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Since Bramlette (1946): the Miocene Monterey Formation of California Revisited

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Since Bramlette (1946): the Miocene Monterey Formation of California Revisited Geological Society of America Special Paper 338 1999 Since Bramlette (1946): The Miocene Monterey Formation of California revisited Richard J. Behl Department of Geological Sciences, California State University, Long Beach, California 90840-3902; e-mail: [email protected]. INTRODUCTION eries in the Monterey Formation following the first sale of Fed- eral Outer Continental Shelf leases in the Santa Barbara Chan- For more than a century the Miocene Monterey Formation nel in 1966. A tremendous amount of this work was published has fascinated geologists with its uniquely siliceous composi- in a series of American Association of Petroleum Geologists tion, complex diagenesis, and importance as both source and (AAPG) and Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineral- reservoir of oil in California. The Monterey’s extensive and ogists (SEPM; now the Society for Sedimentary Geology) spe- excellent outcrops, exposed at different stages of alteration, cial publications and symposium volumes in the 1980s and have served as laboratories for countless studies of silica, clay, 1990s (Isaacs, 1981a; Garrison and Douglas, 1981; Williams carbonate, phosphate, organic matter, and petroleum. Bram- and Graham, 1982; Isaacs and Garrison, 1983; Garrison et al., lette’s U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 212 (1946) 1984; Surdam, 1984; Casey and Barron, 1986; Dunham and served as the foundation for all of these studies and provided Blake, 1987; Schwalbach and Bohacs, 1992; Hornafius, 1994a; the detailed sedimentology, stratigraphy, and petrology to give Eichhubl, 1998) that coincided with the upturn in industry inter- them context and meaning. For the most part, Bramlette had it est in the petroleum potential of the offshore Monterey (Isaacs, right, and an explosion of new research since the 1970s 1984; Crain et al., 1985). An additional major volume focusing advanced and refined understanding without disproving many on the organic geochemistry of the Monterey Formation (Isaacs of Bramlette’s fundamental observations and assertions. One and Ruellkötter, 1999) should be published by the time this hypothesis that did eventually fall was that abundant siliceous review is published. volcanism was the essential source of the silica incorporated in the frustules of diatoms and in the sediment of the Monterey GEOLOGIC SETTING Formation; we have since learned that within zones of intense upwelling, diatoms or radiolarians can extract enough silica The Miocene Monterey Formation was deposited along the from normal seawater to produce highly siliceous sediments North American plate boundary during the transition of the Cal- when undiluted by other sedimentary components (Calvert, ifornia margin from a convergent to transform setting (Blake et 1966, 1968). al., 1978; Barron, 1986a). Resulting tectonic subsidence and Research since Bramlette’s has broadly focused on diagen- landward transgression of the shoreline during the late Oligo- esis (especially that of silica, carbonate, and organic matter), cene to middle Miocene led to the development of middle petroleum generation and reservoirs, dating and stratigraphic bathyal depocenters in which the Monterey sediments accumu- correlation, and the oceanographic context of deposition of the lated (Figs. 1 and 2) (Ingle, 1980, 1981a). Presedimentary and Monterey Formation. Much of this work benefited from tech- synsedimentary tectonic deformation (chiefly extension, shear- nological advances in X-ray diffraction, stable isotopic analy- ing, and rotation) during the Miocene has been overprinted by sis, electron microscopy, and the results of the Deep Sea Pliocene-Pleistocene shortening, making palinspastic recon- Drilling Project (DSDP) and Ocean Drilling Program (ODP). A struction of the location and extent of the Neogene sedimentary burst of research, initially proprietary, began about 1970 as oil basins extremely challenging (Ingersoll and Ernst, 1987; companies sought to explain and exploit major offshore discov- Crouch and Suppe, 1993; Fritsche, 1998; Isaacs, 1999). In Behl, R. J., 1999, Since Bramlette (1946): The Miocene Monterey Formation of California revisited, in Moores, E. M., Sloan, D., and Stout, D. L., eds., Classic Cordilleran Concepts: A View from California: Boulder, Colorado, Geological Society of America Special Paper 338. 