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Carlile Shale
Stratigraphic range: Turonian ~93.9–89.8 Ma PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N ↓
Rare exposure of the Fairport Chalk member of the Carlile Shale in southern Ellis County, Kansas
Type	Geological formation
Unit of	Colorado Group (lower); or Benton Formation Mancos Group (NM)
Sub-units	Juana Lopez (CO, NM) Codell Sandstone Blue Hill Shale Fairport Chalk
Underlies	Niobrara Formation
Overlies	Greenhorn Limestone
Thickness	170–230 feet (52–70 m)
Lithology
Primary	Shale, chalky to carbonaceous
Other	Limestone Sandstone Siltstone Septarians Bentonite
Location
Coordinates	38°22′34″N 104°58′44″W / 38.376°N 104.979°W / 38.376; -104.979
Region	Mid-continental
Country	United States
Type section
Named for	Carlile Spring and Carlile Station, 21 mi west of Pueblo, Colorado
Named by	Gilbert
Year defined	1896
Carlile Shale (the United States)Show map of the United StatesCarlile Shale (Colorado)Show map of Colorado

The Carlile Shale is a Turonian age Upper/Late Cretaceous series shale geologic formation in the central-western United States, including in the Great Plains region of Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming.

History of investigation

The Carlile Shale was first named by Grove Karl Gilbert for exposures at Carlile Spring, located about 21 miles (34 km) west of Pueblo, Colorado. He described it as a medium gray shale, capped with limestone or sandstone, and assigned it to the Benton Group. By 1931, William Walden Rubey and his coinvestigators had mapped it into Kansas and the Black Hills. Rubey also first assigned it to the Colorado Group. C.H. Dane assigned it to the Mancos Shale in New Mexico in 1948.

Description

The formation is composed of marine deposits of the generally retreating phase (hemi-cycle) of the Greenhorn cycle of the Western Interior Seaway, which followed the advancing phase of the same cycle that formed the underlying Graneros Shale and Greenhorn Formation. As such, the lithology progresses from open ocean chalky shale (with thin limestones) to increasing carbonaceous shale to near-shore sandstone. Near the center of the seaway, currents in the remnant shallows sorted skeletal remains into a mass of calcareous sand. The contact between the Carlile Shale and the overlying Niobrara Formation is marked by an unconformity in much of the outcrop area, but where an unconformity is not discernible, the boundary is typically placed at the first resistant, fine-grained limestone bed at the base of the Niobrara Formation.

Gallery

• The lower 25 feet (7.6 m) of the Fairport Chalk member in southern Ellis County, Kansas.
• 1867, bluffs west of Hays, behind the seated soldiers is pre-settlement digging in the Blue Hill Shale.
• The bare Blue Hill Shale slopes at Yocemento as they appeared in 1873

Fossil content

Upper Turonian series plesiosaur remains are among the fossils that have been recovered from the strata of its Blue Hill Shale Member in Kansas. The Carlile in eastern South Dakota contains shark teeth, fossil wood and leaves, and ammonites.

Reptiles

Crocodyliforms

Plesiosaurs

Plesiosaurs
Genus	Species	Location	Stratigraphic position	Material	Notes	Images
Megacephalosaurus	M. eulerti	Near Fairport, Kansas.	Fairport Chalk Member.	A skull & anterior cervical material (FHSM VP-321).	A pliosaurid.
Plesiosauria		Mitchell County, Kansas.	Blue Hill Member.	Portions of a rib (FHSM VP-17299).	May represent a large elasmosaur or pliosaur.

Squamates

Squamates
Genus	Species	Location	Stratigraphic position	Material	Notes	Images
Coniasaurus	C. cf. C. crassidens	Russell County, Kansas.	Fairport Chalk Member.	2 incomplete vertebrae (FHSM VP-4418).	A dolichosaurid.
Russellosaurina		Ellis County, Kansas.	Middle of the Fairport Chalk Member.	7 successive proximal caudal vertebrae (FHSM VP-17564).	A russellosaurine mosasaur.

