Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-c4f8m Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-17T18:21:58.286Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Warwickshire Group (Pennsylvanian) red-beds of the Canonbie Coalfield, England–Scotland border, and their regional palaeogeographical implications

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 June 2010

NEIL S. JONES ,
DOUGLAS W. HOLLIDAY  and
JOHN A. McKERVEY
NEIL S. JONES*
Affiliation:
British Geological Survey, Keyworth, Nottingham NG12 5GG, UK Saudi Aramco, PO Box 2001, Dhahran 31311, Saudi Arabia
DOUGLAS W. HOLLIDAY
Affiliation:
British Geological Survey, Keyworth, Nottingham NG12 5GG, UK 10 Tarn Court, Ilkley, West Yorkshire LS29 8UE, UK
JOHN A. McKERVEY
Affiliation:
British Geological Survey, Keyworth, Nottingham NG12 5GG, UK 16 Harvard House, Rivermead, Wilford Lane, Nottingham NG2 7RB, UK
*
†Author for correspondence: neil.jones@aramco.com
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Late Carboniferous red-beds, < 700 m thick, at outcrop and in the subsurface of the Canonbie Coalfield can be assigned to the Warwickshire Group. They are preserved within the axial part of the Solway Syncline and are divisible into the Eskbank Wood, Canonbie Bridge Sandstone and Becklees Sandstone formations. Sedimentation largely took place on a well-drained alluvial plain, characterized mainly by early, primary oxidation of the strata. Large, northerly-flowing braided river systems were common, with overbank and floodplain fines deposited lateral to the channels; soils formed during intervals of low sediment aggradation. The Canonbie succession includes some of the youngest Carboniferous rocks preserved in the UK. Correlation of the Eskbank Wood Formation is equivocal, but using petrographical, heavy mineral, zircon age dating and palaeocurrent data, the Canonbie Bridge Sandstone Formation can be unambiguously correlated with the Halesowen Formation of Warwickshire, the Pennant Sandstone Formation of South Wales and the offshore Boulton Formation. This suggests that southerly-derived detritus travelled considerable distances from the Variscan highlands of Brittany and/or central Germany across the southern North Sea and UK areas, to a position some hundreds of kilometres north of that previously recognized. The Becklees Sandstone Formation has much in common with the Salop Formation of the English Midlands. It appears to have no preserved equivalent elsewhere in the UK or in the UK sector of the southern North Sea but resembles stratigraphically higher parts of the southern North Sea succession seen in the Dutch sector.

Keywords

CanonbieCarboniferousred-bedscorrelationsedimentology
Type
Original Article
Information
Geological Magazine , Volume 148 , Issue 1 , January 2011 , pp. 50 - 77
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Akhurst, M. C., Chadwick, R. A., Holliday, D. W., McCormac, M., McMillan, A. A., Millward, D. & Young, B. 1997. Geology of the west Cumbria district. Memoir of the British Geological Survey, England and Wales, Sheets 28, 37 and 47, 138 pp.Google Scholar
Bailey, E. B. 1926. Subterranean penetration by a desert climate. Geological Magazine 63, 276–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barrett, B. H. & Richey, J. E. 1945. Economic geology of Canonbie Coalfield (Dumfriesshire & Cumberland). Geological Survey of Great Britain Wartime Pamphlet no. 42, 1–51.Google Scholar
Besly, B. M. 1987. Sedimentological evidence for Carboniferous and Early Permian palaeoclimates of Europe. Extrait des Annales de la Société Géologique du Nord 151, 131–43.Google Scholar
Besly, B. M. 1988. Palaeogeographic implications of late Westphalian to early Permian red-beds, Central England. In Sedimentation in a synorogenic basin complex: the Upper Carboniferous of northwest Europe (eds Besly, B. M. & Kelling, G.), pp. 200–21. London: Blackie.Google Scholar
Besly, B. M. 1998. Carboniferous. In Petroleum Geology of the North Sea: basic concepts and recent advances, Fourth Edition (ed. Glennie, K. W.), pp. 104–36. Oxford: Blackwell.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Besly, B. M. 2005. Late Carboniferous redbeds of the UK southern North Sea, viewed in a regional context. In Carboniferous hydrocarbon geology: the southern North Sea and surrounding onshore areas (eds Collinson, J. D., Evans, D. J., Holliday, D. W. & Jones, N. S.), pp. 225–6. Yorkshire Geological Society Occasional Publication no. 7.Google Scholar
