Geo log i cal Quar terly, 2010, 54 (3): 381–384
First Pa leo zoic Zoophycos trace fos sils from the Sudetes (the Bardo Unit)
Jolanta MUSZER and Joanna HAYDUKIEWICZ
Muszer J. and Haydukiewicz J. (2010) – First Pa leo zoic Zoophycos trace fos sils from the Sudetes (the Bardo Unit). Geol. Quart., 54 (3):
381–384. Warszawa.
The trace fos sil Zoophycos has been first time rec og nized in the Sudetes within the lower Car bon if er ous (up per Visean, crenistria Zone) of the Paprotnia Beds in the Bardo Unit. A dis tinct con cen tra tion of Zoophycos oc curs in the lower part of the Paprotnia pro file, in mudstones interbedded with bentonites, which were most likely de pos ited be tween storm wave base and fair weather wave base, in ox y - gen ated wa ter.
Jolanta Muszer, Uni ver sity of Wroc³aw, In sti tute of Geo log i cal Sci ences, Cybulskiego 30, PL-50-205 Wroc³aw, Po land, e-mail:
jolanta.muszer@ing.uni.wroc.pl; Joanna Haydukiewicz, Uni ver sity of Wroc³aw, In sti tute of Geo log i cal Sci ences, Cybulskiego 30, PL-50-205 Wroc³aw, Po land, e-mail: joanna.haydukiewicz@ing.uni.wroc.pl (re ceived: De cem ber 17, 2009; ac cepted: March 15, 2010).
Key words: Po land, Sudetes, up per Visean, trace fos sils, Zoophycos.
INTRODUCTION
The trace fos sil Zoophycos is a com plex bur row sys tem con - sist ing of a large num ber of three-di men sional heli cally coiled spreiten struc tures, which are very vari able in mor phol ogy and are pres ent in ma rine sed i ments rang ing in age from Cam brian to re cent (see Knaust, 2009). Uchman (1995) pro posed the term
“Zoophycos group” to in clude all the traces that share cer tain com mon mor pho log i cal char ac ter is tics. Al though Zoophycos struc tures are com mon and wide spread in an cient and mod ern sed i ments, the pro duc ing an i mal has not yet been dis cov ered and the be hav ioural ex pla na tion is still de bated (e.g., Bromley, 1991). This ichnogenus was de scribed from di verse sed i ments rep re sent ing var i ous palaeoenvironments from infralittoral to abys sal (Frey et al., 1990) and even in a glaciomarine en vi ron - ment (Gong et al., 2008). It is well-doc u mented in the ichnological lit er a ture that the bathymetric range of this trace has in creased with time (see Bottjer et al., 1988; Kotake, 1997).
This ichnogenus was known in Po land only from the Paleogene flysch de pos its of the Pol ish Carpathians (Wetzel and Uchman, 1998; Uchman, 1998) Ju ras sic car bon ates of Pieniny (Tyszka, 1994) and from the Tournaisian car bon ate de pos its of the Kraków Block (Hoffmann et al., 2009). This ar - ti cle re ports the first cer tain dis cov ery of Zoophycos in the Pa - leo zoic rocks of the Pol ish Sudetes.
GEOLOGICAL SETTING
The Bardo Unit is a sep a rate com plex struc ture within the cen tral Pol ish Sudetes (Fig. 1). The de pos its con tain ing Zoophycos occure within the Paprotnia Beds, which oc cur only in the west ern part of the unit and prob a bly un der lie flysch strata. The Paprotnia Beds are an in for mal unit be long ing to an autochtonous/parautochtonous plat form to fore land suc ces sion of the Bardo Unit (see Haydukiewicz and Muszer, 2002).
The ex posed sec tion, 13.7 m in thick ness, is com posed of claystones and mudstones with thin dark-grey micritic lime - stone beds and sev eral ben ton ite lay ers, lenses and nod ules of dark-grey organodetrital lime stones and greywackes with in - ter ca la tions of mudstones (Fig. 2). These de pos its pass grad u - ally into the polymictic Wilcza Con glom er ates.
The Paprotnia Beds con tain a very rich palaeontological re - cord, that has been much stud ied (see Haydukiewicz and Muszer, 2002), which in di cates that the beds be long to the ammonoid G. crenistria Zone, which cor re sponds with the Asbian re gional substage of the up per Visean (V3b). Both the lithological and palaeontological fea tures of the Paprotnia Beds re flect grad ual en vi ron men tal changes from off shore to on - shore con di tions (Haydukiewicz and Muszer, 2002).
