Chalk Group Lithostratigraphy: Northern England - Black Band
The Black Band s.s. is a name restricted to the dark carbonaceous marl at the centre of a c. 0.5 m thick complex of buff-brown, grey, purple and khaki marls at the base of the Welton Chalk Formation (Gaunt et al., 1992). Some previous usage of the term Black Band has included the super and sub-jacent marls seen in the standard succession at South Ferriby [SE 991 204] (eg. regional guide), herein termed Black Band s.l.. The Black Band s.l. is virtually unfossiliferous (regional guide), except for fish remains and bituminous wood (in the Black Band s.s.) (Gaunt et al., 1992). Recently Wood & Mortimore (1995) introduced the term Variegated Beds for the equivalent of the Black Band s.l. The Black Band s.l. was once thought to equate with the Plenus Marls of southern England (Hill, 1888; Whitham, 1991), and later, on the basis of micro-fossil and carbon isotope evidence, with at least part of the overlying Melbourn Rock of southern England (Gaunt et al., 1992). However, on the basis of new data from an anomalously expanded succession at Melton Ross Quarry [TA 086 115], Lincolnshire, Wood & Mortimore (1995) have suggested that the Variegated Beds (i.e. Black Band s.l.) equate with an interval from within the Plenus Marls up to Meads Marl 5/6 of the Holywell Nodular Chalk of southern England; the Black Band s.s. equating entirely with the post Plenus Marls Holywell Nodular Chalk of southern England. The latter correlation shows that the Black Band s.l. is a highly condensed succession compared to southern England, where the correlative interval reaches a maximum thickness of c. 10 m (Wood & Mortimore, 1995).
The anomalously expanded succession reported by Wood & Mortimore (1995) at Melton Ross Quarry also included horizons not seen in the standard South Ferriby succession. These strata represent an expanded interval at the base of the Black Band s.l. as developed at South Ferriby. New data on the correlation of the Melton Ross succession shows that the expanded basal part, below a prominent limestone bed (the 'Central Limestone' of Wood et al., 1997, that occurs near the base of the standard South Ferriby succession), probably equates with the lower part of the Plenus Marls of southern England (Jefferies beds 1 & 2). Biostratigraphical evidence suggests that the Central Limestone equates with Jefferies' Bed 3 of the standard Plenus Marls succession (Wood et al., 1997). Rare Earth Element analysis of the expanded Black Band succession suggested that none of the clays represented therein were of volcanogenic origin, as suggested by some previous authors, and Wood et al. (1997) further hypothesised that the 'standard' South Ferriby Black Band succession is actually an anomalously condensed section formed over a structural high, and that the Melton Ross succession would be better viewed as the standard.
Macrofossil Biozonation: M. geslinianum Zone, N. juddii Zone, Mytiloides spp. Zone (= Black Band s.l.)
Correlation: see Correlation with other UK Chalk Group successions
see Correlation of the South Ferriby & Melton Ross Black Band successions with southern England
References
HILL, W. 1888. On the lower beds of the Upper Cretaceous Series in Lincolnshire and Yorkshire. Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, Vol. 44, 320-367.
KENT, P. 1980. Eastern England from the Tees to The Wash (2nd Edit.). British Regional Geology. (Her Majesty's Stationery Office, London.)
WHITHAM, F.1991. The stratigraphy of the Upper Cretaceous Ferriby, Welton and Burnham formations north of the Humber, north-east England. Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society, Vol. 48(3), 227-255.
WOOD, C J & MORTIMORE, R N. 1995. An anomalous Black Band succession (Cenomanian - Turonian boundary interval) at Melton Ross, Lincolnshire, eastern England, and its international significance. Berliner geowiss. Abh., Vol. 16, 277-287.
WOOD, C J, BATTEN, D, MORTIMORE, R & WRAY, D. 1997. The stratigraphy of the Cenomanian-Turonian boundary interval succession in Lincolnshire, eastern England. Freiberger Forschungsheft, C468, 333-346.
See: Plenus Marls (Southern England), Melbourn Rock (Southern England), Holywell Nodular Chalk