Middle Devonian invertebrate trace fossils from the marginal marine carbonates of the Zachełmie tetrapod tracksite, Holy Cross Mountains, Poland

 

Authors: Niedźwiedzski G, Narkiewicz M, Szrek P

Published in: Bulletin of Geosciences, volume 89, issue 3; pages: 593 - 606; Received 14 June 2013; Accepted in revised form 7 January 2014; Online 2 April 2014

Keywords: trace fossils, invertebrates, marginal-marine carbonates, Middle Devonian, tetrapod habitats, Central Europe,

full text (PDF, 4.46 MB)

Export to RIS

 

Abstract

The dolomitic deposits of the Middle Devonian Wojciechowice Formation exposed at the tetrapod tracksite in the Zachełmie Quarry in the Holy Cross Mountains (Poland) are characterised by a low diversity of invertebrate trace fossil association. Four ichnoassemblages can be identified in the track-bearing, lower part of the succession. The most conspicuous are trace fossils produced by arthropods (probably crustaceans), which can form distinctive and large horizontal burrows. The described ichnotaxa (cf. Skolithos isp., cf. Balanoglossites isp., Alcyonidiopsis isp., Spongeliomorpha isp., Gordia isp., and Rhizocorallium isp.) are well known from typical marginal-marine and shallow-marine deposits. Nevertheless, the studied assemblages were found in sparsely distributed horizons and are dominated by a single or a few ichnotaxa with locally high trace-densities. Distribution and composition of the trace fossil assemblages probably reflects occurrence of the impoverished, stressed Cruziana ichnofacies. It was affected by changes in water depth with intermittent periods of subaerial exposure connected with salinity fluctuations. The invertebrate trace fossil assemblage, tetrapod tracks and associated sedimentological features point to deposition in a marginal-marine, mostly peritidal and lagoonal environment with minor terrestrial influences.

References

Belka, Z. & Narkiewicz, M. 2008. Devonian, 383-410. In McCann, T. (ed.) The Geology of Central Europe. Vol. 1: Precambrian and Palaeozoic. Geological Society of London, London.

Bromley, R.G. & Asgaard, U. 1979. Triassic freshwater ichnocoenosis from Carlsberg Fjord, East Greenland. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 28, 39-80.View article

Buatois, L.A., Gingras, M.K., MacEachern, J., Mángano, M.G., Zonneveld, J.-P., Pemberton, S.G., Netto, R.G. & Martin, A.J. 2005. Colonization of brackish-water systems through time: Evidence from the trace-fossil record. Palaios 20, 321-347.View article

Buatois, L.A. & Mángano, M.G. 2011. Ichnology: The role of Organism-Substrate Interaction in Space and Time. 358 pp. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.View article

Curran, H.A. 1994. The palaeobiology of ichnocoenoses in Quaternary, Bahamian-style carbonate environments: The modern to fossil transition, 83-104. In Donovan, S.K. (ed.) Palaeobiology of Trace Fossils. John Wiley and Sons, Chichester.

Curran, H.A. 2007. Ichnofacies, ichnocoenoses, and ichnofabrics of Quaternary shallow-marine to dunal tropical carbonates: a model and implications, 232-247. In Miller III, W. (ed.) Trace Fossils Concepts, Problems, Prospects. Elsevier, Amsterdam.View article

Curran, H. & Martin, A.J. 2003. Complex decapod burrows and ecological relationships in modern and Pleistocene intertidal carbonate environments, San Salvador Island, Bahamas. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 192, 229-245.View article

Dadlez, R., Marek, S. & Pokorski, J. 2000. Geological Map of Poland without Cainozoic Deposits (1:1 000 000). Polish Geological Institute, Warszawa.

Davies, N.S. & Gibling, M.R. 2010. Cambrian to Devonian evolution of alluvial systems: the sedimentological impact of the earliest land plants. Earth-Science Review 98, 171-200.View article

Donaldson, D. & Simpson, S. 1962. Chomatichnus, a new ichnogenus and other trace fossils from the Wegber Quarry. Liverpool and Manchester Geological Journal 3, 73-81.View article

Ekdale, A.A. 1992. Mudcraking and mudslinging: the joys of deposit-feeding, 145-171. In Maples, C.G. & West, R.R. (eds) Trace fossils. Paleontological Society, Short Courses in Paleontology 5.

Ekdale, A.A. & Bromley, R.G. 2003. Paleoethologic interpretation of complex Thalassinoides in shallow-marine limestones, Lower Ordovician, southern Sweden. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 192, 221-227.View article

Emmons, E. 1844. The Taconic System based on observations in New York, Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont, and Rhode-Island. 63 pp. Albany, Caroll & Cook.

