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Stratigraphy of Outcropping Rocks, continued
Permian System
Wolfcampian Series
Admire Goup
Hamlin Shale
The Hamlin shale comprises three members, the Oaks shale, Houchen Creek limestone, and Stine shale. Only a few feet of weathered Stine shale occurs in one small area in Osage County. It is not an aquifer.
Stine shale member--The complete thickness of the Stine shale member is about 50 feet in areas adjacent to the west. Only about 5 feet or less of the basal part is present on one hilltop in northwestern Osage County. In outcrops it is observed to be gray to olive, silty to sandy shale.
Five Point Limestone
The Five Point limestone is a gray fossiliferous limestone about 4 feet thick. Fossils include fusulinids, brachiopods, bryozoans, horn corals, and crinoids. It is not an aquifer.
West Branch Shale
Gray silty to sandy shale and sandstone about 25 feet thick comprise most of the West Branch shale. A thin coal generally less than 0.2 foot thick occurs in the upper 1 foot of the formation and is underlain by about 4 feet of gray shale and a thin sandy limestone containing pelecypods, bryozoans, brachiopods, and crinoid fragments. The middle and lower parts are chiefly fine-grained sandstone and sandy shale. It is not an important aquifer.
Falls City Limestone
The Falls City limestone comprises several thin gray limestones that weather light gray to cream and the included gray shale beds. The upper part consists of one or two thin gray limestones containing abundant fossils, chiefly mollusks and bryozoans. The lower part commonly comprises two thin molluscan gray limestones separated by a foot or two or gray shale. The formation has an approximate thickness of 12 feet. It is of little importance as an aquifer.
Hawxby Shale
Three measured sections of the Hawxby shale range from 11 to 14 feet in thickness. It comprises olive-green, gray, and red silty and micaceous or clayey shale, unfossiliferous or with a thin molluscan limestone.
It is not an aquifer.
Aspinwall Limestone
The Aspinwall limestone, comprising 2 to 5 feet of limestone or limestone and interbedded shale, is not a prominent bench-forming limestone. It contains mollusks and generally some productid brachiopods together with considerable ferruginous material locally. The limestone is light gray and weathers gray. It is of little importance as a source of ground water.
Towle Shale
The Towle shale ranges from about 8 to 13 feet in thickness in four measured sections of these beds in northwestern Osage County. The formation contains two members, an unnamed shale, and the Indian Cave sandstone which occurs locally in the lower part of the formation. Only the shale member was observed in the exposures studied. It is of little importance as a source of ground water.
Unnamed shale member--Beds of gray, green, and red shale, in part clayey and in part silty or sandy, comprise the unnamed shale member. Red or red and green shale occurs near the middle or locally comprises almost the entire member.
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Kansas Geological Survey, Geology
Web version April 2002. Original publication date May 1955.
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