The Queenston Formation is a

geological formation A geological formation, or simply formation, is a body of rock having a consistent set of physical characteristics (lithology) that distinguishes it from adjacent bodies of rock, and which occupies a particular position in the layers of rock expo ...

of Upper

Ordovician The Ordovician ( ) is a geologic period and system, the second of six periods of the Paleozoic Era. The Ordovician spans 41.6 million years from the end of the Cambrian Period million years ago (Mya) to the start of the Silurian Period Mya. ...

age (Maysvillian to Richmondian Stage), which outcrops in

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central C ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tota ...

(along the northern and eastern flanks of the

Niagara Escarpment The Niagara Escarpment is a long escarpment, or cuesta, in Canada and the United States that runs predominantly east–west from New York through Ontario, Michigan, Wisconsin, and into Illinois. The escarpment is most famous as the cliff ov ...

, as well as east of

Ottawa Ottawa (, ; Canadian French: ) is the capital city of Canada. It is located at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River in the southern portion of the province of Ontario. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the core ...

) and

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

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 a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

(just south of

Lake Ontario Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border sp ...

). A typical outcrop of the formation is exposed at Bronte Creek just south of the

Queen Elizabeth Way The Queen Elizabeth Way (QEW) is a 400-series highways, 400-series highway in the Canadian province of Ontario linking Toronto with the Niagara Peninsula and Buffalo, New York, Buffalo, New York (state), New York. The Controlled-access highway ...

. The formation is a part of the Queenston Delta clastic wedge, formed as an

erosion Erosion is the action of surface processes (such as water flow or wind) that removes soil, rock, or dissolved material from one location on the Earth's crust, and then transports it to another location where it is deposited. Erosion is di ...

al response to the

Taconic Orogeny The Taconic orogeny was a mountain building period that ended 440 million years ago and affected most of modern-day New England. A great mountain chain formed from eastern Canada down through what is now the Piedmont of the East coast of the Unit ...

. Lithologically, the formation is dominated by red and grey

shale Shale is a fine-grained, clastic sedimentary rock formed from mud that is a mix of flakes of clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4) and tiny fragments (silt-sized particles) of other minerals, especia ...

s with thin

siltstone Siltstone, also known as aleurolite, is a clastic sedimentary rock that is composed mostly of silt. It is a form of mudrock with a low clay mineral content, which can be distinguished from shale by its lack of fissility.Blatt ''et al.'' 1980, ...

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 ...

and

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates ...

interlayers. As materials, comprising the clastic wedge, become coarser in close proximity to the Taconic source rocks, siltstone and sandstone layers are predominant in New York.

Structure and stratigraphy

The formation is wedge-shaped, thick (up to below

Lake Erie Lake Erie ( "eerie") is the fourth largest lake by surface area of the five Great Lakes in North America and the eleventh-largest globally. It is the southernmost, shallowest, and smallest by volume of the Great Lakes and therefore also has t ...

), and laterally extensive, outcropping from

Western New York Western New York (WNY) is the westernmost region of the U.S. state of New York. The eastern boundary of the region is not consistently defined by state agencies or those who call themselves "Western New Yorkers". Almost all sources agree WNY in ...

to Cabot Head. It thins from southeast to northwest at around 0.6 metres per kilometre and has a dip of 3° to the south-southwest. The formation is the topmost Ordovician layer in

Southern Ontario Southern Ontario is a primary region of the province of Ontario, Canada, the other primary region being Northern Ontario. It is the most densely populated and southernmost region in Canada. The exact northern boundary of Southern Ontario is dis ...

and is unconformably overlain by the Lower

Silurian The Silurian ( ) is a geologic period and system spanning 24.6 million years from the end of the Ordovician Period, at million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Devonian Period, Mya. The Silurian is the shortest period of the Paleozoi ...

rocks of the

Cataract Group The Cataract Group is a geologic group in Ohio. It dates back to the Silurian The Silurian ( ) is a geologic period and system spanning 24.6 million years from the end of the Ordovician Period, at million years ago ( Mya), to the beginning ...

. At its base it has a conformable gradational contact with underlying beds of the Georgian Bay Formation in Southern Ontario, the Carlsbad Formation near Ottawa, and the

Oswego Formation The Oswego Formation is a geologic formation in West Virginia West Virginia is a state in the Appalachian, Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States.The Census Bureau and the Association of American Geographers classify W ...

in New York.

