Abstract
MARINE sedimentary rocks exposed near Knysna in the Cape Province of South Africa were assigned to the Upper Jurassic on the basis of a fragment of an ammonoid and seven previously undescribed species of ostracod1. A more thorough examination of the microfossils in these rocks indicates that this assignment was erroneous and that the beds are of Early Cretaceous, probably Hauterivian, age2. This age determination was based on identification of fifty species of palynomorph, five species of calcareous nanno-fossil, and twelve species of foraminifera. Both the palynomorphs and the foraminifera indicate a correlation with the upper part of the Sundays River Formation, a unit reliably dated as Valanginian to Hauterivian. The nannofossils indicate a Valanginian or Hauterivian age.
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STAPLETON, R., BEER, E. “Upper Jurassic” sediments of South Africa. Nature 264, 49 (1976). https://doi.org/10.1038/264049a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/264049a0
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