Besly, B. M. & Cleal, C. J. 1997. Upper Carboniferous stratigraphy of the West Midlands (UK) revised in the light of borehole geophysical logs and detrital compositional suites. Geological Journal 32, 85–118.3.0.CO;2-O>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Besly, B. M. & Fielding, C. R. 1989. Palaeosols in Westphalian coal-bearing and red-bed sequences, Central and Northern England. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 70, 303–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Besly, B. M. & Turner, P. 1983. Origin of red-beds in a moist tropical climate (Etruria Formation, Upper Carboniferous, UK). In Residual Deposits (ed. Wilson, R. C. L.), pp. 131–47. Geological Society of London, Special Publication no. 11.Google Scholar
Besly, B. M., Burley, S. D. & Turner, P. 1993. The late Carboniferous ‘Barren Red-bed’ play of the Silver Pit area, Southern North Sea. In Petroleum Geology of Northwest Europe: Proceedings of the 4th Conference (ed. Parker, J. R.), pp. 727–40. London: Geological Society.Google Scholar
British Geological Survey. 1999. Coal Resources Map of Britain. Chapman, G. R., Natural Environment Research Council and the Coal Authority.Google Scholar
Brockbank, W. 1891. On the occurrence of the Permians, Spirorbis Limestones, and Upper Coal Measures at Frizington Hall in the Whitehaven District. Memoirs of the Proceedings of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society 4, 418–26.Google Scholar
Cameron, T. D. J. 1993. 5. Carboniferous and Devonian of the Southern North Sea. In Lithostratigraphic nomenclature of the UK North Sea (eds Knox, R. W. O'B. & Cordey, W. G.), 93 pp. Nottingham: British Geological Survey.Google Scholar
Chadwick, R. A., Holliday, D. W., Holloway, S. & Hulbert, A. G. 1995. The structure and evolution of the Northumberland–Solway Basin and adjacent areas. Subsurface Memoir of the British Geological Survey, 90 pp.Google Scholar
Corfield, S. M., Gawthorpe, R. L., Gage, M., Fraser, A. J. & Besly, B. M. 1996. Inversion tectonics of the Variscan foreland of the British Isles. Journal of the Geological Society, London 153, 17–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davies, A. 1970. Carboniferous rocks of the Sanquhar outlier. Bulletin of the Geological Survey of Great Britain 31, 37–88.Google Scholar
Day, J. B. W. 1970. Geology of the country around Bewcastle. Memoir of the Geological Survey of Great Britain England and Wales, 357 pp.Google Scholar
de Paola, N., Holdsworth, R. E., McCaffrey, K. J. W. & Barchi, M. R. 2005. Partitioned transtension: an alternative to basin inversion models. Journal of Structural Geology 27, 607–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ford, T. D. 1954. The Upper Carboniferous rocks of the Ingleton Coalfield. Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London 110, 231–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Forsyth, I. H., Hall, I. H. S. & McMillan, A. A. 1996. Geology of the Airdrie district. Memoir of the British Geological Survey, Sheet 31W (Scotland), 94 pp.Google Scholar
Foster, D., Holliday, D. W., Jones, C. M., Owens, B. & Welsh, A. 1989. The concealed Upper Palaeozoic rocks of Berkshire and South Oxfordshire. Proceedings of the Geological Association 100, 395–407.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galehouse, J. S. 1971. Point-counting. In Procedures in Sedimentary Petrology (ed. Carver, R. E.), pp. 385–407. New York: Wiley-Interscience.Google Scholar
Glover, B. W., Powell, J. H. & Waters, C. N. 1993. Etruria Formation (Westphalian C) palaeoenvironments and volcanicity on the southern margins of the Pennine Basin, South Staffordshire, England. Journal of the Geological Society, London 150, 737–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Glover, B. W. & Powell, J. H. 1996. Interaction of climate and tectonics upon alluvial architecture: Late Carboniferous–Early Permian Sequences at the southern margin of the Pennine Basin. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology and Palaeoecology 121, 13–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hallsworth, C. R. 1992. Stratigraphic variations in the heavy minerals and clay mineralogy of the Westphalian to ?Early Permian succession from the Daleswood Farm borehole, and the implications for sand provenance. British Geological Survey Technical Report WH/92/185R.Google Scholar
