Abstract – Janzic and Hatcher
Anita-Maria Janzic and Joseph Hatcher, Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre, Morden, MB
Marine vertebrate fauna of Xiphactinus kill zone from the Gammon Ferruginous Member (Pierre Shale), Manitoba
Abstract
Since 1934, when Charles M. Sternberg excavated the first mosasaur skulls in Canada, from a section of property on the Manitoba Escarpment, marine fossils have been discovered in abundance. Those fossils represent a life in the Cretaceous Western Interior Seaway. In 2010 the same section of land has become a goldmine of marine fauna, not from the Pembina Member of the Pierre Shale Charles Sternberg was excavating in, but the slightly older and rarer Gammon Ferruginous Member. The site, referred to as the Xiphactinus Kill Zone, originally consisting of 2 semi-articulated specimens, a Xiphactinus (large fish) and a Clidastes (small mosasaur) and has expanded over the past 2 field seasons to include all the marine fauna represented in the CFDC’s collection from one site. Birds, fish, cephalopods, turtles, mosasaurs, plesiosaurs and sharks constitute the first faunal assemblage in the exposure of a shallow turbulent marine deposit, the Gammon Ferruginous Member of the Pierre Shale Formation.
Abstract – Janzic and Hatcher
Anita-Maria Janzic and Joseph Hatcher, Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre, Morden, MB
Marine vertebrate fauna of Xiphactinus kill zone from the Gammon Ferruginous Member (Pierre Shale), Manitoba
Abstract
Since 1934, when Charles M. Sternberg excavated the first mosasaur skulls in Canada, from a section of property on the Manitoba Escarpment, marine fossils have been discovered in abundance. Those fossils represent a life in the Cretaceous Western Interior Seaway. In 2010 the same section of land has become a goldmine of marine fauna, not from the Pembina Member of the Pierre Shale Charles Sternberg was excavating in, but the slightly older and rarer Gammon Ferruginous Member. The site, referred to as the Xiphactinus Kill Zone, originally consisting of 2 semi-articulated specimens, a Xiphactinus (large fish) and a Clidastes (small mosasaur) and has expanded over the past 2 field seasons to include all the marine fauna represented in the CFDC’s collection from one site. Birds, fish, cephalopods, turtles, mosasaurs, plesiosaurs and sharks constitute the first faunal assemblage in the exposure of a shallow turbulent marine deposit, the Gammon Ferruginous Member of the Pierre Shale Formation.