Finding evidence of altered volcanic ash (K-bentonite beds) in the Ordovician rocks of Eastern Ontario and the Ordovician rocks of Eastern North America would not be unusual, as occurrences have been reported for over eighty-five years, and the K-bentonite beds have been used as Ordovician stratigraphic marker horizons over much of the eastern United States and southern Ontario. For example, Fyon (2019) provides good photos and an explanation of the K-bentonite volcanic ash beds in Ordovician limestone at Marmora, Ontario, while Sharma et al. (2005a, b) reported on a 6 cm thick K-bentonite (volcanic ash) bed in the Ordovician Billings Formation shales of the Ottawa Embayment, found in logged drill core from Russell, Ontario. Kolata, Huff and Bergstrom (1996) reviewed the Ordovician K-bentonites of eastern North America, reporting “at least 60 volcanic ash beds, K-bentonites” within the Ordovician stratigraphic succession, concluding that the “parental magmas consisted of a calc-alkaline suite ranging from andesite, rhyodacite, trachyandesite and rhyolite” in a “setting characterized by destructive plate-margin volcanics” where erupted volcanic ash was “carried by the prevailing ... tradewinds for hundreds of kilometers ... and were deposited in shallow cratonic seas.” For southern Ontario they report two K-bentonites in the Ordovician Gull River Formation (citing Liberty, 1969) and one in the Ordovician Bobcaygeon succession (citing Liberty, 1969), noting that “The Millbrig occurs in the same stratigraphic interval as [K-bentonite] bed MR, described by Liberty from near the base of the Bobcageon Formation in outcrops in the Lake Simcoe region, southwestern Ontario.” Liberty’s (1969) reports are of k-bentonite clay layers.
Finding visible phenocrysts in Ordovician K-bentonite beds is not the norm. John Haynes (1989) describes the feldspars of the Ordovician Deicke and Millbrig K-bentonite Beds of the southeastern United States, noting (page 37) that “Feldspars are the most abundant phenocrysts in the Dieke and Millbrig....Grain sizes vary greatly; the feldspars average less than .5 mm long in samples from the west-central Valley and Ridge in Virginia, and they average between 0.5 - 1 mm in samples from the Nashville Dome and the Valley and Ridge from southwestern Virginia to Alabama.” He included a number of photomicrographs (Figs. 17-21) of feldspar phenocrysts in his doctoral thesis, but the ones figured are less than a 2.5 mm long. Others report even smaller crystals. When Delano et al. (1990) examined 30 K-bentonites (altered volcanic ashes) in the late Ordovician Utica shale of New York State they found fragmental feldspar crystals up to 600 microns in diameter, with most crystals under 45 microns.
Haynes (1994) mentions “In the southeastern United States, identification of the Rocklandian Deicke and Millbrig K-bentonite Beds is based on differences in phenocryst mineralogy in the tuffaceous zones of each bed, and the two beds can be reliably and consistently distinguished on this basis. The common phenocrysts in the Deicke are labradorite and various Fe-Ti minerals, and in the Millbrig they are andesine, quartz, and biotite. Phenocrysts present in trace amounts are biotite and quartz in the Deicke, and apatite and zircon in both beds. The Deicke is altered dacitic or latitic ash, whereas the Millbrig is altered rhyodacitic ash. Both beds are interpreted as airfall deposits produced by huge volcanic eruptions, each of which was much larger and produced far more ash than the 1815 eruption of Tambora and even the great Toba eruption of 75 Ka.”
Haynes (1994) notes that “Biotite, quartz, feldspars, and other clay minerals are present as primary phenocrysts and secondary phenocrysts in the Diecke and Millbrig in the study area – and in fact are so abundant and coarse grained in some zones that the material in those zones is tuffaceous rather than bentonitic – but the principal constituent of these and many other beds in Lower Paleozoic strata is mixed-layer illite/smectite (I/S) clay...”
