Huntley Mountain Formation

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Huntley Mountain Formation
Stratigraphic range: Late Devonian to Early Mississippian
File:Haystacks1 Loyalsock Creek Sullivan Co PA.jpg
The Haystacks of Loyalsock Creek in Laporte Township, Sullivan County, Pennsylvania are a quartzite bed of the of Huntley Mountain Formation
Type sedimentary
Underlies Burgoon Sandstone
Lithology
Primary sandstone, shale
Location
Region Appalachian Mountains
Extent Pennsylvania
Type section
Named for Huntley Mountain, Lycoming County, Pennsylvania
Named by Berg and Edmunds, 1978

The Huntley Mountain Formation is a late Devonian and early Mississippian mapped bedrock unit in Pennsylvania, in the United States.

Description

File:Huntley Mountain Fm 1.jpg
Outcrop of Huntley Mountain Formation along old railroad bed parallel to Loyalsock Creek north of Laporte, Pennsylvania

The formation is composed of relatively soft grayish-red shale and olive-gray sandstone. It is located in north central Pennsylvania.[1][2][3]

Haystacks

The Haystacks are enigmatic mounds of sandstone that outcrop in Loyalsock Creek south of Dushore in Sullivan County. They are a single bed of quartz sandstone with an undulating upper surface with up to one meter relief. The origin of the mounds is debatable.[4]

Notable Exposures

Stratigraphy

Geologist William E. Edmunds argues that the Huntley Mountain Formation is laterally equivalent to the Rockwell Formation (originally described in West Virginia) and the Spechty Kopf Formation. He proposes that the Pocono Formation be reinstated as "the dominantly non-red, non-marine clastic sequence between the Catskill and Mauch Chunk Formations", with the Huntley Mountain, Beckville, Burgoon, Rockwell, Mt. Carbon, and Spechty Kopf Formations demoted to the status of members of the Pocono Formation.[5] Other workers support this interpretation.[6]

References

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  4. The Haystacks, "Ricketts Folly," and The End of the World: Geology of the Glaciated Allegheny High Plateau, Sullivan, Luzerne, and Columbia Counties, Pennsylvania, 71st Annual Field Conference of Pennsylvania Geologists [1] (field trip guide book), J. D. Inners, G. M. Fleeger, eds., 2006
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  6. Lessing, Peter, Dean, S.L., and Kulander, B.R., 1992, Stratigraphy and structure of Meadow Branch synclinorium, West Virginia: Southeastern Geology, v. 32, no. 3, p. 166-174.

See also