From the Blue Ridge to the Beach: Geological Field Excursions across Virginia
This volume includes seven field guides that explore the diverse geology of Virginia from its Appalachian highlands to the Atlantic shore. The guides cover an array of topics ranging from cave and karst development in the Valley and Ridge to the exceptional fossil localities at the Carmel Church Quarry and the cliffs near Stratford Hall to Precambrian rocks in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Three guides focus on the Paleozoic to Proterozoic tectonic history of the Blue Ridge and Piedmont provinces, two guides discuss the stratigraphy and fossil assemblages preserved in Cenozoic deposits on the Atlantic Coastal Plain, one guide examines Paleozoic stratigraphy and cave formation in western Virginia, and the final guide explores the relationship between the geology of the Fall Zone and the Civil War during the Petersburg Campaign in 1864–1865.
Geology and biostratigraphy of the Potomac River cliffs at Stratford Hall, Westmoreland County, Virginia
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Published:January 01, 2017
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CiteCitation
Robert E. Weems, Lucy E. Edwards, Bryan Landacre, 2017. "Geology and biostratigraphy of the Potomac River cliffs at Stratford Hall, Westmoreland County, Virginia", From the Blue Ridge to the Beach: Geological Field Excursions across Virginia, Christopher M. Bailey, Shelley Jaye
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Abstract
The cliffs along the Potomac River at Stratford Hall display extensive exposures of Miocene marine strata that belong successively to the Calvert, Choptank, St. Marys, and Eastover Formations. Within the lower part of this sequence, in the Calvert and Choptank Formations, there is well-developed cyclic stratigraphy. Above the Miocene units lies the marginal marine to deltaic Pleistocene Bacons Castle Formation, which is the highest and youngest formation exposed in the cliffs. The goals of this field trip guide are to (1) show the Miocene formations exposed in the cliffs and discuss the paleoenvironments within which they formed, (2) demonstrate the cyclicity in the Miocene marine formations and discuss its origin, (3) compare and contrast the section exposed at the Stratford and Nomini Cliffs with the classic Miocene Calvert Cliffs sequence exposed to the northeast in Calvert County, Maryland, and the Miocene sequence recovered in the Haynesville cores to the southeast in Richmond County, Virginia, (4) discuss and explain why a detailed correlation among these three places has been so difficult to attain, and (5) show typical lithologies of the Bacons Castle Formation and discuss the paleoenvironments in which they formed.
- Atlantic Coastal Plain
- biostratigraphy
- Calvert Formation
- Cenozoic
- Choptank Formation
- cliffs
- correlation
- depositional environment
- Eastover Formation
- marine environment
- middle Miocene
- Miocene
- Neogene
- paleoenvironment
- Potomac River
- Saint Marys Formation
- Tertiary
- United States
- upper Miocene
- Virginia
- Westmoreland County Virginia
- Nomini Cliffs
- Stratford Hall