There are numerous other reported occurrences where K-bentonite (volcanic ash) outcrops in Ontario and the Ottawa Embayment. Brun and Chagnon (1979) reported three occurrences of clay (volcanic ash beds) in Black River and Trenton Group (middle Ordovician) rocks of the Ottawa Embayment, at quarries in Aylmer, Lucerne and Hull, Quebec (just across the river from Ottawa). Suarez et al. (2016) reported a late Ordovician U-Pb zircon age from K-bentonite found in the Trenton Group near Kirkfield, Ontario. Al-Delami and Dix (2009) reported two thin (~3 cm) biotite-bearing clay beds in the Upper Ordovician Verulam Formation (Ottawa Group) in the western portion of the Ottawa Embayment, eastern Ontario, which they interpreted as altered volcanic ash from two related eruptive events. Cornell (2001) reviewed the K-bentonite (volcanic ash) occurrences in Ordovician rocks in Ontario and New York State, and reported collecting and examining K-bentonite at localities that included Brechin Quarry, Brechin Ontario; Miller Paving Quarry, Dalrymple, Ontario; Provincial Route 35 road cut just south of Coboconk, Ontario; Provincial Highway 7 road cut west of Marmora, Ontario; Bethlehem Steel Mine, Marmora Ontario; Provincial Route 2 road cut just east of Napanee, Ontario (below the highway department); QEW Highway 401 road cut at Montreal Street exit, Kingston, Ontario; Division Street Quarry, Kingston, Ontario; and Barriefield Hill, near Kingston, Ontario. (Inserted August 12, 2019): Kolata, Huff and Bergström (1996) briefly described the Ordovician K-bentonite bed at the quarry near Aylmer, Quebec (just across the river from Ottawa) noting that this bed is as much as 17 cm thick. Salad Hersi (1998) reported on a Bentonite layer in a roadcut at the intersection of Tenth Line Rd. and St. Joseph Blvd. in Orleans, Ontario (now part of Ottawa), within the Hull Formation about 1 meter below the base of the Verulam Formation. Kierman (1999) analyzed those two K-Bentonites from the Ottawa Embayment: one at the Klock Quarry in Aylmer, Quebec, and the second near the intersection of St. Joseph Blvd. and Tenth Line Rd. in Orleans, Ontario about 1 m below the base of the Verulam Formation. Dix and Jolicoeur ( 2011) discuss bentonite layers in the Ordovician Billings Formation and Carlsbad Formation, Eastern Ontario.
I did not find a report of a porphyritic volcanic rock from the Ordovician rocks of the Ottawa Embayment.
The potassium-rich bentonite clay formed from altered volcanic ash was originally called bentonite, then metabentonite and only later called K-bentonite (Lounsbury and Melhorn, 1963). Kay (1929, 1931, 1935) reported on a six inch layer of metabentonite (now, K-bentonite) north of Kingston, Ontario at the base of the Ordovician Glenburnie shale, and that the metabentonite had been identified at Napanee, Ontario. Kay (1931, 1935) also reported metabentonite occurrences in a number of exposures in the Ordovician Coboconk limestone between Lake Simcoe and Georgian Bay, in Simcoe County, Ontario, with the best of the exposures at quarries between Orillia and Coldwater. Maddox (1930) reported a bed of “bentonite” in Ordovician rocks in a well 2 1/2 miles southeast of Collingwood, Ontario, which Kay (1931) identified as a metabentonite (now, K-bentonite). Orr (1959) reported on samples of “metabentonite or K-bentonite” of Ordovician age from four separate quarries north of Lake Simcoe, Ontario: the first from two 1 inch seams near the town of Medonte; the second from a 1/2 inch thick bentonite layer at the west quarry at the town of Coboconk; the third from an inch thick bentonite layer at an abandoned quarry 25 miles southwest of the town of Sebright; the fourth from the upper of two 1 inch bentonitic shale partings at a quarry north of the Longford Mills.
