formation is a Bathonian geologic formation in the United Kingdom, dating to the Middle Jurassic, 168.3 to 166.1 million years ago. Fossil sauropod tracks have been reported from the formation.Weishampel, et al. (2004). "Din ...

Locations on Earth

Alquézar Alquézar ( Aragonese: ''Alquezra'') is a municipality in the province of Huesca, in the autonomous community of Aragon, Spain. As of 2012, its population was 301. Overview Situated on a limestone outcrop of the Eocene age to the west of the can ...

Aquitaine Basin The Aquitaine Basin is the second largest Mesozoic and Cenozoic sedimentary basin in France after the Paris Basin, occupying a large part of the country's southwestern quadrant. Its surface area covers 66,000 km2 onshore. It formed on Varisc ...

Aymestry Limestone The Aymestry Limestone is a fossiliferous limestone of Gorstian age (Upper Silurian) deposited in a warm shallow sea near the eastern margin of the Iapetus Ocean. It occurs in England in the Ludlow Group, between the Upper Ludlow Shale group, Upp ...

Barstow Formation The Barstow Formation is a series of limestones, conglomerates, sandstones, siltstones and shales exposed in the Mojave Desert near Barstow in San Bernardino County, California.Dibblee, T.W., Jr. (1967). Areal Geology of the Western Mojave ...

Bear Gulch Limestone The Bear Gulch Limestone is a limestone-rich geological lens in central Montana, renowned for the quality of its late Mississippian-aged fossils. It is exposed over a number of outcrops northeast of the Big Snowy Mountains, and is often considere ...

Bennett Island Bennett Island ( rus, Остров Бе́ннетта, r=Ostrov Bennetta; sah, Беннетт Aрыыта, translit= Bennett Arııta) is the largest of the De Long Islands in the northern part of the East Siberian Sea. The area of this island ...

* Bissett Formation * Bladen Nature Reserve *

Bluegrass Region The Bluegrass region is a geographic region in the U.S. state of Kentucky. It makes up the central and northern part of the state, roughly bounded by the cities of Frankfort, Paris, Richmond and Stanford. The Bluegrass region is characteri ...

Boodjamulla National Park Boodjamulla National Park, formerly known as Lawn Hill National Park, is a national park in the Shire of Burke, Queensland, Australia. The Riversleigh World Heritage Area is a World Heritage Site within the park. The park lies on the traditiona ...

Borschiv Borshchiv (, , , yi, בארשטשיוו, Borshtshev) is a city in Chortkiv Raion (since 2020) of Ternopil Oblast (province) of western Ukraine. It previously was the administrative center of the former Borshchiv Raion (district) and is located ...

* Bullock Creek *

Bunda Cliffs The Bunda Cliffs, also known as the Nullarbor Cliffs, are a coastal scarp on the southern coast of Australia, extending from the western coast of South Australia to the south-eastern corner of Western Australia. Geography The Bunda Cliffs e ...

Bungonia State Recreation Area The Bungonia State Recreation Area (SRA) is a nature reserve near the city of Goulburn, New South Wales Australia. The SRA is about east of Goulburn and about south-west of Sydney, and it adjoins the Morton National Park. The area features dr ...

Caves of the Tullybrack and Belmore hills The Caves of the Tullybrack and Belmore hills are a collection of caves in southwest County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. The region is also described as the West Fermanagh Scarplands by environmental agencies and shares many similar karst feat ...

Cedar Mountain Formation The Cedar Mountain Formation is the name given to a distinctive sedimentary geologic formation in eastern Utah, spanning most of the early and mid-Cretaceous. The formation was named for Cedar Mountain in northern Emery County, Utah, where Willia ...

Chazy Formation The Chazy Reef Formation is a mid-Ordovician limestone deposit in northeastern North America. It consists of some of the oldest reef systems built by a community of organisms rather than the deposit of a limited range of similar organisms, such ...