Fürsich, F.T. 1973. Thalassinoides and the origin of nodular limestones in the Corallian Beds (Upper Jurassic) of southern England. Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie, Abhandlungen 12, 719-735.View article

Gaigalas, A. & Uchman, A. 2004. Trace fossils from upper Pleistocene varved clays of Kaunas, Lithuania. Geologija 45, 16-26.

Gensel, P.G. 2008. The earliest land plants. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution and Systematics 39, 459-477.View article

Gevers, T.W., Frakes, L.A., Edwards, L.N. & Marzolf, J.E. 1971. Trace fossils in the Lower Beacon Sediments (Devonian), Darwin Mountains, Southern Victoria Land, Antarctica. Journal of Paleontology 45, 81-94.

Graham, J.R. & Pollard, J.E. 1982. Occurrence of the trace fossil Beaconites antarcticus in the Lower Carboniferous fluviatile rocks of County Mayo, Ireland. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 38, 257-268.View article

Haldeman, S.S. 1840. Supplement to number one of “A monograph of the Limniades, and other freshwater bivalve shells of the apparently new animals in different classes, and names and characters of the subgenera in Paludina and Anculosa. 3 pp. J. Dobson, Philadelphia.

Heer, O. 1877. Flora Fossilis Helvetiae. Vorweltliche Flora der Schweiz. 182 pp. J. Wurster & Company, Zürich.

Jaglarz, P. & Uchman, A. 2010. A hypersaline ichnoassemblage from the Middle Triassic carbonate ramp of the Tatricum domain in the Tatra Mountains, Southern Poland. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 292, 71-81.View article

Kaźmierczak, J. & Pszczółkowski, A. 1969. Burrows of enteropneusta in Muschelkalk (Middle Triassic) of the Holy Cross Mountains, Poland. Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 14, 299-317.

Keighley, D.G. & Pickerill, R.K. 1994. The ichnogenus Beaconites and its distinction from Ancorichnus and Taenidium. Palaeontology 37, 305-337.

Knaust, D. 2008. Balanoglossites Mägdefrau 1932 from the Middle Triassic of Germany: Part of a complex trace fossil probably produced by burrowing and boring polychaetes. Paläontologische Zeitschrift 82, 347-372.View article

Lerner, A.J., Lucas, S.G. & Spielman, J.A. 2007. Invertebrate ichnoassemblage from the Triassic Moenkopi Group in north-central Utah, 203-207. In Lucas, S.G. & Spielmann, J.A. (eds) Triassic of the American West. New Mexico Museum of Natural History, Science Bulletin 40.

MacEachern, J.A., Bann, K.L., Pemberton, S.G. & Gingras, M.K. 2007a. The ichnofacies paradigm: high-resolution paleoenvironmental interpretation of the rock record, 27-64. In MacEachern, J.A., Bann, K.L., Gingras, M.K. & Pemberton, S.G. (eds) Applied Ichnology. SEPM (Society for Sedimentary Petrology) Short Course Notes 52.

MacEachern, J.A. & Gingras, M.K. 2007. Recognition of brackish-water trace-fossil suites in the Cretaceous Western Interior Seaway of Alberta, Canada, 149-193. In Bromley, R.G., Buatois, L.A.,Mángano, M.G., Genise, J.F. & Melchor, R.N. (eds) Sediment-organism interactions: A multifaceted ichnology. Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists (Society for Sedimentary Geology) Special Publications 88.

MacEachern, J.A., Pemberton, S.G., Gingras, M.K. & Bann, K.L. 2007b. The ichnofacies concept: a fifty-year retrospective, 50-75. In Miller III, W. (ed.) Trace Fossils: Concepts, Problems, Prospects. Elsevier, Amsterdam.View article

MacNaughton, R.B. & Pickerill, R.K. 1995. Invertebrate ichnology of the nonmarine Lepreau Formation (Triassic), southern New Brunswick, eastern Canada. Journal of Paleontology 69, 160-171.View article

Mägdefrau, K. 1932. Über einige Bohrgänge aus dem Unteren Muschelkalk von Jena. Paläontologische Zeitschrift 14, 150-160.View article

Mángano, M.G., Buatois, L.A., Limarino, C.O., Tripaldi, A. & Caselli, A. 2003. El icnogénero Psammichnites Torell, 1870 en la Formación Hoyada Verde, Carbonífero Superior de la cuenca Calingasta-Uspallata. Ameghiniana 40, 601-608.