K-bentonite (volcanic ash) layers within sedimentary rocks are fairly common from the Precambrian to the Tertiary (see Huff, 2016). Crystal tuffs and tuffacious zones within K-bentonites layers have been reported from various periods in addition to the Ordovician, but my initial online research suggests that the large size of the feldspar phenocrysts in the rock that I found is very unusual . For example, Dennison and Textoris (1978) report that the Devonian Tioga K-bentonite (found in Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York) has several tuffaceous layers, and state that “The Tioga tuff ranges (in its original rock state) from coarse crystal tuffs rich in biotite and feldspars (Fig. 3) to tuffaceous shales. ... Up to 35 percent of some samples of the middle coarse zone consist of euhedral and fragmented K-feldspar and Na-rich plagioclase.” They use isopach data and crystal size for biotite and feldspar to speculate as to the location of the volcanic source of the Tioga tuffs. Their map plotting the mean diameter of the coarsest feldspar in the middle coarse zone of Tioga Bentonite, Appalachian Basin, has feldspars ranging from .1mm to 1 mm.
In my January 7, 2018 blog posting I mentioned that the Ontario Geological Survey (“OGS”) had released the Summary of Field Work and Other Activities, 2017 (Open File Report 6333), in which Catherine Béland Otis reported on her project ‘Paleozoic Mapping of Eastern Ontario’ . She mentioned that she had been looking at ages determined from zircons found in bentonite beds in Eastern Ontario and hoped to correlate strata in Eastern Ontario with adjacent jurisdictions, and that “The bentonite beds represent Late Ordovician volcanic ash deposits from a volcanic arc, now disappeared, located hundreds of kilometres to the east.” I thought at that time that the altered volcanic ash (K-bentonite beds) would be an interesting blog posting. What is surprising is the number of papers written on the beds in the Ordovician of North America.
Christopher Brett
Ottawa, Ontario
References and Suggested Reading
Adhya, Soumava, 2009
Geochemical fingerprinting of volcanic airfall deposits: A tool in stratigraphic correlation.
Ph.D. Thesis and Dissertation. Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, University at Albany, State University of New York. 532 pages.
http://scholarsarchive.library.albany.edu/cas_daes_geology_etd/125
Al-Delami, M. And Dix, G.R., 2009
Distal Limits and Composition of a Late Ordovician (Mohawkian) Biotite-Bearing Volcanic ash, Foreland Carbonate Platform (Verulam Formation), Ottawa Embayment: Helping to Define Magmatic Change in Volcanism Following Later Platform Foundering. American Geophysical Union, Spring Meeting 2009, abstract id. V31B-10
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2009AGUSM.V31B..10A
Allen, V.T. , 1929
Altered tuffs in the Ordovician of Minnesota. Journal of Geology, 37, 239–248.
https://doi.org/10.1086/623617
https://www.jstor.org/stable/30055890
Allen, V.T. , 1932
Ordovician Altered Volcanic Material in Iowa, Wisconsin, and Missouri. The Journal of Geology 40, no. 3 (Apr. - May, 1932): 259-269.
https://doi.org/10.1086/623945 https://www.jstor.org/stable/30057999
Anonymous, 2019
Deicke and Millbrig bentonite layers - Wikipedia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deicke_and_Millbrig_bentonite_layers
Armstrong, D.K., 2000
Paleozoic Geology of the Northern Lake Simcoe Area, South-Central Ontario. Ontario Geological Survey Open File Report 6011, at pages 18 and 23
http://www.geologyontario.mndmf.gov.on.ca/mndmfiles/pub/data/imaging/OFR6011/OFR6011.pdf
Barth, A.P.; A.D.G. Feilen; S.L. Yager; S.R. Douglas; J.L. Wooden; N.R. Riggs; J.D. Walker
2012
Petrogenetic connections between ash-flow tuffs and a granodioritic to granitic intrusive suite in the Sierra Nevada arc, California . Geosphere (2012) 8 (2): 250-264.
https://doi.org/10.1130/GES00737.1
https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/gsa/geosphere/article/8/2/250/132512/petrogenetic-connections-between-ash-flow-tuffs
Brett, Carlton, McLaughlin, P. , Cornell, S., and Baird, G. 2004
Comparative sequence stratigraphy of two classic Upper Ordovician successions, Trenton Shelf (New York–Ontario) and Lexington Platform (Kentucky–Ohio): implications for eustasy and local tectonism in eastern Laurentia. Palaeo: Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, vol. 210, pages 295- 329; K-bentonites at 306-308
https://www.academia.edu/17890405/Comparative_sequence_stratigraphy_of_two_classic_Upper_Ordovician_successions_Trenton_Shelf_New_York_Ontario_and_Lexington_Platform_Kentucky_Ohio_implications_for_eustasy_and_local_tectonism_in_eastern_Laurentia
Brun J., 1974
Etude Petrograpique des formations du Black River et du Trenton du Quebec.