SHORT COMMUNICATION
SYSTEMATIC ICHNOLOGY
Spreiten Bur rows
Ichnogenus Zoophycos Massalongo, 1855 Zoophycos isp.
(Fig. 3)
M a t e r i a l a n d o c c u r r e n ce. – Sev eral dozen in com plete spec i mens; the Paprotnia Beds (lower part of the sec tion), the Bardo Unit (Sudetes).
D e s c r i p t i o n. – Large spreiten bur row struc tures show ing ei ther sim ple flat forms, or unilobate helicoidal forms par al lel to bed ding. Most col lected spec i mens rep re sent parts of larger struc tures whose ar chi tec ture is un known. Some helicoidal forms show down ward growth. Mea sure ment of many trace fos sils is dif fi cult be cause of cross-cut ting. The in - ter preted to tal length of the forms ranges from 70 to 160 mm.
Some slabs are en cir cled by cy lin dri cal fragmentarily pre - served mar ginal tubes 1–5 mm wide. The min i mal height of the trace ranges ap prox i mately from 14 to 35 mm. The lobes are filled with prom i nent pri mary lamellae, the dis tance be tween two sub se quent lamellae ranging from 1 to 7 mm. The sec ond - ary lamellae oc cur of ten only in the large forms; the dis tance of neigh bour ing ones is 0.7–1 mm. The an gle be tween pri mary lamellae and sec ond ary lamellae var ies from 10 to nearly 30°.
The lamina is spi rally coiled around a ver ti cal axis which is ap - prox i mately per pen dic u lar to bed ding. The ax ial tun nel is oval in out line and its di am e ter reaches from 12 to 30 mm. The an gle be tween the bed ding plane and the up per part of the lamina var - ies be tween 20–55°.
D i s c u s s i o n. – The Zoophycos de scribed above clearly cor re sponds to the con struc tional model of Gaillard and Olivero (1993) and is very sim i lar to Tournaisian forms from Bel gium (Gaillard et al., 1999), but in the Tournaisian ma te rial does not show sec ond ary lamellae. The Paprotnia forms and the lower Car bon if er ous Jap a nese spec i mens (see Kotake, 1997) are sim i lar in hav ing an acute an gle be tween ma jor and mi nor lamella. Our forms have also a very sim i lar dis tance be tween two sub se quent pri mary lamellae and the ax ial tun nel to the forms from the mid dle Penn syl va nian of Nova Sco tia (McIlroy and Fal con-Lang, 2006), but their length are much smaller.
CONCLUSIONS
The char ac ter is tic fea tures and or ga ni za tion of Zoophycos from the Paprotnia Beds are very close to other Car bon if er ous forms (Kotake, 1997; Gaillard et al., 1999; McIlroy and Fal - con-Lang, 2006). Con cen tra tions of Zoophycos oc cur in mudstones, which are un der lain by organodetrital lime stones.
These sed i ments in di cate dis tinct shallowing. The en vi ron ment was lo cated be tween the storm wave and fair weather wave bases, in ox y gen ated wa ter. The pres ence of Zoophycos in such de pos its sup ports the pre vi ously pub lished opin ions that the trace-mak ing an i mal pre ferred shal low-wa ter en vi ron ments dur ing the early Car bon if er ous.
382 Jolanta Muszer and Joanna Haydukiewicz
Fig. 1. Lo ca tion of the Paprotnia site on the map of the Bardo Unit SMF – Sudetic Mar ginal Fault
Fig. 2. Simplified lithological log of the Paprotnia sec tion and Zoophycos oc cur rence
We also note that an cient and re cent Zoophycos-group ichnofossils, sim i lar to Zoophycos from the Paprotnia Beds, of - ten oc curs in sed i ments con tain ing peb ble lags, tuffs or vol ca - nic ash (e.g., Kotake, 1997; Gong et al., 2008; Hoffmann et al., 2009). Rec og ni tion of Zoophycos trace fos sils in the Car bon if - er ous of the Sudetes will encourage fur ther ichnological study of these de pos its.
Ac knowl edg ments. We are obliged to the re viewer R. Mi - kulaš for many valu able com ments. The study was sup ported by in ter nal grants of Wroc³aw Uni ver sity, 2022/W/ING and 1017/S/ING.
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First Paleozoic Zoophycos trace fossils from the Sudetes (the Bardo Unit) 383
Fig. 3. Frag ments of Zoophycos isp. from the Paprotnia Beds
A – sample ING/P-1, B – sam ple ING/P-25, C–D – sam ple ING/P-3; scale bar 1 ´ 1 cm; mt – mar ginal tube, a – ax ial tun nel, pl – pri mary lamellae, sl – sec ond ary lamellae
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