Upper Paleozoic and Cretaceous Stratigraphy of the Hidalgo County Area, New Mexico Eugene Greenwood, F
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New Mexico Geological Society Downloaded from: http://nmgs.nmt.edu/publications/guidebooks/21 Upper Paleozoic and Cretaceous stratigraphy of the Hidalgo County area, New Mexico Eugene Greenwood, F. E. Kottlowski, and A. K. Armstrong, 1970, pp. 33-44 in: Tyrone, Big Hatchet Mountain, Florida Mountains Region, Woodward, L. A.; [ed.], New Mexico Geological Society 21st Annual Fall Field Conference Guidebook, 176 p. This is one of many related papers that were included in the 1970 NMGS Fall Field Conference Guidebook. Annual NMGS Fall Field Conference Guidebooks Every fall since 1950, the New Mexico Geological Society (NMGS) has held an annual Fall Field Conference that explores some region of New Mexico (or surrounding states). Always well attended, these conferences provide a guidebook to participants. Besides detailed road logs, the guidebooks contain many well written, edited, and peer-reviewed geoscience papers. 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No material from the NMGS website, or printed and electronic publications, may be reprinted or redistributed without NMGS permission. Contact us for permission to reprint portions of any of our publications. One printed copy of any materials from the NMGS website or our print and electronic publications may be made for individual use without our permission. Teachers and students may make unlimited copies for educational use. Any other use of these materials requires explicit permission. This page is intentionally left blank to maintain order of facing pages. 33 UPPER PALEOZOIC AND CRETACEOUS STRATIGRAPHY OF THE HIDALGO COUNTY AREA, NEW MEXICO By EUGENE GREENWOOD, FRANK E. KOTTLOWSKI, AND AUGUSTUS K. ARMSTRONG The main upper Paleozoic units in southwesternmost of shelf to miogeosynclinal bioclastic carbonates. The New Mexico are thick to thin Pennsylvanian sequences Escabrosa Group is separated from the underlying Upper Devonian rocks by a disconformity. This hiatus represents a making up most of the Horquilla Limestone, and the small part of Late Devonian and a significant part of Early Permian upper Horquilla, Earp, Abo, Hueco, Colina, Mississippian (Kinderhook) time. The top of the Escabrosa Epitaph, Scherrer, and Concha formations. Group is Late Mississippian (Meramec) in age and is defined No Triassic or Jurassic rocks are known in Hidalgo as the first appearance of thin-bedded, argillaceous limestone County, but marine Jurassic strata crop our far to the and shale beds. southeast in Chihuahua. The major Cretaceous formations Paleontologic and field studies indicate no significant in the Hachita area are the Hell-to-Finish, U-Bar, Mojado, hiatus within the Escabrosa Group. The contact between and Ringbone. Deposition of the Ringbone Formation ap- the Escabrosa Group and the overlying Paradise Formation pears to have extended into early Tertiary time. The Hidal- is gradational. The shale, silt, and shallow water, thin- go volcanic sequence, unconformable on the Ringbone, is bedded limestone of the Paradise Formation reflect devel- probably of early Tertiary age. In the Grant and Luna opment of the Chester-age highlands of central New Mex- Counties area, Cretaceous units are the Sarten Sandstone, ico and the resulting influx of terrigenous sediments into Beartooth orthoquartzite, Colorado Shale, some of the beds the Paradise sea (Armstrong, 1967). Extensive erosion in called the Lobo Formation, and thick unnamed units. southwestern and central New Mexico in late Chester and Descriptions of the Mississippian strata* are by Augustus Early Pennsylvanian time removed a considerable thickness K. Armstrong, U.S. Geological Survey, Menlo Park, of the of Mississippian strata and produced everywhere a pro- Pennsylvanian and Permian beds are by Eugene Green- nounced unconformity between Mississippian and Pennyl- wood, Midland, and of the Mesozoic rocks by Frank E. vanian strata. Kottlowski, New Mexico Bureau of Mines and Mineral KEATING FORMATION Resources. The type section of the Keating Formation (Figs. 2, 3) MISSISSIPPIAN STRATA was established by Armstrong (1962, p. 5) in sec. 20, T. 26 S., R. 30 E., on the southeast side of Blue Mountain, Chiri- This brief resume covers the Escabrosa Group and Par- cahua Mountains, Cochise County, southeastern