Tag Archives: Cretaceous

Visiting a subduction zone in New Zealand

Mark Wilson September 29, 2010 2:12 pm

CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND–Wooster geology student Andrew Collins has once again visited a fascinating geological locality in New Zealand. He is certainly getting his semester’s worth of adventures, from earthquakes to glaciers. Please visit his blog and see additional photos and … Continue reading →

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Fossils on the Meuse-Argonne Battlefield

Mark Wilson August 16, 2010 10:21 am

VIENNE LE CHATEAU, FRANCE–To my delight, while exploring the Meuse-Argonne area this morning, I found an exposure of marly Cretaceous sediments very near where my Grandfather’s tank brigade assembled for an attack at dawn on October 4, 1918. The sediment … Continue reading →

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Battle of the Mines: Vauquois, 1915-1918

Mark Wilson August 16, 2010 8:16 am

VIENNE LE CHATEAU, FRANCE–The influence of geology on war is shockingly clear on the Butte de Vauquois (N 49° 12′ 20.20”, E 5° 4′ 11.42”). This large hill (290 meters in elevation) is an outlier of the chalky detritic sandstone … Continue reading →

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The military advantage of holding the Upper Cretaceous chalk highlands

Mark Wilson August 15, 2010 12:08 pm

VIENNE LE CHATEAU, FRANCE–There is one strong geological control of warfare in northern France: the high areas are often thick, resistant Upper Cretaceous chalk while the valleys and plains below are usually poorly-consolidated greensands and clays. We’ve already seen these … Continue reading →

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The best Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary yet

Mark Wilson August 10, 2010 1:30 am

MAASTRICHT, THE NETHERLANDS–The Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary (K/T, or as I should be writing, the “Cretaceous-Paleogene” boundary, or K/Pg) has been one of the Wooster Geology themes this summer. We saw it in Alabama and Mississippi in May, and in Israel in … Continue reading →

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Tunnels (again)

Mark Wilson August 9, 2010 3:44 pm

MAASTRICHT, THE NETHERLANDS–After mentioning the excavations in the Maastricht Formation limestones (latest Cretaceous) in the last post, I expected to be moving on the next day to a quarry. I hadn’t read the guidebook closely enough: we were planning to … Continue reading →

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Geology and Art History

Mark Wilson August 9, 2010 12:42 am

MAASTRICHT, THE NETHERLANDS–The tunnels dug into the soft Maastrichtian Formation limestones in this city have a long history starting with the Romans. At first the excavations were intended only to extract building stone, but with all the battles, sieges and … Continue reading →

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Wooster Geologist in The Netherlands

Mark Wilson August 8, 2010 4:37 pm

MAASTRICHT, THE NETHERLANDS–This is the first day of the International Bryozoology Association post-conference field trip. We took a train south from Kiel to Hamburg, Germany, and then connected with another train to Cologne. After spending a half-hour at the Cologne … Continue reading →

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The power of biostratigraphy: the Campanian-Maastrichtian boundary in the Late Cretaceous

Mark Wilson August 7, 2010 12:10 pm

KIEL, GERMANY–Comparing the two very different geological sections pictured above, you should ask how we know that they are precisely the same age. After all, they are thousands of miles apart and are quite different in their composition and fossil … Continue reading →

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Cretaceous soft-bodied bryozoans from the western USA

Mark Wilson August 6, 2010 2:30 pm

KIEL, GERMANY–I gave my presentation to the International Bryozoology Association meeting this afternoon. It was a fun project because it involved two of my favorite things: working with Paul Taylor from the Natural History Museum and advising an Independent Study … Continue reading →

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