Hallsworth, C. R. & Chisholm, J. I. 2000. Stratigraphic evolution of provenance characteristics in Westphalian sandstones of the Yorkshire Coalfield. Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society 53, 43–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hallsworth, C. R., Morton, A. C., Claoué-Long, J. & Fanning, C. M. 2000. Carboniferous sand provenance in the Pennine Basin, UK: constraints from heavy mineral and detrital zircon age data. Sedimentary Geology 137, 147–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, C. M., Allen, P. J. & Morrison, N. H. 2005. Geological factors influencing gas production in the Tyne field (Block 44/18a), southern North Sea, and their impact on future infill well planning. In Carboniferous hydrocarbon geology: the southern North Sea and surrounding onshore areas (eds Collinson, J. D., Evans, D. J., Holliday, D. W. & Jones, N. S.), pp. 183–94. Yorkshire Geological Society Occasional Publication no. 7.Google Scholar
Jones, J. A. & Hartley, A. J. 1993. Reservoir characteristics of a braid-plain depositional system: the Upper Carboniferous Pennant Sandstone of South Wales. In Characterization of Fluvial and Aeolian Reservoirs (eds North, C. P. & Prosser, D. J.), pp. 143–56. Geological Society of London, Special Publication no. 73.Google Scholar
Jones, N. S. 1993. Stratigraphical and sedimentological characteristics of the ‘Whitehaven Sandstone Series’, Westphalian C, West Cumbrian Coalfield. British Geological Survey Technical Report WH/93/102R.Google Scholar
Jones, N. S. & Holliday, D. W. 2007. The stratigraphy and sedimentology of Upper Carboniferous Warwickshire Group red-bed facies in the Canonbie area of S.W. Scotland. British Geological Survey Report IR/06/043.Google Scholar
Kelling, G. 1974. Upper Carboniferous sedimentation in South Wales. In The Upper Palaeozoic and post-Palaeozoic rocks of Wales (ed. Owen, T. R.), pp. 185–224. University of Wales Press.Google Scholar
Kelling, G. & Collinson, J. D. 1992. Silesian. In Geology of England and Wales (eds Duff, P. M. D. & Smith, A. J.), pp. 239–73. London: Geological Society.Google Scholar
Kendall, J. D. 1896. The Whitehaven Sandstone Series. Transactions of the Institution of Mining Engineers 10, 204–24.Google Scholar
Leeder, M. R. & Hardman, M. 1990. Carboniferous geology of the Southern North Sea Basin and controls on hydrocarbon prospectivity. In Tectonic Events Responsible for Britain's Oil and Gas Reserves (eds Hardman, R. F. P. & Brooks, J.), pp. 87–105. Geological Society of London, Special Publication no. 55.Google Scholar
Lumsden, G. I., Tulloch, W., Howells, M. F. & Davies, A. 1967. The Geology of the Neighbourhood of Langholm. Memoirs of the Geological Survey, Scotland, 255 pp.Google Scholar
McMillan, A. A. & Brand, P. J. 1995. Depositional setting of Permian and Upper Carboniferous strata of the Thornhill Basin, Dumfriesshire. Scottish Journal of Geology 31, 43–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morton, A. C. & Hallsworth, C. R. 1994. Identifying provenance-specific features of detrital heavy mineral assemblages in sandstones. Sedimentary Geology 90, 241–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morton, A. C. & Hallsworth, C. R. 1999. Processes controlling the composition of heavy mineral assemblages in sandstones. Sedimentary Geology 124, 3–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morton, A. C., Claoué-Long, J. C. & Hallsworth, C. R. 2001. Zircon age and heavy mineral constraints on provenance of North Sea Carboniferous sandstones. Marine and Petroleum Geology 18, 319–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morton, A. C., Hallsworth, C. R. & Moscariello, A. 2005. Interplay between northern and southern sediment sources during Westphalian deposition in the Silverpit Basin, southern North Sea. In Carboniferous hydrocarbon geology: the southern North Sea and surrounding onshore areas (eds Collinson, J. D., Evans, D. J., Holliday, D. W. & Jones, N. S.), pp. 135–46. Yorkshire Geological Society Occasional Publication no. 7.Google Scholar
Morton, A. C., Fanning, M. & Jones, N. S. 2010. Variscan sourcing of Wesphalian (Pennsylvanian) sandstones in the Canonbie Coalfield, UK. Geological Magazine, doi: 10.1017/S0016756810000014, published online 12 Feb 2010.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moscariello, A. 2003. The Schooner Field, Blocks 44/26a, 43/30a, UK North Sea. In United Kingdom Oil and Gas Fields, Commemorative Millennium Volume (eds Gluyas, J. G. & Hichins, H. M.), pp. 811–24. Geological Society of London, Memoir no. 20.Google Scholar
