Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gxg78 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T15:08:21.016Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The first Early Ordovician graptolites and marine incursions in eastern Alborz, Iran

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 April 2021

Adrian W. A. Rushton
Affiliation:
Department of Earth Sciences, The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD, UK
Mansoureh Ghobadi Pour*
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, National Museum of Wales, Cathays Park, Cardiff CF10 3NP, UK Department of Geology, Faculty of Sciences, Golestan University, Gorgan 49138-15739, Iran
Leonid E. Popov
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, National Museum of Wales, Cathays Park, Cardiff CF10 3NP, UK
Hadi Jahangir
Affiliation:
Bargab Company, Southern Motahari Street, Gorgan, Iran
Arash Amini
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, Faculty of Sciences, Golestan University, Gorgan 49138-15739, Iran
*
Author for correspondence: Mansoureh Ghobadi Pour, Email: [email protected]

Abstract

Graptolites have been collected from sections through Lower Ordovician strata in northern Iran. At the Saluk Mountains, in the Kopet–Dagh region, mudrocks yielded fragmentary tubaria of Rhabdinopora sp. cf. R. flabelliformis, indicating the presence of lower Tremadocian strata there; stratigraphically, they lie between two limestone beds with the euconodont Cordylodus lindstromi. At Simeh–Kuh in the eastern Alborz Mountains (Semnan Province), upper Tremadocian – lower Floian strata include laminated dark mudstones that contain restricted graptolite faunas, mainly of small declined didymograptids; these are thought to represent incursions of plankton during periods of marine highstands. The lower major flooding surface in Simeh–Kuh coincides with an invasion of the graptolite biofacies and an incursion of Hunnegraptus? sp.; the second major flooding surface is associated with an incursion of Baltograptus geometricus. They were most probably synchronous with those in the lower part of the Hunnegraptus copiosus Biozone and at the base of the Cymatograptus protobalticus Biozone in the of the Tøyen Shale Formation succession of Västergötland, Scandinavia, suggesting that observed characters of sedimentation were eustatically controlled.

Type
Original Article
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alavi, M and Salehi-Rad, R (1975) Geological map of Damghan. Geological map of Iran 1:100,000 Series, Sheet 6862. Tehran: Geological Survey of Iran.Google Scholar
Artyushkov, EV, Lindstrom, M and Popov, LE (2000) Relative sea-level changes in Baltoscandia in the Cambrian and early Ordovician: the predominance of tectonic factors and the absence of large scale eustatic fluctuations. Tectonophysics 320, 375407.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bergeron, J (1894) (for 1893) Notes paléontologiques I. Crustacés. Bulletin de la Société géologique de France 21, 333–46.Google Scholar
Bruton, DL, Wright, AJ and Hamedi, MA (2004) Ordovician trilobites of Iran. Palaeontographica, Abteilung A271, 111–49.Google Scholar
Bulman, OMB (1927) British dendroid graptolites, Part 1. Monograph of the Palaeontographical Society 79(367), 1−28, pls 1−2.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bulman, OMB (1950) Graptolites from the Dictyonema Shales of Quebec. Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London 106, 6399, pls 4−8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bulman, OMB (1954) The graptolite fauna of the Dictyonema Shales of the Oslo region. Norsk Geologisk Tiddskrift 33, 140, pls 1−8.Google Scholar