Ministere de Rechesses Naturelles Service des gites Mineraux. 24 pages
Brun, J. and Chagnon, A., 1979
Rock Stratigraphy and clay mineralogy of volcanic ash beds from the Black River and Trenton Groups (middle Ordovician) of southern Quebec. Can. Journal of Earth Sciences, vol 16, 1499–1507
https://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/abs/10.1139/e79-133
Carey, Adam, Samson, Scott D., and Bryan Sell, 2009
Utility and Limitations of Apatite Phenocryst Chemistry for Continent-Scale Correlation of Ordovician K-Bentonites. The Journal of Geology, Vol. 117, No. 1 (January 2009), pp. 1-14
https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/594368
Cornell, Sean R., 2001
Sequence Stratigraphy and Event Correlations of Upper Black River and Lower Trenton Carbonates of Northern New York State and Southern Ontario, Canada. Thesis, Master of Science, University of Cincinnati
https://etd.ohiolink.edu/!etd.send_file?accession=ucin997444936&disposition...
Delano, J. W., Schirnick, C., Bock, B., W. S. F. Kidd, M. T. Heizler, G. W. Putman, S. E. De Long, M. Ohr, 1990
Petrology and Geochemistry of Ordovician K-Bentonites in New York State: Constraints on the Nature of a Volcanic Arc. The Journal of Geology, Vol. 98, No. 2 (Mar., 1990), pp. 157-170
https://www.jstor.org/stable/30063767
Dennison , J. M. And Textoris, D. A, 1978
Tioga Bentonite Time-Marker Associated with Devonian shales in Appalachian Basin. 166-182
in Proceedings First Eastern Gas Shales Symposium, October 17-19, 1977, Lakeview Inn and Country Club, Morgantown, West Virginia. Department of Energy, Technical Information Center, 1978 , 783 pages
https://books.google.com/books/about/Proceedings_First_Eastern_Gas_Shales_Sym.html?id=rA8Ma1wed6QC
Dix, George R. And Jolicoeur, C. , 2011
Tectonostratigraphic framework of Upper Ordovician source rocks, Ottawa Embayment (eastern Ontario). Bulletin of Canadian Petroleum Geology, Vol. 59, No. 1 (March, 2011), P. 7–26
https://doi.org/10.2113/gscpgbull.59.1.7
Fyon, Andy, 2019
Marmora Ash Beds — Ontario Beneath Our Feet
https://www.ontariobeneathourfeet.com/marmora-ash-beds
downloaded July 27, 2019
Haynes, John T., 1989
The Mineralogy And Stratigraphic Setting Of The Rocklandian (Upper Ordovician) Deicke And Millbrig K Bentonite Beds Along The Cincinnati Arch And In The Southern Valley And Ridge.