Chestnut Ridge, Bedford County Chestnut Ridge is an elongate hill trending northeast-southwest in west-central Bedford County, Pennsylvania. It is partially forested with rural homes, farms, and notably apple orchards. Four small towns surround it: Schellsburg, New Paris ...

Chocolate Hills The Chocolate Hills ( ceb, Mga Bungtod sa Tsokolate, tgl, Mga Tsokolateng Burol) are a geological formation in the Bohol province of the Philippines.

Colemans Quarry Colemans Quarry, is a limestone quarry at Holwell, near Nunney on the Mendip Hills, Somerset, England. The Colemans Quarry complex comprises four pits separated by three roads (including the A361) The quarry exhibits pale to dark grey Black ...

Columbus Limestone The Columbus Limestone is a mapped bedrock unit consisting primarily of fossiliferous limestone, and it occurs in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia in the United States, and in Ontario, Canada. Description Depositional environment The depositiona ...

Coniston Limestone The Dent Group is a group of Upper Ordovician sedimentary and volcanic rocks in north-west England. It is the lowermost part of the Windermere Supergroup, which was deposited in the foreland basin formed during the collision between Laurentia a ...

Coon Creek Formation The Coon Creek Formation is a geologic formation located in western Tennessee and extreme northeast Mississippi. It is a sedimentary sandy marl deposit, Late Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) in age, about 70 million years old. The formation is known for ...

Cowan Lake (Ohio) Cowan Lake, also known as Cowan Creek Reservoir, is a lake within Cowan Lake State Park in Clinton County, Ohio, United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is ...

Crab Island (Lake Champlain) Crab Island is a roughly limestone island situated in Lake Champlain just outside Plattsburgh Bay in the town of Plattsburgh in Clinton County in upstate New York. During the War of 1812, the island was utilized as a military field hospital fo ...

Cradle of Humankind The Cradle of Humankind is a paleoanthropological site and is located about northwest of Johannesburg, South Africa, in the Gauteng province. Declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1999, the site is home to the largest concentration ...

Crato Formation The Crato Formation is a geologic formation of Early Cretaceous (Aptian) age in northeastern Brazil's Araripe Basin. It is an important Lagerstätte (undisturbed fossil accumulation) for palaeontologists. The strata were laid down mostly durin ...

Cumnor Hurst Hurst Hill or Cumnor Hurst is a biological and geological Site of Special Scientific Interest west of Oxford in Oxfordshire. It is a Geological Conservation Review site. The site is owned by All Souls College, Oxford, and its mosses and liver ...

Cunswick Scar Cunswick Scar is a limestone ''scar'' (cliff or steep rock face) in the Lake District, England. There are extensive views from the large cairn at the top (). The scar is listed in the Scout Scar chapter of Wainwright's ''The Outlying Fells of La ...

Dinosaur Valley State Park Dinosaur Valley State Park is a state park near Glen Rose, Texas, United States. History Dinosaur Valley State Park, located just northwest of Glen Rose in Somervell County, Texas, is a scenic park set astride the Paluxy River. The land fo ...

Durupınar site The Durupınar site ( tr, Durupınar sitesi) is geological formartion of made of limonite on Mount Tendürek, adjacent to the village of Üzengili in eastern Anatolia or Turkey. The site is north of the Iranian border, southeast of Doğubayaz� ...

Dudley Tunnel Dudley Tunnel is a canal tunnel on the Dudley Canal Line No 1, England. At about long, it is now the second longest canal tunnel on the UK canal network today. (Standedge Tunnel is the longest, at , and the Higham and Strood tunnel is now ...

East Kirkton Quarry East Kirkton Quarry is a former limestone quarry in West Lothian, Scotland (East Kirkton Limestone), now better known as a fossil site known for terrestrial fossils from the fossil-poor Romer's gap, a 15 million year period at the beginning of th ...

