Kinzers Formation
Geological formation in Pennsylvania
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The Kinzers Formation is a geologic formation in Pennsylvania. It preserves fossils dating back to the fourth stage of the Cambrian Period.
| Kinzers Formation | |
|---|---|
| Stratigraphic range: Cambrian Stage 4 | |
Reticulately weathered argillaceous-banded limestone of upper member of Kinzers Formation. USGS photo. | |
| Type | Sedimentary |
| Sub-units | Emigsville Mb., York Mb., Greenmount Mb. |
| Underlies | Ledger Formation |
| Overlies | Vintage Dolomite |
| Lithology | |
| Primary | Limestone |
| Other | Shale, marble |
| Location | |
| Region | Mid-Atlantic United States |
| Country | United States |
| Extent | Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia |
| Type section | |
| Named for | Kinzers, Pennsylvania |
| Named by | Stose, G.W., and Jonas, A.I.[1] |
The base of the Kinzers Formation is primarily a dark-brown shale. The middle is a gray and white spotted limestone and, locally, marble having irregular partings. The top is a sandy limestone which weathers to a fine-grained, friable, porous, sandy mass.[2] Wilshusen formally divided the Kinzers into three members along these lines in his 1979 map of York, Pennsylvania. The members are called the Earthy Buff Limestone Member, Pure Limestone Member, and Shale Member.[3]
Type section
Named from exposures at a railroad cut at Kinzers, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.[1]
Other outcrops
The Kinzers overlies the Vintage Dolomite at the type section of the Vintage at a railroad cut at Vintage, Pennsylvania.
High quality fossil specimens (Lagerstätte) were obtained from the Noah Getz Quarry, one mile north of Rohrerstown, Pennsylvania, but the quarry location is overgrown and disturbed by development. The fossils are from the Emigsville Member, and include the trilobite Olenellus thompsoni, the radiodont Lenisicaris pennsylvanica, the hymenocarine arthropod Tuzoia getzi, the edrioasteroid echinoderm Yorkicystis haefneri, and the hemichordate nest Margaretia dorus.[4][5][6] The Kinzers Formation is also notable for preserving one of the most diverse radiodont faunas of the Cambrian period, with at least ten species known, including members of the tamisiocarididae, anomalocarididae, and amplectobeluidae families.[7]
The sponge Hazelia walcotti has also been found in the Kinzers. It is one of few sponges known from the Cambrian period of North America.[8]
The section at Vintage in 2019. The Kinzers is the darker, layered rock above the lighter Vintage.
Another view of the type section.