Massalongo, A. 1856. Studi Paleontologici. 53 pp. Antonelli, Verona.

Narkiewicz, K. 2013. (in press). Taxonomic revision and phylogenetic affinities of the conodont Bipennatus montensis (Weddige 1977) from the Eifelian (Middle Devonian) of Poland. Paläontologische Zeitschrift.View article

Narkiewicz, K. & Narkiewicz, M. 2010. Mid Devonian carbonate platform development in the Holy Cross Mts. area (central Poland): new constraints from the conodont Bipennatus fauna. Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie, Abhandlungen 255, 287-300.View article

Narkiewicz, M. & Retallack, G.J. 2014. Dolomitic paleosols in the lagoonal tetrapod track-bearing succession of the Holy Cross Mountains (Middle Devonian, Poland). Sedimentary Geology 29, 74-87.View article

Niedźwiedzki, G., Szrek, P., Narkiewicz, K., Narkiewicz, M. & Ahlberg, P.E. 2010. Tetrapod trackways from the early Middle Devonian period of Poland. Nature 463, 43-48.View article

Patel, S.J. & Desai, B.G. 2009. Animal-sediment relationship of the crustaceans and polychaetes in the intertidal zone around Mandvi Gulf of Kachchh, Western India. Journal of Geological Society of India 74, 233-259.View article

Pemberton, S.G. & Frey, R. 1982. Trace fossil nomenclature and the Planolites-Palaeophycus dilemma. Journal of Paleontology 56, 843-881.

Pemberton, S.G., Spila, M., Pulham, A.J., Saunders, T., Maceachern, J.A., Robbins, D. & Sinclair, I.K. 2001. Ichnology and sedimentology of shallow to marginal marine systems: Ben Nevis and Avalon Reservoirs, Jeanne d’Arc Basin. Geological Association of Canada, St. John’s Newfoundland, Short Course Notes 15, 1-353.

Remane, A. & Schlieper, C. 1971. Biology of Brackish Water. 372 pp. John Wiley and Sons, New York.

Retallack, G.J. 2011. Woodland hypothesis for Devonian tetrapod evolution. Journal of Geology 119, 235-258.View article

Saporta, G.D. 1887. Nouveaux documents relatifs aux organismes problématiques des anciennes mers. Bulletin de la Société Géologique du France, 3me Série 15, 286-302.

Schlirf,M. 2000. Upper Jurassic trace fossils from the Boulonnais (northern France). Geologia et Palaeontologia 34, 145-213.

Schlirf,M. 2011.Anew classification concept for U-shaped spreite trace fossils. Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie, Abhandlungen 260, 33-54.View article

Schlirf, M. & Uchman, A. 2005. Revision of the ichnogenus Sabellarifex Richter, 1921 and its relationship to Skolithos Haldeman, 1840 and Polykladichnus Fürsich, 1981. Journal of Systematic Palaeontology 3, 115-131.View article

Seilacher, A. 2007. Trace Fossil Analysis. 226 pp. Springer Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg, New York.

Singh, I.B. & Shukla, U.K. 1991. Significance of trace fossils in the Bhuj Sandstone (Lower Cretaceous), Bhuj area, Kachchh. Journal of the Palaeontological Society of India 36, 121-126.

Surlyk, F.,Milan, J. & Noe-Nygaard, N. 2008. Dinosaur tracks and possible lungfish aestivation burrows in a shallow coastal lake; lowermost Cretaceous, Bornholm, Denmark. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 231, 253-264.View article

Szulczewski, M. 1995. Depositional evolution of the Holy Cross Mts. (Poland) in the Devonian and Carboniferous - a review. Geological Quarterly 39, 471-488.

Uchman, A. 1995. Taxonomy and palaeoecology of flysch trace fossils: the Marnoso-arenacea Formation and associated facies (Miocene, northern Apennines, Italy). Beringeria 15, 1-115.

Uchman, A. 1999. Ichnology of the Rhenodanubian Flysch (Lower Cretaceous-Eocene) in Austria and Germany. Beringeria 25, 65-171.

Virtasalo, J.J., Kotilainen, A.T. & Gingras, M.K. 2006. Trace fossils as indicators of environmental change in Holocene sediments of the Archipelago Sea, northern Baltic Sea. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 240, 453-467.View article

Voigt, S., Scheneider, J.W., Saber, H., Hminna, A., Lagnaoui, A., Klein, H., Brosig, A. & Fischer, J. 2011. Complex tetrapod burrows from Middle Triassic red beds of the Argana Basin (Western High Atlas, Morocco). Palaios 26, 555-566.View article