Elliot Formation The Elliot Formation is a geological formation and forms part of the Stormberg Group, the uppermost geological group that comprises the greater Karoo Supergroup. Outcrops of the Elliot Formation have been found in the northern Eastern Cape, south ...

English Riviera Geopark The English Riviera Geopark (ERG) in Torbay is one of eight UNESCO Global Geoparks in the United Kingdom, and one of over one hundred and seventy worldwide.It is one of only two urban Geoparks in the UK, and joined the Global Geoparks Network on ...

Falls of the Ohio State Park Falls of the Ohio State Park is a state park in the U.S. state of Indiana. It is located on the banks of the Ohio River at Clarksville, Indiana, across from Louisville, Kentucky. The park is part of the Falls of the Ohio National Wildlife Conserva ...

Front Range The Front Range is a mountain range of the Southern Rocky Mountains of North America located in the central portion of the U.S. State of Colorado, and southeastern portion of the U.S. State of Wyoming. It is the first mountain range encountere ...

Gem Valley Gem Valley is a rural valley in Caribou County, Bannock, and Franklin counties in Idaho, United States, so named for its local gemstones which can be found throughout the valley. It is approximately wide at its widest point east to west, ...

Geology of Australia The geology of Australia includes virtually all known rock types, spanning a geological time period of over 3.8 billion years, including some of the oldest rocks on earth. Australia is a continent situated on the Indo-Australian Plate. Compo ...

Geology of the Canyonlands area The exposed geology of the Canyonlands area is complex and diverse; 12 formations are exposed in Canyonlands National Park that range in age from Pennsylvanian to Cretaceous. The oldest and perhaps most interesting was created from evaporites d ...

Geology of the Capitol Reef area The exposed geology of the Capitol Reef area presents a record of mostly Mesozoic-aged sedimentation in an area of North America in and around Capitol Reef National Park, on the Colorado Plateau in southeastern Utah. Nearly 10,000 feet (3,0 ...

* Geology of the Dallas–Fort Worth Metroplex * Geology of Ethiopia *

Geology of the Grand Canyon area The geology of the Grand Canyon area includes one of the most complete and studied sequences of rock on Earth. The nearly 40 major sedimentary rock layers exposed in the Grand Canyon and in the Grand Canyon National Park area range in age from ab ...

Geology of the Grand Teton area The geology of the Grand Teton area consists of some of the oldest rocks and one of the youngest mountain ranges in North America. The Teton Range, partly located in Grand Teton National Park, started to grow some 9 million years ago. An older fe ...

Geology of the Iberian Peninsula The geology of the Iberian Peninsula consists of the study of the rock formations on the Iberian Peninsula, which includes Spain, Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, In recognized minority languages of Portugal: :* mwl, ...

Geology of Nepal The geology of Nepal is dominated by the Himalaya, the highest, youngest and a very highly active mountain range. Himalaya is a type locality for the study of on-going continent-continent collision tectonics. The Himalayan arc extends about fro ...

Geology of the Pyrenees The Pyrenees are a 430-kilometre-long, roughly east–west striking, intracontinental mountain chain that divide France, Spain, and Andorra. The belt has an extended, polycyclic geological evolution dating back to the Precambrian. The chain's pre ...

Geology of Somerset Somerset is a rural county in the southwest of England, covering . It is bounded on the north-west by the Bristol Channel, on the north by Bristol and Gloucestershire, on the north-east by Wiltshire, on the south-east by Dorset, and on the south ...

Geology of the Zion and Kolob canyons area The geology of the Zion and Kolob canyons area includes nine known exposed formations, all visible in Zion National Park in the U.S. state of Utah. Together, these formations represent about 150 million years of mostly Mesozoic-aged sedimenta ...

Gilwern Hill, Powys Gilwern Hill is a hill about 3 mi / 5 km southeast of Llandrindod Wells in the county of Powys, Wales. Geology The hill is composed from a range of lower and middle Ordovician volcaniclastic rocks which form a part of the Builth I ...