Colmenar, J and Alvaro, JJ (2015) Integrated brachiopod-based bioevents and sequence-stratigraphic framework for a Late Ordovician subpolar platform, eastern Anti-Atlas, Morocco. Geological Magazine, 152, 603–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cooper, AH, Fortey, NJ, Hughes, RA, Molyneux, SG, Moore, RM, Rushton, AWA and Stone, P (2004) The Skiddaw Group of the English Lake District. Nottingham: British Geological Survey, Memoir, x + 147 pp.Google Scholar
Cooper, RA and Fortey, RA (1982) The Ordovician graptolites of Spitsbergen. Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), Geology 36, 157302, pls 1−6.Google Scholar
Cooper, RA, Maletz, J, Wang, H and Erdtmann, B-D (1998) Taxonomy and evolution of earliest Ordovician graptoloids. Norsk Geologisk Tiddskrift 78, 332.Google Scholar
Cooper, RA and Sadler, PM (2012) The Ordovician Period. In The Geologic Time Scale 2012 (eds Gradstein, FM, Ogg, JG, Schmitz, M and Ogg, G), pp. 489523. Oxford: Elsevier.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cope, JC and Ghobadi Pour, M (2020) An Early Ordovician (late Tremadocian) bivalve fauna from Iran. Geological Journal 55, 3258–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dean, WT (1971) The Lower Palaeozoic stratigraphy and faunas of the Taurus Mountains near Beyshir, Turkey. II. The trilobites of the Sedişehir Formation (Ordovician). Bulletin of the British Museum, Natural History, Geology 20, 121.Google Scholar
Dean, WT and Monod, O (1990) Revised stratigraphy and relationships of Lower Palaeozoic rocks, eastern Taurus Mountains, south central Turkey. Geological Magazine 127, 333–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Druce, EC and Jones, PJ (1971) Cambro-Ordovician conodonts from the Burke River Structural Belt, Queensland. Bureau of Mineral Resources, Geology and Geophysics, Bulletin 110, 1159.Google Scholar
Egenhoff, S, Cassle, C, Maletz, J, Frisk, ÅM, Ebbestad, JOR and Stübner, K (2010) Sedimentology and sequence stratigraphy of a pronounced Early Ordovician sea-level fall on Baltica—The Bjørkåsholmen Formation in Norway and Sweden. Sedimentary Geology 224, 114.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Egenhoff, S and Maletz, J (2007) Graptolites as indicators of maximum flooding surfaces in monotonous deep-water shelf successions. Palaios 22, 373–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eichwald, EJ (1840) Ueber das silurische Schichtensystem in Esthland. Zeitschrift für Natur und Heilkunde der Medizinischen Akademie zu St. Petersburg 1(2), 1210.Google Scholar
Eichwald, EJ (1855) Beitrag zur geographischen Verbreitung des fossilien Thiere russlands. Alte Periode. Bulletin de la Société impériale des Naturalistes de Moscou 28, 433–66.Google Scholar
Elles, GL and Wood, EMR (1901) A monograph of British graptolites, Part 1. Monograph of the Palaeontographical Society 55, 154, pls 1–4.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Elles, GL and Wood, EMR (1907) A monograph of British graptolites, Part 6. Monograph of the Palaeontographical Society 60, 217–72, pls 28–31.Google Scholar
Gansser, A and Huber, H (1962) Geological observations in the Central Elburz, Iran. Schweizerische Mineralogische und Petrographische Mitteilungen 42, 593630.Google Scholar
Ghavidel-Syooki, M (2001) Palynostratigraphy and paleobiogeography of the Lower Paleozoic sequence in the northeastern Alborz Range (Kopet-Dagh Region) of Iran. In Proceedings of the IX International Palynological Congress, Houston, Texas, USA, 1996 (eds Goodman, DK and Clarke, RT), 1735. American Association of Stratigraphic Palynologists Foundation.Google Scholar
Ghavidel-Syooki, M (2006) Palynostratigraphy and palaeogeography of the Cambro-Ordovician strata in southwest of Shahrud city (Kuh-e Kharbash, near Deh-Molla), Central Alborz, Northern Iran. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 139, 8195.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ghavidel-Syooki, M, Álvaro, JJ, Popov, L, Ghobadi Pour, M, Ehsani, MH and Suyarkova, A (2011) Stratigraphic evidence for the Hirnantian (latest Ordovician) glaciation in the Zagros Mountains, Iran. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 307, 16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ghobadi Pour, M (2006) Early Ordovician (Tremadocian) trilobites from Simeh-Kuh, Eastern Alborz, Iran. In Studies in Palaeozoic Palaeontology (eds Bassett, MG and Deisler, VK), pp. 93118. Cardiff: National Museum of Wales, Geological Series no. 25.Google Scholar