Fish

Cartilaginous fish

Cartilaginous fish
Genus	Species	Location	Stratigraphic position	Material	Notes	Images
Cretodus	C. houghtonorum	North-central Kansas.	Blue Hill Shale.	A partial skeleton consisting of 134 disarticulated teeth, 61 vertebrae, 23 placoid scales, and fragments of calcified cartilage.	A mackerel shark.
Cretoxyrhina	C. mantelli	Dixon County, Nebraska.	Fairport Chalky Shale Member.	A tooth (UNSM 129549).	A large mackerel shark.
Ptychodus	P. latissimus	Kansas.	Codell Sandstone Member.	3 teeth.	A ptychodontid.
	P. mammillaris	North of Schoenchen, Ellis County, Kansas.	Fairport Chalk Member.	A medial tooth (FHSM VP-15284).	A ptychodontid.
	P. sp.	Ellis County, Kansas.	Blue Hill Shale Member.	A tooth contained in a coprolite (FHSM VP-13325).	A ptychodontid.

See also

• Volcanic mineralization of the Greenhorn cycle:
  • Bentonite, sedimentary volcanic ash (named for the original Graneros/Greenhorn/Carlile classification), generally showing some weathered iron stain in the Colorado Group
  • Pyrite, precipitation of volcanic sulfuric acid with oceanic iron as FeS₂
  • Limonite, pyrite in limestone weathered to HFeO₂ (rust stain or yellow ochre)
  • Selenite, CaSO₄ associated with Bentonite seams and ochre

