The Geological Evolution of Australia & New Zealand by D. A. Brown & K.S.W. CAMPBELL & K.A.W. CROOK

Author:D. A. Brown & K.S.W. CAMPBELL & K.A.W. CROOK [BROWN, D.A. & CAMPBELL, K.S.W. & CROOK, K.A.W.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781483181134
Publisher: Elsevier Science
Published: 1968-06-15T00:00:00+00:00

PALAEONTOLOGY

The faunas of Australia may be characterized as Gondwana in type in that the distinctive elements Eurydesma, Sanguinolites, Atomodesma (Bivalvia), Warthia (Gastropoda), and Ingelarella and Taeniothaerus (Brachiopoda) occur in all regions. But simply to do this is to obscure the important fact that the western Australian and eastern Australian areas each formed distinct faunal provinces, to say nothing of their constituent sub-provinces. One remarkable feature is the complete absence of the warm-water fusulinid forams, compound rugose corals and enteletid, richthofeniid and notothyrid brachiopods from the Australian continent.

There is a strong Tethyan and Uralian element in the western Australian faunas. This is particularly evident in the large number of ammonoids (Juresanites, Metalegoceras, Propinacoceras, Uraloceras, and Thalassoceras), the brachiopods (Aulosteges, Dictyoclostus, Marginifera, Leptodus, Neospirifer, Spiriferella, and Hoskingia), the polyzoans (Fistulipora, Hexagonella, Stenopora, and Dyscritella), many of which are specifically identical with Timor and Salt Range forms, and the bradyodont shark Helicoprion. In addition there are strikingly abundant indigenous forms such as the crinoid Calceolispongia. This influence is absent from eastern Australia which was dominated by an indigenous fauna. The solitary coral Euryphyllum, the brachiopods Ingelarella, Notosprifier, Grantonia, Trigonotreta, Strophalosia, and Terrakea are profuse, as also are the bivalves Etheripecten, Deltopecten, Stutchburia, Eurydesma, and Glyptoleda, the gastropods Platyteichum and Warthia, and the polyzoans Fenestella, and Stenopora. Ammonoids are represented by only a handful of specimens, and Calceolispongia is known from rare occurrences in Tasmania, New South Wales, and Queensland. A large number of smaller forams including Calcitornella, Hyperammina, Ammodiscus, Nodosaria, and Frondicularia is found in both east and west (Crespin, 1958). And, finally, insects are common at certain horizons in the Newcastle Coal Measures. A few species of these show similarity to Lower and Upper Permian forms from Russia, and to Lower Permian species from Kansas, but in general there is little evidence of a close relationship with Permian faunas elsewhere in the world.

There appears to have been no marked floral differentiation within the continent, the Glossopteris–Gangamopteris flora and the Striatites Microflora being ubiquitous (Balme, 1960b).

In the New Zealand Permian biota, the most important element for local correlation and general identification of the system is the bivalve Atomodesma and its various species, several as yet undescribed. Their shells occur, most commonly as comminuted fragments, from the Lower Permian (?Upper Carboniferous) Longwood Complex to the uppermost Permian Stephens Formation and its correlatives (Waterhouse, 1958a).

There is a considerable degree of similarity between the faunal successions of the Lower Permian in eastern Australia and New Zealand. Of particular interest is the occurrence in common of such peculiarly Australasian genera as the brachiopods Fletcherithyris and Terrakea; the gastropods Platyteichum and Keeneia; and the bivalves Etheripecten and Glyptoleda, along with a host of other genera of wider distribution. The New Zealand sequence, on the other hand, includes fusulinids and compound corals, but lacks such characteristic Australian genera as the bivalve Eurydesma, the brachiopod Trigonotreta, and the crinoid Calceolispongia, a feature which suggests that the New Zealand waters were somewhat warmer than those of eastern Australia. Moreover, a link

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