Ph.D. thesis, University of Cincinnati
https://scholar.uc.edu/concern/etds/cn69m4153?locale=en
Haynes, John T., 1994
The Ordovician Deicke and Millbrig K-Bentonite Beds of the Cincinnati Arch and the Southern Valley and Ridge Province. Geological Society of America Special Paper Volume 290
Doi: https://doi.org/10.1130/SPE290-p1
https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/books/book/426/chapter/3798516/the-ordovician-deicke-and-millbrig-k-bentonite
https://books.google.com/books/about/The_Ordovician_Deicke_and_Millbrig_K_ben.html?id=MYuKAAAAQBAJ
Hewett, D. F., 1917
The origin of bentonite and the geologic range of related materials in Bighorn basin, Wyoming. Journal Washington Academy Sciences, vol. VII, pp 196-198
https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/18415#page/202/mode/1up
Huff, Warren, 2016
K-bentonites: A review. American Mineralogist, Volume 101(1), pages 43-70
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/289366248_K-bentonites_A_review
Huff, W., Kolata, D.R., Bergstrom, S. M. And Zhang, Y-S., 1996
Large-magnitude Middle Ordovician volcanic ash falls in North America and Europe: dimensions, emplacement and post-emplacement characteristics. Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research, volume 73, 285-301
Https://www.academia.edu/27206142/Large-magnitude_Middle_Ordovician_volcanic_ash_falls_in_North_America_and_Europe_dimensions_emplacement_and_post-emplacement_characteristics
Kay, G.M., 1929,
Stratigraphy of the Decorah Formation, Journal of Geology, vol. 37, 639-671,
Kay, G. M., 1930
Age of the Hounsfield Metabentonite, Science, vol. 72, 365
Kay, G.M., 1931
Stratigraphy of the Ordovician Hounsfield Metabentonite, Journal of Geology, vol. , p. 361-376.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/3008078
Kay, G.M., 1935
Distribution of Ordovician altered volcanic materials and related clays. Geological Society of America Bulletin 46: 225-244 doi:10.1130/GSAB-46-195
Kierman, Jeffrey P., 1999
Lithography, Sedimentology and Diagenesis of the Upper Ordovician Hull Beds and Verulam Formation, Upper Ottawa Group, Eastern Ontario. Thesis, Master of Science, Department of Earth Sciences, Carleton University. 262 pages. MQ43360.pdf
https://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk1/tape8/PQDD_0003/MQ43360.pdf
Kolata, Dennis R., Huff, Warren D. and Bergstrom, Stig M., 1996
Ordovician K-bentonites of eastern North America. Geological Society of America, Special Paper 313
https://books.google.com/books/about/Ordovician_K_bentonites_of_eastern_North.html?id=iTDpAgAAQBAJ
https://epdf.pub/ordovician-k-bentonites-of-eastern-north-america.html
Lafleur, Jean and Hogarth, D.,
Cambro-Proterozoic volcanism near Buckingham, Quebec. [trachyandesit 573 +-32 Ma]
Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences, 1981, 18(12): 1817-1823,
https://doi.org/10.1139/e81-169
Liberty, B.A., 1969
Paleozoic geology of the Lake Simcoe area, Ontario. Geological Survey of Canada Memoir 355, 215 pages. https://doi.org/10.4095/102319
Lounsbury , Richard W. and Melhorn Wilton N., 1963
Clay mineralogy of Paleozoic k-bentonites of the Eastern United States (part 1). Twelfth national conference on clays and clay minerals, 557-565
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1346/CCMN.1963.0120148
“Ross (1928) proposed the term metabentonite for these altered volcanic ash deposits. Since, as Weaver (1953) points out, these materials are frequently not metamorphosed, they are not metabentonites. He suggests use of the term K-bentonite for these deposits.”
Maddox, D.C., 1930
Bentonite in the Ordovician near Collingwood, Ontario. Science, Vol. 72, Issue 1877, pp. 630
DOI: 10.1126/science.72.1877.630
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/72/1877/630.1
Mitchell CE, Adhya S, Bergström SM, Joy MP, Delano JW., 2004.
