Sedgwick Museum Notes. The Characteristic Assemblages of the Graptolite Zones of the British Isles.

Abstract

It has become increasingly evident during the past few years that there are many geologists working on the older Palaeozoic rocks in various parts of the British Isles, to whom a knowledge of the common assemblages of graptolites characteristic of our different British graptolite zones might be useful. In the following lists, therefore, an attempt has been made to put together the facts gleaned from the study of the Graptolite Shales of the British Isles in many widely separated localities. The lists do not claim to be in any way a complete representation of the entire fauna of any zone, but merely an enumeration of those graptolites which in the author's experience are most universally and abundantly represented, so that they are likely to be the forms met with most characteristically in an exposure of any particular horizon. Some co-mingling at the boundaries of the zones must naturally be expected, especially when dealing with a succession of purely shaly deposits, but as a rule even then the coming in of new forms in abundance should be taken as an index of the passage to a higher horizon. This fact is one upon which great emphasis should be laid, it is upon this coming in of new forms, usually indicative of a more advanced stage in evolution, that the basis of modern zonal stratigraphy is laid; the persistence of old forms tends to vary greatly in different localities with the richness of the previous fauna; when the fauna of the earlier zones was both rich and varied, there are naturally more survivors into the succeeding zones than when the fauna was a poor one.