Glen Rose Formation The Glen Rose Formation is a shallow marine to shoreline geological formation from the lower Cretaceous period exposed over a large area from South Central to North Central Texas. The formation is most widely known for the dinosaur footprints ...

Gurney Slade quarry Gurney Slade quarry, is a limestone quarry near Gurney Slade between Binegar and Holcombe, on the Mendip Hills, Somerset, England. Gurney Slade quarry exhibits pale to very dark grey Carboniferous Limestone overlain by red and purple-coloured ...

Haile Quarry site The Haile Quarry or Haile sites are an Early Miocene and Pleistocene assemblage of vertebrate fossils located in the Haile quarries, Alachua County, northern Florida. The assemblage was discovered during phosphate mining, which began in the lat ...

Halecombe Halecombe, is a limestone quarry near Leigh-on-Mendip on the Mendip Hills, Somerset, England. The quarry exhibits pale to dark grey well-bedded Carboniferous Limestone, about 350-320 million years old, dipping steeply and consistently northw ...

Hamilton Group The Hamilton Group is a Devonian-age geological group in the Appalachian region of the United States. It is present in New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio, West Virginia, northwestern Virginia and Ontario, Canada. It is mainly composed of mar ...

* Hawkesbury Quarry * Hessilhead Limestone *

Hill Country State Natural Area Hill Country State Natural Area (HCSNA) preserves of rugged, relatively pristine Hill Country terrain in Bandera County, Texas. It was opened to the public in 1984. Since HCSNA is designated a "Natural Area" rather than a "State Park", the fir ...

Hotavlje Hotavlje (; in older sources also ''Hotovlje'',''Leksikon občin kraljestev in dežel zastopanih v državnem zboru,'' vol. 6: ''Kranjsko''. 1906. Vienna: C. Kr. Dvorna in Državna Tiskarna, p. 64. german: Hotaule) is a village in the Sora (river), ...

House Range The House Range is a north-south trending mountain range in Millard County, of west-central Utah. The House Range was named in 1859 by James H. Simpson. It was named by Simpson because "...of its well-defined stratification and the resemblance ...

Humpback Rock Humpback Rocks is a massive greenstone outcropping near the peak of Humpback Mountain in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Augusta County and Nelson County, Virginia, United States, with a summit elevation of . The rock formation is so named for the ...

Hunstanton Hunstanton () is a seaside town in Norfolk, England, which had a population of 4,229 at the 2011 Census. It faces west across The Wash, making it one of the few places on the east coast of Great Britain where the sun sets over the sea. Hunst ...

Indiana Limestone Indiana limestone — also known as Bedford limestone in the building trade — has long been an economically important building material, particularly for monumental public structures. Indiana limestone is a more common term for Salem Limestone ...

Isle La Motte, Vermont Isle La Motte is an island in Lake Champlain in northwestern Vermont, United States. At 7 mi (11 km) by 2 mi (3 km), it lies close to the place that the lake empties into the Richelieu River. It is incorporated as a New England town in Grand Isle ...

Ixkun Ixkun (Ixcún or Ixkún in Spanish orthography) is a pre-Columbian Maya archaeological site, situated in the Petén Basin region of the southern Maya lowlands. It lies to the north of the town of Dolores, in the modern-day department of Pet ...

John Boyd Thacher State Park John Boyd Thacher State Park is a state park located 15 miles (24 km) southwest of Albany, New York, near Voorheesville, in Albany County on State Route 157. Located mostly atop the Helderberg Escarpment, the park has several hiking trail ...

Kaibab Limestone The Kaibab Limestone is a resistant cliff-forming, Permian geologic formation that crops out across the U.S. states of northern Arizona, southern Utah, east central Nevada and southeast California. It is also known as the Kaibab Formation in Ar ...