Ghobadi Pour, M, Popov, LE, Hejazi, SH, Holmer, LE, Hosseini-Nezhad, M, Rasuli, R, Fallah, Kh, Amini, A and Jahangir, H (2015) Early Ordovician (Tremadocian) faunas and biostratigraphy of the Gerd-Kuh section, eastern Alborz, Iran. Stratigraphy 12, 5561.Google Scholar
Ghobadi Pour, M, Popov, LE, Kebria-Ee Zadeh, MR and Baars, C (2011) Middle Ordovician (Darriwilian) brachiopods associated with the Neseuretus biofacies, eastern Alborz Mountains, Iran. Memoirs of the Association of Australasian Palaeontologists 42, 263–83.Google Scholar
Ghobadi Pour, M, Vidal, M and Hosseini-Nezhad, M (2007) An Early Ordovician trilobite assemblage from the Lashkarak Formation, Damghan area, northern Iran. Geobios 40, 489500.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hall, J (1865) Graptolites of the Quebec Group. Figures and descriptions of Canadian organic remains, Decade 2. Geological Survey of Canada, i−iv, 1151, pls A, B, I−XXI.Google Scholar
Hopkinson, J and Lapworth, C (1875) Description of the graptolites of the Arenig and Llandeilo rocks of St. David’s. Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London 31, 631–72, pls 33−37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howe, MPA (1983) Measurement of thecal spacing in graptolites. Geological Magazine 120, 635–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jahangir, H, Ghobadi Pour, M, Ashuri, A and Amini, A (2016) Terminal Cambrian and Early Ordovician (Tremadocian) conodonts from Eastern Alborz, north-central Iran. Alcheringa 40, 219–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jahangir, H, Ghobadi Pour, M, Holmer, LE, Popov, LE, Ashuri, A-R, Rushton, AWA, Yu Tolmacheva, TYu and Amini, A (2015) Biostratigraphy of the Cambrian–Ordovician boundary beds at Kopet-Dagh, Iran. Stratigraphy 12, 4047.Google Scholar
Lee, CK and Chen, X (1962) Cambrian and Ordovician graptolites from Sandu, S. Gueizhou (Kueichou). Acta Palaeontologica Sinica 10, 1230, pls 1–3 [in Chinese, English summary].Google Scholar
Legrand, P (1977) Contribution à l’étude des graptolites du Llandoverien inférieur de l’Oued In Djerane (Tassili N’Ajjer oriental, Sahara algérien). Bulletin de la Société d’Histoire Naturelle de l’Afrique du Nord 67, 141–96.Google Scholar
Li, LX, Feng, HZ, Wang, WH and Chen, WJ (2012) Proximal development, systematic taxonomy, and dispersal pattern of the Early-Middle Ordovician graptolite Acrograptus from South China. Science China, Earth Sciences 55, 1110–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lindholm, K (1991) Ordovician graptolites from the early Hunneberg of southern Scandinavia. Palaeontology 34, 283–27.Google Scholar
Löfgren, AM (1994) Arenig (Lower Ordovician) conodonts and biozonation in the eastern Siljan District, central Sweden. Journal of Paleontology 68, 1350–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maletz, J (1994) Pendent didymograptids (Graptoloidea, Dichograptacea). In Graptolite Research Today (eds Chen, X, Erdtmann, B-D and Ni, Y-N), pp. 2743, pl. 1. Nanjing: Nanjing University Press.Google Scholar