301 302 R. J. Behl Eel River 100 km Key: Faults: N SAF - San Andreas Fault GF - Garlock Fault HCF - Hayward-Calaveras Fault Point Arena MFZ - Mendocino Fracture Zone Basins: Great Valley a. Livermore b. La Honda Bodega a c. Pismo, Huasna, Cuyama San Joaquin d. Ridge e. Soledad Año Nuevo f. Santa Monica, San Pedro b g. Los Angeles Salinas h. San Diego Basin & Range Santa Maria SAF Basins (+ Partington GF & Santa Lucia) c d e g Santa Barbara/Ventura f Salton Trough Borderland Basins h Figure 1. Present location of Neogene depocenters or sedimentary basins (after Biddle, 1991; Dunkel and Piper, 1997). many cases, the geometry and bathymetry of individual AGE OF THE MONTEREY FORMATION depocenters evolved from the Miocene through the Pleistocene, with earlier deposited sediments, including the Monterey For- Like most lithostratigraphic units, the age of the middle to late mation, now forming the folded and faulted flanks of the Miocene Monterey Formation varies with location, as sedimenta- Pliocene and Quaternary depocenters (Teng and Gorsline, tion characteristic of the formation commenced and terminated at 1989; Blake, 1991). different times in separate depocenters. If a typical duration could be specified, it would be from about 16 Ma to 6 Ma (Barron, 1986b). GEOGRAPHIC EXTENT Initiation of Monterey deposition started as early as 17.8 Ma (Saucesian stage, Naples Beach) (DePaolo and Finger, 1991) or as The Monterey Formation is part of a discontinuous belt of late as 15 Ma (e.g., Relizian, Palos Verdes Hills, Berkeley Hills, fine-grained, notably siliceous (diatomaceous) sediments that Monterey; Obradovich and Naeser, 1981). The youngest Monterey accumulated around the north Pacific Rim chiefly during the strata at any one location range from about 13 Ma (Luisian, Berke- Miocene (ca. 16–4 Ma) (Ingle, 1973, 1980, 1981b). On land, ley Hills) to <5 Ma (Delmontian, Pliocene, Palos Verdes Hills; well-studied Monterey strata form extensive outcrops and sub- Woodring et al., 1946; Obradovich and Naeser, 1981). In the crops in the Coast Ranges and western parts of California (Bram- Cuyama basin, the Saltos Shale and Whiterock Bluff Shale, often lette, 1946; Pisciotto and Garrison, 1981), extending as an assigned as members of the Monterey Formation (Hill et al., 1958), irregular blanket some 1700 km north and south along the conti- were apparently deposited entirely before initiation of Monterey nental margin. Offshore equivalents of Monterey siliceous sedi- sedimentation in the type area (Obradovich and Naeser, 1981). ments have been cored by deep-sea drilling as far as 300 km seaward from the modern coast and in water as deep as 4200 m Biostratigraphy (ODP Sites 1010, 1016, 1021) (Lyle et al., 1997). The formation is typically 300–500 m thick on land, but is locally much thinner Microfossils provide the primary basis for biostratigraphy and thicker (Bramlette, 1946; Isaacs and Petersen, 1987). within the fine-grained Monterey Formation, with benthic Since Bramlette (1946): the Miocene Monterey Formation of California revisited 303 Figure 2. Generalized upper Tertiary sedimentary facies of the California Coast Ranges, showing the position and facies of the Monterey Formation (Pisciotto and Garrison, 1981). foraminifers remaining the most commonly used taxa for corre- 1987). Although the highly diatomaceous and organic-rich lation. Because of downsection silica phase transformations and deposit has been interpreted to record unusually great plank- upsection loss or dissolution of carbonate, none of the major bio- tonic productivity along the eastern Pacific margin (Barron, stratigraphic groups are generally useful through the entire for- 1986a; Ingle, 1980, 1981b; Pisciotto and Garrison, 1981), mass mation. accumulation rates show that the purest biogenic intervals Monterey strata span the late Saucesian, Luisian, Mohnian, reflect decreased terrigenous input, and consequently less dilu- and locally, the early Delmontian benthic foraminiferal stages tion of the biogenic component (Isaacs, 1985, 1999). Overall, of California (Kleinpell, 1938, 1980). Since development of the Monterey Formation records sediment starvation in con- these Neogene stages, however, it has become evident that ben- junction with surface productivity associated with upwelling thic assemblages were influenced by local paleobathymetry, along the California Current system. These sedimentary condi- character of the impinging water mass, and benthic sedimentol- tions increased the relative proportions of silica, organic matter, ogy, making them time transgressive and often provincial in phosphate, or carbonate with respect to fine-grained detritus— nature (Crouch and Bukry, 1979; Ingle, 1980; Obradovich and mainly illite-smectite mixed-layer clay minerals, feldspars, and Naeser, 1981). Although still quite useful within individual quartz (Isaacs, 1980; Pollastro, 1990; Compton, 1991). Periods fields or basins because of their abundance (Finger, 1995; of extremely slow pelagic sedimentation, undiluted by much Blake, 1991), benthic foraminifers had to be integrated with fine-grained detritus and during which most of the primary bio- planktonic foraminifers (Keller and Barron, 1981), diatoms genic hard components
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