Kakanui The small town of Kakanui lies on the coast of Otago, in New Zealand, fourteen kilometres to the south of Oamaru. The Kakanui River and its estuary divide the township in two. The part of the settlement south of the river, also known as Kakanui ...

Kennetcook River The Kennetcook River is a river that flows through Hants County, Nova Scotia. From headwaters near the mouth of the Shubenacadie River, the Kennetcook traverses about 45 kilometres of mostly rural terrain, discharging into the Avon River at Wind ...

Keyser Formation The Late Silurian to Early Devonian Keyser Formation is a mapped limestone bedrock unit in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia. Description The Keyser is a nodular limestone overlain by thick- and thin-bedded limestone and lamina ...

Kotelny Island Kotelny Island ( rus, Остров Котельный, r=Ostrov Kotelny; sah, Олгуйдаах Aрыы, translit=Olguydaax Arııta) is part of the Anzhu Islands subgroup of the New Siberian Islands located between the Laptev Sea and the Ea ...

Latyan Dam Latyan Dam ( fa, سد لتيان, also Romanized as ''Sadd-e Latyān'') is a buttress dam on the Jajrood River, located less than 25 km from Tehran in the south of city of Lavasan. It is one of the main sources of water for Tehran metropolita ...

Lincolnshire limestone The Lincolnshire Limestone Formation is a geological formation in England, part of the Inferior Oolite Group of the (Bajocian) Middle Jurassic strata of eastern England. It was formed around 165 million years ago, in a shallow, warm sea on the mar ...

* Llandovery Group *

Madar, Yemen Madar is a village about north of the Yemeni capital of Sanaa. In 2003 a local journalist noted the existence of dinosaur footprints in limestone bedrock and brought them to the attention of geologists at the University of Sanaa. The main site o ...

Majlis al Jinn Majlis al Jinn, also ''Majlis al-Jinn'' ( ar, مجلس الجن, ) is the second-largest known cave chamber in the world, as measured by the surface area of the floor. It ranks lower when measured by volume. The cave is located in a remote are ...

Michigan Basin The Michigan Basin is a geologic basin centered on the Lower Peninsula of the U.S. state of Michigan. The feature is represented by a nearly circular pattern of geologic sedimentary strata in the area with a nearly uniform structural dip towa ...

Middridge Quarry Middridge Quarry is a Site of Special Scientific Interest in the Sedgefield district of County Durham, England. It is a disused quarry, situated alongside the railway line between Newton Aycliffe and Shildon, 1 km south of the village ...

Mooreville Chalk Formation The Mooreville Chalk is a geological formation in North America, within the U.S. states of Alabama and Mississippi, which were part of the subcontinent of Appalachia. The strata date back to the early Santonian to the early Campanian stage of ...

Mortimer Forest Mortimer Forest is a forest on the Shropshire/Herefordshire border in England, near the town of Ludlow.

Mugarra {{Infobox mountain , name = Mugarra , native_name_lang = eus , photo = Mugarra 2.JPG , photo_caption = Mugarra from the east. The quarry is clearly seen. , elevation_m = 936 , elevation_ref = , prominence_m = 195 , prominence_ref = , map ...

Naracoorte Caves National Park Naracoorte Caves National Park is a national park near Naracoorte in the Limestone Coast tourism region in the south-east of South Australia ( Australia). It was officially recognised in 1994 for its extensive fossil record when the site was in ...

Neckar The Neckar () is a river in Germany, mainly flowing through the southwestern state of Baden-Württemberg, with a short section through Hesse. The Neckar is a major right tributary of the Rhine. Rising in the Schwarzwald-Baar-Kreis near Sc ...

Notch Peak Notch Peak is a distinctive summit located on Sawtooth Mountain in the House Range, west of Delta, Utah, United States. The peak and the surrounding area are part of the Notch Peak Wilderness Study Area (WSA). Bristlecone pines, estimated to b ...

