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Amuri Bluff (Cretaceous to of New Zealand)

Also known as Hamuri Bluff

Where: South Island, New Zealand (42.6° S, 173.5° E: paleocoordinates 57.7° S, 148.9° W)

• coordinate based on nearby landmark

• outcrop-level geographic resolution

When: Conway Formation, Campanian to Campanian (84.9 - 66.0 Ma)

• Hiller et al. (2005):

•

•The vast majority of reptilian remains reported from North Canterbury have come from the Conway Formation, especially from exposures at Haumuri Bluff and along the Waipara River...

•

•The name Conway Formation is currently applied to those stratigraphic units that have in the past been called the ‘Boulder Sands’ (Hector, 1874; McKay, 1877), ‘Concretionary Sands’ (Mason, 1941), ‘Laidmore Formation’ (Webb, 1966; 1971; Wells and Gregg, 1971), ‘Saurian Beds’ (McKay, 1877; Thomson, 1920; Wellman, 1959; Wilson, 1963), ‘Saurian Sands’ (Haast, 1871a; Wilson, 1963), ‘Septaria Clays’ (Haast, 1871b), and ‘Sulphur Sands’ (Hector, 1874; Thomson, 1920; Mason, 1941; Wilson, 1963). More detailed descriptions and synonymies of the Conway Formation can be found in Warren and Speden (1978), Browne and Field (1985), Andrews et al. (1987) and Warren (1995)...

•

•In part, the revision of

•Haumurian correlation is based on the development of a refined biostratigraphic subdivision of the New Zealand Upper Cretaceous founded on dinoflagellates (Roncaglia and Schiøler, 1997; Schiøler and Wilson, 1998; Roncaglia et al., 1999). Application of this biostratigraphic scheme to the Conway Formation shows it to range from middle Campanian at Haumuri Bluff to upper Maastrichtian at Waipara River (Roncaglia and Schiøler, 1997; Roncaglia et al., 1999)

Environment/lithology: basinal (); massive, concretionary, gray, silty, calcareous sandstone

• The Conway Formation was debioturbation suggests relatively slow rates of accumulation, and the jarosite content is thought to be the result of bacposited in a marine environment with restricted bottom circulation and sedimentation largely from suspension (Warren and Speden, 1978). The extent of terial reduction of seawater sulphates associated with organic carbon in a low oxygen environment (Warren and Speden, 1978). A barred submarine depression, or series of depressions, is the favored interpretation of the depositional setting (Warren and Speden, 1978; Browne and Field, 1985; Warren, 1995).
• Throughout most of its outcrop area, the Conway Formation is a soft, easily eroded, dark grey, massive, jarositic (KFe3 +3(SO4)2(OH)6) siltstone or silty sandstone in which pervasive bioturbation has all but obliterated primary sedimentary features in most exposures. Scattered large subspherical calcareous

•concretions, up to 5 m in diameter, are a distinctive characteristic of the unit, especially in the lower part. About 25% of these concretions contain reptilian bones (Warren and Speden, 1978:26). Non-spherical concretions are rare, but at one locality on Ngaroma Station along the Conway River (Fig. 1B), near the top of the formation, the remains of several reptile specimens have been found encased in irregular concretionary masses.

Size class: macrofossils

Collected by McKay, Haast, H. Travers in 1869, 1871

Primary reference: J. Hector. 1874. On the fossil Reptilia of New Zealand. Transactions and Proceedings of the Royal Society of New Zealand 6:333-358 [M. Carrano/M. Carrano/M. Carrano] more details

Purpose of describing collection: general faunal/floral analysis

PaleoDB collection 101382: authorized by Matthew Carrano, entered by Hallie Street on 21.12.2010, edited by Mark Uhen and Matthew Clapham

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)