Lithology

The formation is composed primarily of red and grey hematitic, sandy,

calcareous Calcareous () is an adjective meaning "mostly or partly composed of calcium carbonate", in other words, containing lime or being chalky. The term is used in a wide variety of scientific disciplines. In zoology ''Calcareous'' is used as an a ...

and

argillaceous Clay minerals are hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates (e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4), sometimes with variable amounts of iron, magnesium, alkali metals, alkaline earths, and other cations found on or near some planetary surfaces. Clay mineral ...

shales with localized greenish banding. Colouration is connected to post-depositional processes: red portions are the result of

oxidation Redox (reduction–oxidation, , ) is a type of chemical reaction in which the oxidation states of substrate change. Oxidation is the loss of electrons or an increase in the oxidation state, while reduction is the gain of electrons or a ...

of iron-bearing minerals and green comes from reduction, possibly by acidic groundwater. The formation also contains thin layers of calcareous sandstone, bioclastic, argillaceous and silty limestone, as well as calcareous sandstone. Coarser layers become much thicker in New York. Minor amounts of

gypsum Gypsum is a soft sulfate mineral composed of calcium sulfate dihydrate, with the chemical formula . It is widely mined and is used as a fertilizer and as the main constituent in many forms of plaster, blackboard or sidewalk chalk, and dr ...

, in nodules and laminae, are found throughout. On the

Manitoulin Island Manitoulin Island is an island in Lake Huron, located within the borders of the Canadian province of Ontario, in the bioregion known as Laurentia. With an area of , it is the largest lake island in the world, large enough that it has over 100 ...

, the formation is dominated by limestone and dolomite.

Fossils

The formation is devoid of fossils in the uppermost shaly layers and is poorly fossiliferous throughout other parts, particularly, the bioclastic beds, where

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, ...

bryozoa Bryozoa (also known as the Polyzoa, Ectoprocta or commonly as moss animals) are a phylum of simple, aquatic invertebrate animals, nearly all living in sedentary colonies. Typically about long, they have a special feeding structure called a ...

ns,

ostracodes Ostracods, or ostracodes, are a class of the Crustacea (class Ostracoda), sometimes known as seed shrimp. Some 70,000 species (only 13,000 of which are extant) have been identified, grouped into several orders. They are small crustaceans, typical ...

, pelecypods, gastropods,

tabulate coral Tabulata, commonly known as tabulate corals, are an order of extinct forms of coral. They are almost always colonial, forming colonies of individual hexagonal cells known as corallites defined by a skeleton of calcite, similar in appearance to ...

s and

trilobite Trilobites (; meaning "three lobes") are extinct marine arthropods that form the class Trilobita. Trilobites form one of the earliest-known groups of arthropods. The first appearance of trilobites in the fossil record defines the base of the ...

s ('' Acernaspis'') are found.

Ichnofossil A trace fossil, also known as an ichnofossil (; from el, ἴχνος ''ikhnos'' "trace, track"), is a fossil record of biological activity but not the preserved remains of the plant or animal itself. Trace fossils contrast with body fossils, ...

s are more common, represented by '' Diplocraterion'', '' Skolithos'' and ''

Chondrites A chondrite is a stony (non-metallic) meteorite that has not been modified, by either melting or differentiation of the parent body. They are formed when various types of dust and small grains in the early Solar System accreted to form primi ...

''.

Facies and depositional environments

Most of the sediments was deposited in the near-coastal

semiarid A semi-arid climate, semi-desert climate, or steppe climate is a dry climate sub-type. It is located on regions that receive precipitation below potential evapotranspiration, but not as low as a desert climate. There are different kinds of semi-ar ...

setting Setting may refer to: * A location (geography) where something is set * Set construction in theatrical scenery * Setting (narrative), the place and time in a work of narrative, especially fiction * Setting up to fail a manipulative technique to ...

with shallow, wide, muddy, prograding shore, affected by

tide Tides are the rise and fall of sea levels caused by the combined effects of the gravitational forces exerted by the Moon (and to a much lesser extent, the Sun) and are also caused by the Earth and Moon orbiting one another. Tide tables can ...

s, frequent storms and fluctuating

sea level Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical datuma standardise ...

tectonic Tectonics (; ) are the processes that control the structure and properties of the Earth's crust and its evolution through time. These include the processes of mountain building, the growth and behavior of the strong, old cores of continents ...

or, possibly,

eustatic Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical datuma standardised g ...

origin ( Andean-Saharan glaciation). Prior to

lithification Lithification (from the Ancient Greek word ''lithos'' meaning 'rock' and the Latin-derived suffix ''-ific'') is the process in which sediments compact under pressure, expel connate fluids, and gradually become solid rock. Essentially, lithificatio ...