Nullarbor Plain The Nullarbor Plain ( ; Latin: feminine of , 'no', and , 'tree') is part of the area of flat, almost treeless, arid or semi-arid country of southern Australia, located on the Great Australian Bight coast with the Great Victoria Desert to i ...

Old Rag Mountain Old Rag Mountain is a mountain near Sperryville in Madison County, Virginia. A part of the Blue Ridge Mountains, the peak is located within Shenandoah National Park and is the most popular hiking destination within the park. In contrast to ...

Onondaga Formation The Onondaga Limestone is a group of hard limestones and dolomites of Devonian age that form an important geographic feature in some areas in which it outcrops; in others, especially its Southern Ontario portion, the formation can be less promin ...

Ottawa Valley The Ottawa Valley is the valley of the Ottawa River, along the boundary between Eastern Ontario and the Outaouais, Quebec, Canada. The valley is the transition between the Saint Lawrence Lowlands and the Canadian Shield. Because of the surrou ...

* Owl's Hill Nature Center *

Öland Öland (, ; ; sometimes written ''Øland'' in other Scandinavian languages, and often ''Oland'' internationally; la, Oelandia) is the second-largest Swedish island and the smallest of the traditional provinces of Sweden. Öland has an area ...

Palm Islands Nature Reserve The Palm Islands Nature Reserve consists of three flat, rocky islands of eroded limestone and the surrounding sea area, located offshore and northwest of the city of Mina El Mina, Lebanon, to the west of Tripoli, Lebanon. The overall area of ...

* Paluxy River *

Penmon Penmon is a promontory, village and ecclesiastical parish on the eastern tip of the Isle of Anglesey in Wales, about east of the town of Beaumaris. It is in the community of Llangoed. The name comes from cy, pen (which can mean "head", "end" ...

Perth Basin The Perth Basin is a thick, elongated sedimentary basin in Western Australia. It lies beneath the Swan Coastal Plain west of the Darling Scarp, representing the western limit of the much older Yilgarn Craton, and extends further west offshore. C ...

Pipe Creek Sinkhole The Pipe Creek Sinkhole near Swayzee in Grant County, Indiana, is one of the most important paleontological sites in the interior of the eastern half of North America. It is preserved because it was buried by glacial till. Uncovered in 1996 by wo ...

Purbeck Limestone Formation The Purbeck Group is an Upper Jurassic to Lower Cretaceous lithostratigraphy, lithostratigraphic group (stratigraphy), group (a sequence of rock strata) in south-east England. The name is derived from the district known as the Isle of Purbeck in D ...

* Riversleigh *

Rock Point Provincial Park Rock Point Provincial Park is a park located on the north shore of Lake Erie near the mouth of the Grand River in the Carolinian zone of southwestern Ontario. It occupies an area of . Habitats within the park include wetlands, forests and du ...

Sacul, El Petén Sacul is an archaeological site of the Maya civilization located in the upper drainage of the Mopan River, in the Petén department of Guatemala. The city occupied an important trade route through the Maya Mountains. The main period of occupati ...

St. Louis Limestone The St. Louis Limestone is a large geologic formation covering a wide area of the midwest of the United States. It is named after an exposure at St. Louis, Missouri. It consists of sedimentary limestone with scattered chert beds, including th ...

Santana Formation The Santana Group is a geologic group, formerly included as the middle part of the Araripe Group, in the Araripe Basin of northeastern Brazil. The group comprises the Crato, Ipubi and Romualdo Formations and is dated to the Aptian to Albian stag ...

* Solnhofen Plattenkalk *

Somervell County, Texas Somervell County ( ) is a county on the Edwards Plateau in the U.S. state of Texas. As of the 2020 census, its population was 9,205. Its county seat is Glen Rose. The county is named for Alexander Somervell, secretary of war for the Republi ...

