Hamilton, E. L. (1953). Upper Cretaceous, Tertiary and Recent planktonic foraminifera from mid-Pacific flat-topped seamounts. Journal of Paleontology. 27: 204-237.

185323

Hamilton, E. L.

1953

27: 204-237

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Foraminifera discussed in this paper were collected by the 1950 Scripps Institution-U. S. Navy Electronics Laboratory Mid-Pacific Expedition. Five flat-topped seamounts ("guyots" of Hess, 1946) were dredged and cored in an area between 600 and 1100 miles west of Hawaii. The following faunas have been identified: Basaltic gravel layers in a core at 2050 fathoms near one of the guyots contain an Upper Cretaceous (Campanian-Maestrichtian) fauna including species of Globotruncana, striate Gilmbelina, and Ventilabrella, mixed with Tertiary and Recent species. An upper Paleocene fauna dominated by Globorotalia velascoensis occurs in indurated Globigerina ooze on top of a second guyot. Two cores taken on top of another guyot contain a lower-middle Eocene Globigerina ooze planktonic assemblage dominated by Globorotalia aragonensis and with Hantkenina mexicana to within an inch of the top of the core. Conclusions are that the mixed Cretaceous-Recent fauna and the gravel were transported by turbidity currents to their present location and that the Eocene ooze on top of one guyot is due to non-accumulation of later planktonic sediments. The Foraminifera date the truncation of one guyot as pre-Upper Cretaceous and two others as pre-Paleocene-Eocene, which generally supports the evidence provided by the "middle" Cretaceous reef coral rudistid fauna dredged from these guyots. Geographic ranges of many Upper Cretaceous and Tertiary planktonic index species have now been extended into the Middle Pacific. These forms will be useful in dating and solving problems of the sedimentation of deep-sea sediments.

Foraminifera

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