Maletz, J (2014) Classification of the Pterobranchia (Cephalodiscida and Graptolithina). Bulletin of Geosciences 89, 477540.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maletz, J (2020) Hemichordata (Enteropneusta & Pterobranchia, incl. Graptolithina): A review of their fossil preservation as organic material. Bulletin of Geosciences 95, 4180.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maletz, J and Ahlberg, P (2011) The Lerhamn drill core and its bearing for the graptolite biostratigraphy of the Ordovician Tøyen Shale in Scania, southern Sweden. Lethaia 44, 350–68. CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maletz, J, Kley, J and Reinhardt, M (1995) New data on the palaeontology and biostratigraphy of the Ordovician in southern Bolivia. Newsletters on Stratigraphy 32, 163–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maletz, J, Löfgren, A and Bergström, SM (1996) The base of the Tetragraptus approximatus Zone at Hunneberg, S.W. Sweden: a proposed global stratotype for the base of the second Series of the Ordovician System. Newsletters on Stratigraphy 34, 129–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maletz, J, Rushton, AWA and Lindholm, K (1991) A new early Ordovician didymograptid, and its bearing on the correlation of the Skiddaw Group of England with the Tøyen Shale of Scandinavia. Geological Magazine 128, 335–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Monsen, A (1937) Die Graptolithenfauna im unteren Didymograptusschiefer (Phyllograptusschiefer) norwegens. Norsk Geologisk Tidsskrift 16, 57266, 20 pls.Google Scholar
Mu, AT (1950) On the evolution and classification of graptolites. Geological Review 15, 171–83 [in Chinese].Google Scholar
Mu, AT, Ge, MY, Chen, X, Ni, YN and Lin, YK (1979) Lower Ordovician graptolites of southwest China. Palaeontologia Sinica 156B, 1192, pls 1−48 [in Chinese, with English summary].Google Scholar
Mu, AT and Lee, CK (1958) Scandent graptolites from the Ningkuo Shale of the Kiangshan-Chanshan area, western Chekiang. Acta Palaeontologica Sinica 6, 391411 [in Chinese], 412–27 [in English], 5 pls.Google Scholar
Nicholson, HA (1869) On some new species of graptolites. Annals and Magazine of Natural History, Series 4, 231–42, pl. 11.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nielsen, AT (2004) Ordovician sea level changes: a baltoscandian perspective. In The Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event (eds Webby, BD, Paris, F, Droser, ML and Percival, IG), pp. 8493. New York: Columbia University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pander, CH (1856) Monographie der fossilen Fische des silurischen Systems der russisch–baltischen Gouvernments. St Petersburg: Akademie der Wissenschaft, 91 p.Google Scholar
Perner, J (1895) Studie o českých graptolitech II. Palaeontographica Bohemica 3b, 152.Google Scholar
Popov, LE, Ghobadi Pour, M, Bassett, MG and Kebria-Ee Zadeh, MR (2009) Billingsellide and orthide brachiopods: new insights into earliest Ordovician evolution and biogeography from Northern Iran. Palaeontology 52, 3552.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Popov, LE, Ghobadi Pour, M and Hosseini, M (2008) Early to Middle Ordovician lingulate brachiopods from the Lashkarak Formation, Eastern Alborz Mountains, Iran. Alcheringa 32, 135.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pyle, LJ and Barnes, CR (2002) Taxonomy, Evolution, and Biostratigraphy of Conodonts from the Kechika Formation, Skoki Formation, and Road River Group (Upper Cambrian to Lower Silurian). Ottawa, Northeastern British Columbia: NRC Research Press, 227 p.Google Scholar
Rickards, RB, Booth, GA, Paris, F and Heward, AP (2010) Marine flooding events of the Early and Middle Ordovician of Oman and the United Arab Emirates and their graptolite, acritarch and chitinozoan associations. GeoArabia 15, 81120.Google Scholar
Rickards, RB, Hamedi, MA and Wright, AJ (1994) A new Arenig (Ordovician) graptolite fauna from the Kerman district, east-central Iran. Geological Magazine 131, 3542.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rickards, RB, Hamedi, MA and Wright, AJ (2000) Late Ordovician and Early Silurian graptolites from southern Iran. Records of the Western Australian Museum, Supplement 58, 103–22.Google Scholar