Stephen Formation The Stephen Formation is a geologic formation exposed in the Canadian Rockies of British Columbia and Alberta, on the western edge of the Western Canada Sedimentary Basin. It consists of shale, thin-bedded limestone, and siltstone that was deposite ...

Suwannee Limestone The Suwannee Limestone is an Early Oligocene geologic formation of exposed limestones in North Florida, United States. Description Suwannee Limestone is found in the peninsula carbonate outcroppings on the northwestern, northeastern and southwe ...

Swartkrans Swartkrans is a fossil-bearing cave designated as a South African National Heritage Site, located about from Johannesburg. It is located in the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site and is notable for being extremely rich in archaeological ma ...

Tamiami Formation The Tamiami Formation is a Late Miocene to Pliocene geologic formation in the southwest Florida peninsula. Age Period: Neogene Epoch: Late Miocene to Pliocene Faunal stage: Clarendonian through Blancan ~13.06–2.588 mya, calculates to a peri ...

Taynton Limestone Formation The Taynton LimestoneWeishampel, David B; et al. (2004). "Dinosaur distribution (Middle Jurassic, Europe)." In: Weishampel, David B.; Dodson, Peter; and Osmólska, Halszka (eds.): The Dinosauria, 2nd, Berkeley: University of California Press. Pp. 5 ...

Tennessee marble Tennessee marble is a type of crystalline limestone found only in East Tennessee, in the southeastern United States. Long esteemed by architects and builders for its pinkish-gray color and the ease with which it is polished, this stone has been u ...

Torreya Formation The Torreya Formation is a Miocene geologic formation with an outcrop in North Florida. It is within the Hawthorn Group. Age Period: Neogene Epoch: Early Miocene Faunal stage: Aquitanian through early Messinian ~19–15.3 mya, calculate ...

Tyndall Limestone Tyndall Stone is a registered trademark name by Gillis Quarries Ltd. Tyndall Stone is a dolomitic limestone that is quarried from the Selkirk Member of the Ordovician Red River Formation in the vicinity of Garson and Tyndall, Manitoba, Ca ...

Upper Elliot Formation The Elliot Formation is a geological formation and forms part of the Stormberg Group, the uppermost geological group that comprises the greater Karoo Supergroup. Outcrops of the Elliot Formation have been found in the northern Eastern Cape, sout ...

* Walcott-Rust quarry *

Warrior Formation The Cambrian Warrior Formation is a mapped limestone bedrock unit in Pennsylvania. Description The Warrior Formation is described by Berg and others as gray, thin- to medium-bedded, fossiliferous, cyclic limestone bearing stromatolites, interbedde ...

Washtenaw Community College Washtenaw Community College (WCC) is a public community college in Ann Arbor Charter Township, Michigan.Weardale Weardale is a dale, or valley, on the east side of the Pennines in County Durham, England. Large parts of Weardale fall within the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) – the second-largest AONB in England and Wales ...

Wetterstein limestone The Wetterstein Formation is a regional geologic formation of the Northern Limestone Alps and Western Carpathians extending from southern Bavaria, Germany in the west, through northern Austria to northern Hungary and western Slovakia in the east. ...

Wills Creek Formation Wills Creek Formation is a mapped Silurian bedrock unit in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia. Description The Wills Creek is defined as a moderately well bedded greenish-gray shale containing local limestone and sandstone zon ...

Wren's Nest The Wren's Nest is a geological Site of Special Scientific Interest in the Dudley Metropolitan Borough, north west of the town centre of Dudley, in the West Midlands (county), West Midlands of England. It is one of the most important geologic ...

Zhoukoudian Zhoukoudian Area () is a town and an area located on the east Fangshan District, Beijing, China. It borders Nanjiao and Fozizhuang Townships to its north, Xiangyang, Chengguan and Yingfeng Subdistricts to its east, Shilou and Hangcunhe Towns ...

* Zitai Formation {{Div col end

Use

Common rock types

Less fossil bearing types

Geological layers

Locations on Earth

See also