Mykura, W. 1960. The replacement of coal by limestone and the reddening of Coal Measures in the Ayrshire Coalfield. Bulletin of the Geological Survey of Great Britain 16, 69–109.Google Scholar
Mykura, W. 1967. The Upper Carboniferous rocks of south-west Ayrshire. Bulletin of the Geological Survey of Great Britain 26, 23–98.Google Scholar
Parrish, J. T. 1982. Upwelling and petroleum source beds, with reference to the Paleozoic. American Association of Petroleum Geologists Bulletin 66, 750–74.Google Scholar
Peach, B. N. & Horne, J. 1903. The Canonbie Coalfield: its Geological Structure and Relations to the Carboniferous Rocks of Northern England and Central Scotland. Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 40, 835–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pettijohn, F. J., Potter, P. E. & Siever, R. 1987. Sand and Sandstone, 2nd edition. New York: Springer-Verlag, 553 pp.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Picken, G. S. 1988. The concealed coalfield at Canonbie: an interpretation based on boreholes and seismic surveys. Scottish Journal of Geology 24, 61–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Powell, J. H., Chisholm, J. I., Bridge, D. McC., Rees, J. G., Glover, B. W. & Besly, B. M. 2000. Stratigraphical framework for Westphalian to Early Permian red-bed successions of the Pennine Basin. British Geological Survey Research Report RR/00/01.Google Scholar
Ramsbottom, W. H. C., Calver, M. A., Eager, R. M. C., Hodson, F., Holliday, D. W., Stubblefield, C. J. & Wilson, R. B. 1978. A correlation of Silesian rocks in the British Isles. Geological Society of London, Special Report no. 10, 81 pp.Google Scholar
Rowley, D. B., Raymond, A., Parrish, J. T., Lottes, A. L., Scotese, C. R. & Ziegler, A. M. 1985. Carboniferous palaeogeographic, phytogeographic and palaeoclimatic reconstruction. International Journal of Coal Geology 5, 7–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shephard-Thorn, E. R. 1988. Geology of the country around Ramsgate and Dover. Memoir of the British Geological Survey, Sheets 274 and 279 (England and Wales), 49 pp.Google Scholar
Sherlock, S. C., Jones, K. A. & Jones, J. A. 2000. A central European Variscide source for Upper Carboniferous sediments in SW England: 40Ar/39Ar detrital white mica ages from the Forest of Dean. Journal of the Geological Society, London 157, 905–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simpson, J. B. & Richey, J. E. 1936. The geology of the Sanquhar Coalfield. Memoirs of the Geological Survey, Scotland, 97 pp.Google Scholar
Smith, D. B. 1994. Geology of the country around Sunderland. Memoir of the British Geological Survey, sheet 21 (England and Wales), 161 pp.Google Scholar
Stone, P., Millward, D., Young, B., Merritt, J. W., Clarke, S. M., McCormac, M. & Lawrence, D. J. D. 2010. British Regional Geology Northern England (5th edition). Keyworth, Nottingham: British Geological Survey.Google Scholar
Trotter, F. M. 1953. Reddened beds of Carboniferous age in North-West England and their origin. Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society 29, 1–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Trotter, F. M. 1954. Reddened beds in the Coal Measures of South Lancashire. Bulletin of the Geological Survey of Great Britain 5, 61–80.Google Scholar
Trueman, A. E. & Weir, J. 1946–58. A monograph on British Carboniferous non-marine Lamellibranchia. Palaeontographical Society Monograph, 449 pp.Google Scholar
Turner, P. 1980. Continental Red Beds. Developments in Sedimentology, vol. 29. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 562 pp.Google Scholar
Van Adrichem Boogaert, H. A. & Kouwe, W. F. P. 1995. Stratigraphic Nomenclature of the Netherlands, revision and update by RGD and NOGEPA, Section C: Silesian (Limburg Group). Mededelingen Rijks Geologische Dienst 50, 40 pp.Google Scholar
Wagner, R. H. 1966. On the presence of probably Upper Stephanian beds in Ayrshire. Scottish Journal of Geology 2, 122–3.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Waters, C. N., Browne, M. A. E., Dean, M. T. & Powell, J. H. 2007. Lithostratigraphical framework for Carboniferous successions of Great Britain (Onshore). British Geological Survey Research Report RR/07/01.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Jones Supplementary Material

Colour Figures.zip

Download Jones Supplementary Material(File)
File 16.7 MB