, the mud deposits had been frequently exposed

subaerial In natural science, subaerial (literally "under the air"), has been used since 1833,Subaerial
in the Merriam ...

ly and

desiccated Desiccation () is the state of extreme dryness, or the process of extreme drying. A desiccant is a hygroscopic (attracts and holds water) substance that induces or sustains such a state in its local vicinity in a moderately sealed container. ...

, as evidenced by the numerous mudcracks, while

evaporite An evaporite () is a water- soluble sedimentary mineral deposit that results from concentration and crystallization by evaporation from an aqueous solution. There are two types of evaporite deposits: marine, which can also be described as oce ...

s (mostly, gypsum) were deposited in isolated pools. The formation is composed of 14

facies In geology, a facies ( , ; same pronunciation and spelling in the plural) is a body of rock with specified characteristics, which can be any observable attribute of rocks (such as their overall appearance, composition, or condition of formatio ...

, grouped into 4 facies associations, named A through D, corresponding to the specific depositional environments. Facies association A, composed mostly of dark grey shales, was deposited on a

shelf Shelf ( : shelves) may refer to: * Shelf (storage), a flat horizontal surface used for display and storage Geology * Continental shelf, the extended perimeter of a continent, usually covered by shallow seas * Ice shelf, a thick platform of ice f ...

, shallow enough to be affected by storms, that resulted in sandstone and bioclastic limestone layers. Facies association B was deposited under highly variable conditions, ranging from

subtidal The neritic zone (or sublittoral zone) is the relatively shallow part of the ocean above the drop-off of the continental shelf, approximately in depth. From the point of view of marine biology it forms a relatively stable and well-illuminated ...

intertidal The intertidal zone, also known as the foreshore, is the area above water level at low tide and underwater at high tide (in other words, the area within the tidal range). This area can include several types of habitats with various species ...

to supratidal. It is defined by red and dark grey shales. Facies association C was deposited in the paralic setting and consists primarily of red shales. Facies association D, only found in New York, was deposited under

fluvial In geography and geology, fluvial processes are associated with rivers and streams and the deposits and landforms created by them. When the stream or rivers are associated with glaciers, ice sheets, or ice caps, the term glaciofluvial or fluv ...

conditions. It is dominated by sand, carried by

braided river A braided river, or braided channel, consists of a network of river channels separated by small, often temporary, islands called braid bars or, in English usage, '' aits'' or ''eyots''. Braided streams tend to occur in rivers with high sedime ...

s. Similar depositional environments are currently found at the

Gulf of California The Gulf of California ( es, Golfo de California), also known as the Sea of Cortés (''Mar de Cortés'') or Sea of Cortez, or less commonly as the Vermilion Sea (''Mar Bermejo''), is a marginal sea of the Pacific Ocean that separates the Baja C ...

and the northwest shore of Australia.

Economic significance

In New York, the formation's sandstone

beds A bed is an item of furniture that is used as a place to sleep, rest, and relax. Most modern beds consist of a soft, cushioned mattress on a bed frame. The mattress rests either on a solid base, often wood slats, or a sprung base. Many be ...

are commercially producing reservoir rocks for

natural gas Natural gas (also called fossil gas or simply gas) is a naturally occurring mixture of gaseous hydrocarbons consisting primarily of methane in addition to various smaller amounts of other higher alkanes. Low levels of trace gases like carbon ...

; the West Auburn Field has been productive since the 1940s. These beds are also currently considered for geological storage. In Ontario, shales of the formation have long been used by the ceramic industry, mainly for brick and tile production.

References

{{Chronostratigraphy of Ohio Geologic formations of New York (state) Geologic formations of Ontario Ordovician Canada Ordovician United States Ordovician southern paleotemperate deposits Ordovician southern paleotropical deposits Limestone formations of Canada Limestone formations of the United States Shale formations of the United States Siltstone formations Sandstone formations of Canada Sandstone formations of the United States Fluvial deposits Tidal deposits Shallow marine deposits Evaporite deposits Reservoir rock formations Fossiliferous stratigraphic units of North America Paleontology in New York (state) Paleontology in Ontario