Discovery of the Ordovician Millbrig K-bentonite bed in the Trenton Group of New York State: implications for regional correlation and sequence stratigraphy in eastern North America. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 210: 331-346
[Only Abstract looked at]
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.palaeo.2004.02.037
Orr, John Barrie Bain, 1959
Ordovician Bentonites from Ontario. Thesis, Master of Science, The University of Alberta. 86 pages
https://archive.org/details/Orr1959
Oruche, Nkechi E., Dix, George R. And Sandra L. Kamob, 2018
Lithostratigraphy of the upper Turinian – lower Chatfieldian (Upper Ordovician) foreland succession, and a U–Pb ID–TIMS date for the Millbrig volcanic ash bed in the Ottawa Embayment. Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences, 2018, 55(9): 1079-1102,
[Only Abstract looked at]
https://doi.org/10.1139/cjes-2018-0006
https://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/abs/10.1139/cjes-2018-0006
Ross, C.S., 1927
Altered Paleozoic Volcanic Materials and Their Recognition., Bulletin American Association Petroleum Geologists, Vol. XII, p. 149-164
http://archives.datapages.com/data/bulletns/1917-30/data/pg/0012/0002/0100/0143.htm
Salad Hcrsi , Osman , 1998
Stratigraphic revision of the Upper Chazyan to Trentonian succession, and sedimentologic and diagenetic aspects of the Blackriveran strata Ottawa Embayment, Ontario, Canada. Unpub. PhD. thesis Carleton University, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, 370 pp.
https://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk2/tape17/PQDD_0035/NQ26886.pdf
Samson, Scott, 1996
40Ar/39Ar and Nd-Sr isotopic characteristics of mid-Ordovician North American K-Bentonites: A test of early Paleozoic Laurentia-Gondwana interactions. Advanced Earth and Space Science.
https://doi.org/10.1029/96TC00829
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/96TC00829
Sharma, S., Dix, G.R. and M. Villeneuve, 2005a
Petrology and potential tectonic significance of a K-bentonite in a Taconian shale basin (eastern Ontario, Canada), northern Appalachians: Geological Magazine, v. 142, p. 145-158.
DOI: 10.1017/S001675680400041X
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/248686363_Petrology_and_potential_tectonic_significance_of_a_K-bentonite_in_a_Taconian_shale_basin_eastern_Ontario_Canada_northern_Appalachians
Sharma , S., Dix. G.R., Coniglio, M., Achab, A. , and Riva, J. F. V., 2005b
Records of Punctuated Tectonism in Platform-Interior Graben Systems (Ontario, Canada) Far-Flung from Contemporaneous Taconic Orogenesis in the Northern Appalachians.
Poster presentation at AAPG Annual Convention, Calgary, Alberta, June 19-22, 2005. http://www.searchanddiscovery.com/documents/2005/sharma/index.htm
www.searchanddiscovery.com/documents/2005/sharma/images/poster01.pdf
Suarez, S. E.; Brookfield, M. E.; Catlos, E. J.; Stockli, D. F.; Batchelor, R. A., 2016
Precise U/Pb zircons dates of bentonites in Upper Ordovician and Lower Silurian. American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2016, abstract #V11A-2761
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2016AGUFM.V11A2761S
3 precise U-Pb zircon ages from the Trenton Group, Ontario, Canada, The youngest age from the top of the Kirkfield Formation in Ontario is 448.0 +/- 18 Ma, which fits with existing late Ordovician stratigraphic ages
Tweet, Justin, 2016
(former) Ash beds in St. Paul
Equatorial Minnesota: Minnesota paleontology and geology, National Park Service paleontology, the Mesozoic, and occasional distractions. Posted Sunday, July 31, 2016
https://equatorialminnesota.blogspot.com/2016/07/former-ash-beds-in-st-paul.html
Ver Straeten, C., Baird, G. C., Karabinos, P., Samson, S. D., and Brett, Carlton E., 2012
Silicic Appalachian Magmatism During the Ordovician and Devonian: Perspectives from the Foreland Basin, and the Hinterland. In New York State Geological Association, 84th Annual Meeting Guidebook, Publisher: New York State Geological Association, Editors: Todd W. Rayne, pp. A7-1 to A7-59
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/281120169_Silicic_Appalachian_Magmatism_During_the_Ordovician_and_Devonian_Perspectives_from_the_Foreland_Basin_and_the_Hinterland
Wentworth, Chester K. And Williams, Howel, 1932
The Classification and Terminology of the Pyroclastic Rocks, pages 19-53, in Report of the Committee on Sedimentation, 1930-1932, Bulletin of the National Research Council, No. 89, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, D.C.
https://books.google.com/books/about/Bulletin_of_the_National_Research_Counci.html?id=ECMrAAAAYAAJ
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