• Plesiosaur stratigraphic distribution

References

1. "Geologic Unit: Carlile". National Geologic Database. Geolex — Unit Summary. United States Geological Survey. Retrieved 2017-02-03.
2. USGS.gov: Mineral resources of the Niobrara and Carlile Formations
3. Gilbert, G.K. (1896). "The underground water of the Arkansas Valley in eastern Colorado". In Walcott, C.D. (ed.). Seventeenth Annual report of the United States Geological Survey to the Secretary of the Interior, 1895-1896. Vol. 17. pp. 551–601. doi:10.3133/ar17_2.
4. Rubey, W.W.; Bass, N.W. (1925). "The geology of Russell County, Kansas, with special reference to oil and gas resources". Kansas Geological Survey Bulletin. 10 (1): 1–86.
5. Rubey, W.W. (1931). "Lithologic studies of fine-grained Upper Cretaceous sedimentary rocks of the Black Hills region". U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper. 165-A: A1–A54. doi:10.3133/pp165A.
6. Dane, C.H. (1948). "Geology and oil possibilities of the eastern side of the San Juan Basin, Rio Arriba County, New Mexico". U.S. Geological Survey Oil and Gas Investigations Map. OM-78. Retrieved 23 November 2020.
7. McLane, Michael (1982). "Upper Cretaceous Coastal Deposits in South-Central Colorado--Codell and Juana Lopez Members of Carlile Shale". AAPG Bulletin. 66. doi:10.1306/03B59A26-16D1-11D7-8645000102C1865D.
8. White, Timothy; Arthur, Michael A. (May 2006). "Organic carbon production and preservation in response to sea-level changes in the Turonian Carlile Formation, U.S. Western Interior Basin". Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology. 235 (1–3): 223–244. Bibcode:2006PPP...235..223W. doi:10.1016/j.palaeo.2005.09.031.
9. King, Norman R. (1974). "The Carlile-Niobrara contact and lower Niobrara strata near El Vado, New Mexico". New Mexico Geological Society Field Conference Series. 24: 259–266. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.513.8769.
10. ^ Jstor.org: "Probable plesiosaur remains from the Blue Hill Shale (Carlile Formation)" in Kansas", Kansas Academy of Science, 2009.
11. William A. Cobban and E.A. Merewether (1983), Stratigraphy and paleontology of mid-Cretaceous rocks in Minnesota and contiguous areas. USGS Professional Paper 1253.
12. ^ Shimada, Kenshu; Parris, David C. (2007). "A Long-Snouted Late Cretaceous Crocodyliform, Terminonaris cf. T. browni, from the Carlile Shale (Turonian) of Kansas". Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science. 110 (1/2): 107–115. doi:10.1660/0022-8443(2007)110[107:ALLCCT]2.0.CO;2. ISSN 0022-8443. JSTOR 20476300. S2CID 86273062.
13. ^ Schumacher, Bruce A.; Carpenter, Kenneth; Everhart, Michael J. (May 2013). "A new Cretaceous Pliosaurid (Reptilia, Plesiosauria) from the Carlile Shale (middle Turonian) of Russell County, Kansas". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 33 (3): 613–628. Bibcode:2013JVPal..33..613S. doi:10.1080/02724634.2013.722576. S2CID 130165209.
14. ^ Shimada, Kenshu; Ystesund, Tracy K. (2007). "A Dolichosaurid Lizard, Coniasaurus cf. C. crassidens, from the Upper Cretaceous Carlile Shale in Russell County, Kansas". Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science. 110 (3/4): 236–242. doi:10.1660/0022-8443(2007)110[236:ADLCCC]2.0.CO;2. ISSN 0022-8443. JSTOR 20476320. S2CID 86027583.
15. ^ Schumacher, Bruce A. (2011). "A 'woollgari-zone mosasaur' (Squamata; Mosasauridae) from the Carlile Shale (Lower Middle Turonian) of central Kansas and the stratigraphic overlap of early mosasaurs and pliosaurid plesiosaurs". Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science. 114 (1/2): 1–14. doi:10.1660/062.114.0101. ISSN 0022-8443. JSTOR 41309621. S2CID 84678673.
16. ^ Shimada, K.; Everhart, M. (July 2019). "A New Large Late Cretaceous Lamniform Shark from North America, with Comments on the Taxonomy, Paleoecology, and Evolution of the Genus Cretodus". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 39 (4): e1673399. Bibcode:2019JVPal..39E3399S. doi:10.1080/02724634.2019.1673399. S2CID 209439997.
17. ^ Johnson-Ransom, Evan; Shimada, Kenshu; Kirkland, James I. (April 2016). "The Late Cretaceous Lamniform Shark,Cretoxyrhina mantelli, from the Fairport Chalky Shale Member of the Carlile Shale in Northeastern Nebraska". Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science. 119 (2): 208–210. doi:10.1660/062.119.0212. ISSN 0022-8443. S2CID 88299661.
18. ^ Hamm, Shawn A. (2020). "The First Occurrence of Ptychodus latissimus from the Codell Sandstone Member of the Carlile Shale in Kansas". Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science. 123 (3–4). doi:10.1660/062.123.0311. S2CID 226238444.
19. ^ Everhart, Michael J.; Darnell, Michelle K. (2004). "Occurrence of Ptychodus mammillaris (Elasmobranchii) in the Fairport Chalk Member of the Carlile Shale (Upper Cretaceous) of Ellis County, Kansas". Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science. 107 (3/4): 126–130. doi:10.1660/0022-8443(2004)107[0126:OOPMEI]2.0.CO;2. ISSN 0022-8443. JSTOR 3627900. S2CID 85825569.
20. ^ Shimada, Kenshu (1997). "Shark-Tooth-Bearing Coprolite from the Carlile Shale (Upper Cretaceous), Ellis County, Kansas". Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science. 100 (3/4): 133–138. doi:10.2307/3628001. ISSN 0022-8443. JSTOR 3628001.
21. Alvin R. Leonard; Delmar W. Berry (1961). Geology and Ground-water Resources of Southern Ellis County and Parts of Trego and Rush Counties, Kansas, Bulletin 149. University of Kansas Publications, State Geological Survey of Kansas. p. Geologic Formations in Relation to Ground Water. The upper 175 feet of the Carlile is classed as the Blue Hill Shale member. Most of it is blue-gray fissile argillaceous shale that contains selenite crystals and flakes of bright yellow ochre.

• Shale formations of the United States
• Turonian Stage
• Cretaceous Colorado
• Cretaceous Kansas
• Cretaceous Nebraska
• Cretaceous formations of New Mexico
• Cretaceous geology of North Dakota
• Cretaceous geology of South Dakota
• Cretaceous geology of Wyoming
• Upper Cretaceous Series of North America
• Geologic formations of Colorado
• Geologic formations of Kansas
• Geologic formations of Nebraska
• Geologic formations of North Dakota
• Geologic formations of South Dakota
• Geologic formations of Wyoming