Rickards, RB, Hamedi, MA and Wright, AJ (2001) A new assemblage of graptolites, rhabdopleuran hemichordates and chitinous hydroids from the late Arenig (Ordovician) of the Banestan area, east-central Iran. Alcheringa 25, 169–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Riva, J (1994) Yutagraptus mantuanus Riva, in Rickards 1994. A pendent xiphograptid from the Lower Ordovician of Utah, USA. In Graptolite Research Today (eds Chen, X, Erdtmann, B-D and Ni, Y-N), pp. 113. Taipei: Academia Sinica.Google Scholar
Ruedemann, R (1904) Graptolites of New York. Part I. Graptolites of the lower beds. New York State Museum Bulletin 7, 457803.Google Scholar
Rushton, AWA (2000) Acrograptus affinis (Nicholson, 1859 [recte 1869]). In Atlas of Graptolite Type Specimens, Folio 1 (eds JA Zalasiewicz, AWA Rushton, JE Hutt and MPA Howe). London: Palaeontographical Society.Google Scholar
Rushton, AWA (2011) Deflexed didymograptids from the Lower Ordovician Skiddaw Group of northern England. Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society 58, 319–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sachanski, V, Özgül, N and Arpat, E (2006) The graptolite species Hunnegraptus copiosus Lindholm, 1991 from the Lower Ordovician of Central Taurus, Turkey. Geosciences 2006, 4952.Google Scholar
Skevington, D (1963) Graptolites from the Ontikan Limestones (Ordovician) of Öland, Sweden: I. Dendroidea, Tuboidea, Camaroidea and Stolonoidea. Bulletins of the Geological Institute, University of Uppsala 42, 162.Google Scholar
Stöcklin, J and Setudehnia, A (1971Stratigraphic Lexicon of Iran. Part 1. Central, North and East Iran. Geological Survey of Iran, Report no. 18, 376 p.Google Scholar
Törnquist, SL (1901) Researches into the graptolites of the lower zones of the Scanian and Vestrogothian Phyllo-Tetragraptus Beds, I. Lunds Universitets Årsskrift 37, 126, 3 pls.Google Scholar
Toro, B (1997) La fauna de graptolitos de la Formación Acoite, en el borde occidental de la Cordillera Oriental Argentina. Análisis bioestratigráfico. Ameghiniana 34, 393412.Google Scholar
Toro, B and Maletz, J (2008) The proximal development in Cymatograptus (Graptoloidea) from Argentina and its relevance for the early evolution of the Dichograptacea. Journal of Paleontology 82, 974–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tullberg, SA (1880) Några Didymograptus-arter i undre graptolitskiffer vid Kiviks-Esperöd. Geologisk Föreningens i Stockholm Förhandlingar 5, 4143, pl. 2.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tzaj, DT (1969) Novyi ordoviksii rod Acrograptus Paleontologicheskii Zhurnal 1969(1), 142−143 [in Russian] A new Ordovician genus Acrograptus . Paleontological Journal 1, 133–34 [English translation].Google Scholar
Wang, JD (1974) Graptolites. In Palaeontological Atlas of Yunnan (ed. Geological Bureau of Yunnan), pp. 731–61. Kunming: People’s Publishing House of Yunnan.Google Scholar
Zhang, J and Zhang, Y (2014) Graptolite fauna of the Hungshiyen Formation (Early Ordovician), eastern Yunnan, China. Alcheringa 38, 434–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zhang, Y (2008) Kiaerograptus kiaeri (Monsen, 1925). In Atlas of Graptolite Type Specimens, Folio 2 (eds JA Zalasiewicz, AWA Rushton, JE Hutt and MPA Howe). London: Palaeontographical Society.Google Scholar
Zhang, Y, Chen, X, Goldman, D, Zhang, J, Cheng, J and Song, Y (2010) Diversity and paleobiogeographic distribution patterns of Early and Middle Ordovician graptolites in distinct depositional environments of South China. Science China. Earth Sciences 53, 1811–27.Google Scholar
Zhang, Y, Erdtmann, BD and Feng, H (2004) Tremadocian (early Ordovician) graptolite biostratigraphy of China. Newsletters on Stratigraphy 40, 155–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zhou, Z and Zhen, Y (eds) (2009) Trilobite Record of China. Beijing: Science Press, 402 pp.Google Scholar