Arizona. adise Formation of extreme southwestern New Mexico. The name was derived from Keating Canyon, a few miles For detailed information on the Mississippian strata of the north of the type section. The thickest sections in New region see Laudon and Bowsher (1949) and Armstrong Mexico are in the Klondike Hills, where the formation is (1958, 1962, and 1963). Formal systematic faunal studies 700 feet thick, and on the north side of the Big Hatchet and documentation of stratigraphic zonation used are in Mountains, where it is 590 feet thick. The Keating Forma- E. J. Zeller (1957), Armstrong (1958, 1962), and Hernon tion thins to the north in the Peloncillo Mountains. It is (1935). The classification of carbonate rocks used is Dun- readily divisible into two lithic members, A and B (in ham's (1962). ascending order). Member A contains a brachiopod and coral fauna (Fig. ESCABROSA GROUP 4) of latest Kinderhook and early Osage age. It rests with The Escabrosa Limestone of Mississippian age was a disconformity on marine shales and carbonates of the named by Girty (in Ransome, 1904) for the lower Car- Late Devonian Percha Shale. boniferous section in the Escabrosa Cliffs, west of Bisbee, Carbonates of member A are the initial phase of a car- Cochise County, southeastern Arizona. The Escabrosa bonate transgression over a weathered and peneplaned Limestone in the Chiricahua Mountains of southeastern Devonian surface. The lowest beds contain appreciable Arizona and southwestern New Mexico was elevated by amounts of calcareous shale, silt, and fine-sand-size quartz Armstrong (1962, p. 5) to the Escabrosa Group and di- disseminated in the limestone. The higher beds of member vided into two newly named formations: the Keating A arc almost pure carbonate rocks composed of bryozoan, Formation with two members, A and B; and the overlying echinoderm, brachiopod, and coral lime wackestones and Hachita Formation (Fig. 1). This nomenclature was ex- packstones with occasional lenticular bodies of oolite pack- tended into Luna, Hidalgo, and Grant Counties, south- stones. * Publication of the Mississippian chapter is authorized by the Director of the U.S. Geological Survey. western New Mexico. Within this region the Escabrosa Group is a thick sequence The most characteristic features of member A are its T. 26 S., R. 30 E., at the south end of Blue Mountain, massive bedding and chert-free carbonate rocks. Chiricahua Mountains. The Hachita Formation is litho- In contrast, member B is characterized by thin-bedded logically and topographically the most characteristic part mudstone and wackestone to packstone with dark-gray to of the Escabrosa Group. The lower two-thirds of the black lenticular chert. The chert bodies are generally paral- Hachita Formation is almost devoid of bedding and is com- lel to the bedding but are commonly grown together in posed of crinoid fragments to the virtual exclusion of other coalescing masses. Field observations and thin-section study organic remains. The upper third of the formation is darker indicate that the chert formed by diagenetic or post-diagen- gray, has persistent massive bedding, and is composed to a etic replacement of the original carbonate. large extent of crinoid packstone, although it also contains The gradational contact between members A and B is a appreciable amounts of brachiopod and bryozoan remains. zone 10 to 30 feet thick in which the bedding becomes thin- The thickest known section of the Hachita Formation, ner and the percentage of chert increases upward. 380 feet, is at the northern end of the Big Hatchet Moun- The lower beds of member B are soft pellet lime mud- tains. The formation thins to the north and west, apparently stone and pellet packstone; higher horizons contain progres- because of differential depositional rates. sively larger percentages of echinoderm bioclasts. The up- per beds of member B generally are echinoderm packstone and grainstone. PARADISE FORMATION The Paradise Formation was named by Stoyanow (1926) for outcrops a few miles east of the old mining camp of HACHITA FORMATION Paradise, on the east side of the Chiricahua Mountains. He The type section of the Hachita Formation (Figs. 2, 3) described the Paradise Formation as 134 feet thick and was established by Armstrong (1962, p. 10) in S1/2 sec. 20, "composed of black and gray, moderately thick and thin- bedded crystalline limestone, olive and yellow