Fossil Communities in an Early Miocene Transgressive Sequence, Mathesons Bay, Leigh, Auckland
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Tane 37: 43-67 (1999) FOSSIL COMMUNITIES IN AN EARLY MIOCENE TRANSGRESSIVE SEQUENCE, MATHESONS BAY, LEIGH, AUCKLAND Michael K. Eagle1, Bruce W. Hayward2, Jack A. Grant-Mackie2 and Murray R. Gregory2 1 Auckland War Memorial Museum, Private Bag 92018, Auckland 2 Department of Geology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland SUMMARY Sixty-three macrofossil taxa (including 22 bivalves, 8 gastropods, 7 corals and 7 barnacles) are recorded from early Miocene Kawau Subgroup (Waitemata Group) sequences at Mathesons Bay, Leigh. Fossils derived from intertidal, shallow subtidal, and inner shelf rocky reefs, bouldery talus deposits and pebbly, coarse sand seafloor communities are mixed together throughout most of the breccia, pebble conglomerate and coarse sandstone units. As this area subsided it became sediment-starved, resulting in condensed sequences at the top of the Kawau Subgroup. These contain a mixture of fossils that lived at inner shelf through to upper bathyal depths. Thin lenses composed largely of the plates of the bathyal barnacle, Bathylasma, form the uppermost level of the Kawau Subgroup. Continued subsidence to mid bathyal depths appears to have resulted in the incoming of a submarine slump containing a block of concretionary siltstone with fragile bivalves and an unusual foraminiferal fauna suggestive of accumulation around a hydrocarbon seep. This fauna is dominated by the benthic foraminifer, Amphimorphina butonensis, which is recorded from New Zealand for the first time. Further subsidence resulted in the onset of Waitemata Basin flysch sedimentation. Keywords: Paleoecology; early Miocene; Waitemata Group; Kawau Subgroup; Mathesons Bay; fossil Mollusca; fossil Foraminifera; Amphimorphina butonensis. INTRODUCTION Previous work Mathesons Bay rock exposures were included in the regional mapping projects of Cox (1881), Ferrar (1934) and Hopgood (1961). Ferrar (1934, p.37) recognised the "coarse massive conglomerates" as "basal Waitemata Beds" which originally was "... talus that accumulated at the foot of a former sea-cliff ii 43 N greywacke STUDY AREA Kawau Is Waiheke Is AUCKLAND Hays Creek siltstone shelly conglomerate with algal rhodoliths sandstone cobble, boulder breccia pebble conglomerate ray-feeding burrows S5 Mathesons Bay islet VS3, S4 ^5 S1.S2 m South Mathesons North Mathesons Bay 0 Bay Fig. 1. Geological sketch map of Mathesons Bay area, with stratigraphic columns for the early Miocene Waitemata Group for each end of the beach and the small islet. 44 Some of the first fossil collections from the Cape Rodney area were made by Sir James Hector, as a specimen identified as "Haliotis iris" collected by him from "Cape Rodney", is listed in a catalogue of Tertiary Mollusca held in the British Museum (Harris 1897). Fossils were first reported from Mathesons Bay by Ferrar (1934), who records the locality as "west of entrance to Omaha Harbour" and marks "Fossils" on the south side of Mathesons Bay on his map. He lists three species (Spondylus aucklandicus, Venericardia cf. awamoaensis, Eucrassatella ampla) identified by Dr Marwick from this locality. Squires (1962) recorded three genera of hermatypic, chaliciform corals (Cyathoseris, Fungophyllia, Leptoseris) from this and nearby localities. He noted that none "... are sufficiently well preserved to permit specific identification, Crabb (1971) included fossil bryozoa from Mathesons Bay in his study of the environmental information that may be gleaned from their growth forms. Gregory (1991) and Grant-Mackie (1993) describe ray feeding structures, and Buckeridge (1979, 1983) recorded three species of fossil barnacle (Bathylasma aucklandica, Pachylasma southlandica, Tetraclitella sp. cf. T. purpurescens) from the Mathesons Bay early Miocene sequence. The geology of the early Miocene rocks around Mathesons Bay and Cape Rodney has been mapped superficially by Ferrar (1934), Hopgood (1961), Thompson (1961) and Hayward and Brook (1984). Stratigraphic columns and descriptions of the sequences on either side of Mathesons Bay have been presented in Hayward and Brook (1984) and Ricketts et al. (1989). Swain (1993) undertook an MSc study on the structure of the rocks in the Leigh area, including Mathesons Bay. GEOLOGY (Figs. 1,2) The Cape Rodney-Leigh area is composed of Triassic-Jurassic Waipapa Group greywacke basement unconformably overlaid in places by the eroded remnants of an early Miocene transgressive sequence (Waitemata Group) which progressively buries an irregular coastal topography of greywacke stacks, cliffs and embayed islands (Ballance 1974, Ricketts et al. 1989). Quaternary erosion is exhuming this pre-Waitemata topography as it strips off the softer Miocene rocks. The