scholarly journals The stratigraphy and geochemistry of late Devonian to early Carboniferous volcanic rocks of the northern Chignecto peninsula, Cobequid Highlands, Nova Scotia

10.4138/2077 ◽  
1996 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
David J.W. Piper ◽  
Georgia Pe-Piper ◽  
David J. Pass

2002 ◽  
Vol 39 (8) ◽  
pp. 1219-1237 ◽  
Author(s):  
Greg R Dunning ◽  
Sandra M Barr ◽  
Peter S Giles ◽  
D Colin McGregor ◽  
Georgia Pe-Piper ◽  
...  

Fifteen U–Pb (zircon) radiometric age determinations have been made on igneous rocks of Middle Devonian to Early Carboniferous age from the southern margin of the Magdalen basin in Cape Breton Island and northern mainland Nova Scotia. Volcanic rocks interbed with early rift-basin sedimentary rocks with some palynological biostratigraphy; dated intrusive rocks cut these sedimentary units. Our biostratigraphically constrained ages are in close agreement with the current Devonian time scale. Combined with previously published data, the age determinations show that igneous activity occurred in four pulses: Middle Devonian (390–385 Ma), early Late Devonian (375–370 Ma), latest Devonian to early Tournaisian (365–354 Ma), and late Tournaisian to early Visean (ca. 339 Ma). Middle Devonian (385–389 Ma) volcanic rocks are confined to the Guysborough Group. The Fisset Brook Formation (basalt and minor rhyolite) in the type area and elsewhere in Cape Breton Island and northern mainland Nova Scotia is Late Devonian (ca. 373 Ma), whereas the biostratigraphically distinct succession at Lowland Cove is younger (365 Ma). These Late Devonian rocks are synchronous with plutonism in the Cape Breton Highlands and the Meguma terrane. In the Cobequid Highlands, rhyolite of the Fountain Lake Group was synchronous with Horton Group deposition and with widespread granite plutons (362–358 Ma) emplaced during shear on the Cobequid fault zone. The overlying Diamond Brook Formation basalts are slightly younger (355 Ma). Late Tournaisian – early Visean mafic intrusions and minor basalt occur along the Cobequid – Chedabucto fault zone and in a belt from southern New Brunswick through Prince Edward Island to southwestern Cape Breton Island.



2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (5) ◽  
pp. 210281
Author(s):  
Kendra I. Lennie ◽  
Sarah L. Manske ◽  
Chris F. Mansky ◽  
Jason S. Anderson

Evidence for terrestriality in early tetrapods is fundamentally contradictory. Fossil trackways attributed to early terrestrial tetrapods long predate the first body fossils from the Late Devonian. However, the Devonian body fossils demonstrate an obligatorily aquatic lifestyle. Complicating our understanding of the transition from water to land is a pronounced gap in the fossil record between the aquatic Devonian taxa and presumably terrestrial tetrapods from the later Early Carboniferous. Recent work suggests that an obligatorily aquatic habit persists much higher in the tetrapod tree than previously recognized. Here, we present independent microanatomical data of locomotor capability from the earliest Carboniferous of Blue Beach, Nova Scotia. The site preserves limb bones from taxa representative of Late Devonian to mid-Carboniferous faunas as well as a rich trackway record. Given that bone remodels in response to functional stresses including gravity and ground reaction forces, we analysed both the midshaft compactness profiles and trabecular anisotropy, the latter using a new whole bone approach. Our findings suggest that early tetrapods retained an aquatic lifestyle despite varied limb morphologies, prior to their emergence onto land. These results suggest that trackways attributed to early tetrapods be closely scrutinized for additional information regarding their creation conditions, and demand an expansion of sampling to better identify the first terrestrial tetrapods.



1989 ◽  
Vol 26 (6) ◽  
pp. 1297-1307 ◽  
Author(s):  
Georgia Pe-Piper ◽  
R. F. Cormier ◽  
David J. W. Piper

A series of granite plutons with minor gabbro–diorite phases outcrops immediately north of the Cobequid Fault in the western Cobequid Highlands, Nova Scotia. The plutons were cut by numerous dykes, and parts of some plutons and some dykes subsequently underwent ductile deformation. Four Rb–Sr whole-rock–K-feldspar isochron dates ranging from 338 to 356 Ma have been obtained from these plutons and the dykes that cut them. The ages of these plutons are indistinguishable from an age of 341 Ma obtained for the nearby Fountain Lake Group volcanic rocks, within estimated uncertainties. Measured Carboniferous granite ages are uncommon in the Appalachian Orogen of eastern Canada. The geochemical character of these plutons indicates that they result from crustal extension. This extension and the compression observed in the granites with ductile deformation are related to transcurrent motion between the Avalon and Meguma terranes along the Minas fault zone.Preliminary Rb–Sr whole-rock data from poorly exposed plutons in the northern part of the Cobequid Highlands suggest a Middle to Late Devonian or older age. These plutons may represent an earlier phase of crustal extension.



1985 ◽  
Vol 22 (7) ◽  
pp. 1080-1092 ◽  
Author(s):  
Derek H. C. Wilton

Four granitoid suites are recognized in the region of the Cape Ray Fault Zone of southwestern Newfoundland. The two oldest (Ordovician–Silurian (?)) suites represent partial melts of their enclosing host rocks. The Port aux Basques granite is modelled as a partial melt of the gneissic component of its host, Port aux Basques Complex. The Cape Ray granite forms a dominantly tonalitic terrane derived by partial melting of ophiolitic material. The Red Rocks granite and a megacrystic phase of the Cape Ray granite form coherent lines of geochemical descent from the parental tonalite but show evidence of some continental crust contamination.The Late Devonian Windowglass Hill granite is a subvolcanic equivalent of felsic volcanic rocks in the Windsor Point Group. Both units were derived as partial melts of continental crust.The post-tectonic, Late Devonian to Early Carboniferous Strawberry and Isle aux Morts Brook granites constitute the youngest granitoid suite in the region. These A-type granitoids were derived as partial melts of an underlying depleted granulitic (felsic) crust. The depleted nature of the source may have resulted from previous generation of the Windowglass Hill granite and Windsor Point Group. The only possible protolith for the granulitic source is Precambrian Grenvillian gneiss. The presence of this gneiss beneath the Cape Ray Fault Zone of southwestern Newfoundland implies that the complete series of lithologies is allochthonous.



