Moose River Basin: geology and mineral potential - Geology Ontario

Mesozoic Palynology
Clearwater Formation, and Colorado Group of Alberta; Ashville Group of Man
itoba. Correlative strata in the eastern Canadian offshore region are thick ma
rine and deltaic sandstones and shales (Logan Canyon Formation) deposited on
a subsiding shelf (Gradstein et al. 1975; Jansa and Wade 1975).
On the Atlantic Coastal Plain of Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, and New
Jersey, the fluvial-deltaic Potomac Group (Doyle and Robbins 1977) is partially
correlative with the Mattagami Formation. Palynofloras from the Magothy
Formation (Upper Santonian-Lower Campanian) are characterized by various
advanced Normapolles genera, some of which have been found in a carbona
ceous horizon in a drillhole in Cargill Township, Ontario. This assemblage is
provisionally called the "Cargill Palynoflora" and will be the subject of a subse
quent study.
The extensive hiatus between the Albian Mattagami Formation and the
Middle Jurassic Mistuskwia Beds is noteworthy. The Mistuskwia Beds occur in
two drillholes in the central part of the Moose River Basin (Telford et al. 1975;
Telford, this report) and have been dated palynologically as Middle Jurassic
and correlated tentatively with the Gravelbourg and Shaunavon Formations of
the Williston Basin (Norris 1977). The precise stratigraphic and structural rel
ationships between the Mattagami Formation and the Mistuskwia Beds are
not yet established. A similar hiatus is present, however, in Manitoba and Sas
katchewan between the Albian Swan River Group and the underlying Jurassic
(Playford 1971).
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This work was made possible with a grant from the Ontario Geoscience Re
search Fund (Grant No. 19). I thank Peter Telford, Harish Verma, and Max Vos
for information on stratigraphy of the Moose River Basin and for facilitating
the collection of samples through the Ontario Geological Survey. Anne Nal
drett and Patricia Dobell provided valuable photographic and technical assis
tance for this project.
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