basal Waitemata Group rocks (Kawau Subgroup overlain by basal Warkworth Subgroup - Hayward & Brook 1984) around Mathesons Bay are seen best in three separate cliff and shore platform sections, each with a slightly different sequence preserved: South Mathesons Bay (Figs. 1, 2) The sequence here dips at 10-15° to the northwest. Thus Waipapa Group greywacke outcrops at the base of the sequence 200 m along the coast to the southwest. The top of a greywacke paleostack protrudes up into the Kawau 45 North Mathesons Bay greywacke Fig. 2. Sketches of the cliff sections north and south of Mathesons Bay. See Fig. 1 for location. Subgroup sequence adjacent to Mathesons Bay beach at the northeast end of this section. The exposed early Miocene sequence is 16 m thick and consists of (base upwards): 46 0-1 m of lenticular, angular to subrounded, greywacke cobble and boulder breccia (basal conglomerate facies of Ricketts et al. 1989); fossil sites SI and S2. 0-10 m of fossiliferous pebbly sandstone and sandy pebble conglomerate (sandstone-conglomerate facies of Ricketts et al. 1989). This latter unit has variably developed stratification often with wedge-shaped conglomerate beds. Pebble- and sand-filled subcylindrical excavations, up to 0.3 m diameter and depth (ray-feeding burrows, Gregory 1991), are plentiful along the bases of some beds. This thick unit grades laterally northwards into a coarser facies of shelly, subrounded to subangular pebble breccia adjacent to the paleostack (Fig. 2); S3, S4. 0-2 m bed of shelly, clast-supported, boulder and cobble breccia (upper breccia facies of Ricketts et al. 1989). 0-1 m of lenticular, fossiliferous, subangular to subrounded, cobble and pebble conglomerate. Many clasts are encrusted with calcareous algae (part of pebbly coquina facies of Ricketts et al. 1989); S5. 0-0.1 m of lenticular, shelly sandstone in shallow depressions atop the underlying units. Shells are the disarticulated plates of the large barnacle Bathylasma aucklandica (part of pebbly coquina facies of Ricketts et al. 1989, upper unit of Kawau Subgroup); S6. 2 m + of massive to weakly laminated mudstone and very fine sandstone (mudstone-sandstone facies of Ricketts et al. 1989, basal unit of Warkworth Subgroup). Mathesons Bay islet (Fig. 1) The islet and its surrounding shore platform, situated 300m offshore in the middle of Mathesons Bay, is composed entirely of early Miocene Kawau Subgroup rocks dipping 10° to the northwest. The local sequence (sandstone- conglomerate facies of Ricketts et al. 1989) consists of (base upwards): 9 m + of decimetre-metre bedded, sparsely shelly, pebbly coarse sandstone with common ray feeding structures; 11. 0.5 m of shelly, subrounded to rounded, pebble conglomerate; 12. 6 m + of decimetre-metre bedded, slightly shelly, medium to coarse sandstone and fine pebbly, very coarse sandstone with frequent ray feeding structures; 13. North Mathesons Bay (Figs. 1,2) The irregular contact of early Miocene Waitemata rocks (Kawau and basal Warkworth Subgroups) over Waipapa greywacke paleostacks is discontinuously exposed in the cliffs and shore platform for 500 m north of Mathesons Bay. Here Kawau strata are lenticular and discontinuous. At the south end of the section, 47 they dip gently to the northwest, but to the north the dip swings to the northeast. The generalised, totalling c. 40 m sequence consists of (base upwards): 2 m + of pebbly sandstone (sandstone-conglomerate facies of Ricketts et al. 1989). 0-2 m of lenticular, angular to subrounded, greywacke cobble and boulder breccia (upper breccia facies of Ricketts et al. 1989). 0-1 m of lenticular, fossiliferous, subangular to subrounded, cobble and pebble conglomerate. Many clasts are encrusted with calcareous algae (part of pebbly coquina facies of Ricketts et al. 1989); Nl, N3. 0-0.1 m of lenticular, shelly sandstone or shell hash limestone in shallow depressions atop the underlying units or infilling matrix between boulders in the top of the boulder breccia (part of pebbly coquina facies of Ricketts et al. 1989, upper unit of Kawau Subgroup); N2. 2-3 m of massive to weakly laminated mudstone and very fine sandstone (mudstone-sandstone facies of Ricketts et al. 1989, basal unit of Warkworth Subgroup); N5. 0-10 m thick lenticular unit containing blocks of weakly laminated mudstone and very fine sandstone. One 3 m-diameter block of hard, concretionary siltstone contains scattered thin-shelled fossils (slide facies of Ricketts et al. 1989); N4. 20 m + of interbedded sandstone and mudstone with an overall upward increase in turbiditic sandstone beds (mudstone-sandstone facies of Ricketts et al. 1989). Upper parts of the unit, exposed high in the cliffs, have 2-3 m thick beds of graded turbiditic sandstone (Pakiri facies of Ballance 1974). FOSSIL COLLECTIONS The macrofossils listed here is largely based on collections