2020 ◽  
Vol 55 (4) ◽  
pp. 2881-2901
Author(s):  
Xin Xu ◽  
Changfeng Liu ◽  
Wencan Liu ◽  
Baoying Ye ◽  
Zixian Zhao ◽  
...  


1988 ◽  
Vol 25 (9) ◽  
pp. 1349-1364 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. C. McGregor ◽  
S. R. McCutcheon

The predominantly volcanic Piskahegan Group has commonly been considered Early Carboniferous, based on its stratigraphic position. However, spores recently discovered in the Carrow Formation, an alluvial fan deposit in the exocaldera facies, indicate that most, if not all, of the group is of Late Devonian (late Famennian) age. The spore assemblage includes several species reported previously from Ireland, Belgium, and eastern Europe, some of them apparently restricted to the southern parts of the Old Red Sandstone Continent in Late Devonian time. Comparison of records of earliest occurrences suggests that the incoming of some species was diachronous. Volcanic rocks of the Piskahegan Group are coeval with post-Acadian, tin–tungsten-bearing granites elsewhere in New Brunswick and are considered the surface expression of plutonism that resulted from Acadian continental collison.



2014 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrian F. Park ◽  
Robert L. Treat ◽  
Sandra M. Barr ◽  
Chris E. White ◽  
Brent V. Miller ◽  
...  

The Partridge Island block is a newly identified tectonic element in the Saint John area of southern New Brunswick, located south of and in faulted contact with Proterozoic and Cambrian rocks of the Ganderian Brookville and Avalonian Caledonia terranes. It includes the Lorneville Group and Tiner Point complex. The Lorneville Group consists of interbedded volcanic and sedimentary rocks, subdivided into the Taylors Island Formation west of Saint John Harbour and West Beach Formation east of Saint John Harbour. A sample from thin rhyolite layers interbedded with basaltic flows of the Taylors Island Formation at Sheldon Point yielded a Late Devonian – Early Carboniferous U–Pb (zircon) age of 358.9 +6/–5 Ma. Petrological similarities indicate that all of the basaltic rocks of the Taylors Island and West Beach formations are of similar age and formed in a continental within-plate tectonic setting. West of Saint John Harbour, basaltic and sedimentary rocks of the Taylors Island Formation are increasingly deformed and mylonitic to the south, and in part tectonically interlayered with mylonitic granitoid rocks and minor metasedimentary rocks of the Tiner Point complex. Based on magnetic signatures, the deformed rocks of the Tiner Point complex can be traced through Partridge Island to the eastern side of Saint John Harbour, where together with the West Beach Formation, they occupy a thrust sheet above a redbed sequence of the mid-Carboniferous Balls Lake Formation. The Tiner Point complex includes leucotonalite and aegirine-bearing alkali-feldspar granite with A-type chemical affinity and Early Carboniferous U–Pb (zircon) ages of 353.6 ± 5.7 and 346.4 ± 0.7 Ma, respectively. Based on similarities in age, petrological characteristics, alteration, iron oxide – copper – gold (IOCG)-type mineralization, and deformation style, the Partridge Island block is correlated with Late Devonian – Early Carboniferous volcanic–sedimentary–plutonic rocks of the Cobequid Highlands in northern mainland Nova Scotia. Deformation was likely a result of dextral transpression along the Cobequid–Chedabucto fault zone during juxtaposition of the Meguma terrane.



2004 ◽  
Vol 41 (8) ◽  
pp. 987-996 ◽  
Author(s):  
P H Reynolds ◽  
S M Barr ◽  
C E White ◽  
P J Ténière

40Ar/39Ar dating of whole-rock samples and muscovite separates using age spectrum analysis, and of single muscovite grains using total fusion analysis, yields new insights into the timing of regional metamorphism and sediment provenance in the Late Devonian – Early Carboniferous Horton Group in the Lochaber–Mulgrave area of Nova Scotia. The time of regional metamorphism is constrained to ca. 340–335 Ma by whole-rock spectra from well-cleaved slate and shale samples from the lowermost Clam Harbour River and overlying Tracadie Road formations of the Horton Group. This ca. 340–335 Ma event may have been the result of burial and deformation of the Horton Group by older volcanic and sedimentary rocks of the Guysborough Group, which were overthrust from the south as the result of development of a positive flower structure at a restraining bend along the Cobequid–Chedabucto fault system, the boundary between the Meguma and Avalon terranes. Detrital muscovite ages of ca. 410–380 and ca. 500 Ma were obtained from single-grain analysis and from spectral analysis of separated grains. Whole-rock spectra for two samples from a mylonitic metasedimentary unit in the Cape Porcupine Complex yielded plateau ages of 364 ± 4 and 367 ± 4 Ma, providing a likely source for ca. 370–360 Ma detrital muscovite, ages that may be reflected in some of the age spectrum data. However, the Meguma terrane to the south is the most likely source for most of the detrital muscovite.



2017 ◽  
Vol 41 ◽  
pp. 142-156 ◽  
Author(s):  
Baodi Wang ◽  
Liquan Wang ◽  
Jianlin Chen ◽  
Han Liu ◽  
Fuguang Yin ◽  
...  


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