GEOL 120 2ND EXAM REVIEWER

DEPOSITIONAL ENVIRONMENTS pt.1

(RAGANIT, 2019)

ALLUVIAL FAN

❖ Fan-shaped accumulation of sediment in areas adjacent to high relief and tectonically active, usually
along fault scarps
❖ Form upon exit of drainage basin from mountain front
❖ Mix of sediment gravity flow (deposit is called gravites) and fluid flow depositional processes
❖ Sensitive to tectonic (uplift) and climactic (amount of rainfall) controls and well as the lithology of the
area (muddy – debris flows; sand or gravel, resistate rocks – sheetflood or stream-channel)
❖ Coarse-grained at mouth, fine-grained along the edges (Decreasing grain size downslope)
❖ Usually in desert environments, but can also be in humid environments
❖ Triangular in map view; wedge-shaped in cross section
➢ Lobe-switching processes produce cone
❖ Types of alluvial fans [P]

Characteristics of beds deposited:

 Cgl are normally matrix-supported
 Poor sorting of cgl
 Clasts may show crude alignment
parallel to flow but may also be
randomly oriented with structureless
beds
 Clay to boulder sized clasts
 Tens of centimeters to meters thick
beds
➢
■ Mixture of large amount of detritus and small quantity of water flows
■ Laminar flow (high density and high viscosity)

Characteristics of sheetflood deposits:

 Sheet geometry of thick beds
 Well-stratified beds with distinct
couplets of coarse and finer gravel
 Imbrication is common
 Up-stream cross-stratification formed
by antidunes may be preserved
 Poorly sorted
 No silt or clay-sized material
 Normal grading due to waning flow
➢
■ Happens when the catchment area of an alluvial fan is inundated with water
■ Pebbles, cobbles, and boulders are carried as bedload; finer sediments in suspension
■ Deposition couplets – most common style of bedding; coarse gravel overlain by finer gravel
and sand from suspension
 Characteristics of beds:
 Sheet geometry of thick beds
 Sharp base
 Clast-supported cgl fining up to
sandstone
 Structures of those of a braided river
o Imbrication
o Cross-stratification of gravels
o Cross-bedded sandstone

➢
■River emerges from feeder canyon to flow on alluvial plain
■When the channel becomes “choked” with sediment, the channel migrates over the fan
surface, either by gradual lateral migration or avulsion (abandonment of river channel)
■ Shape of fan is similar to that of a sheetflood, but is not restricted
➢ Mixtures of these processes can occur on a single fan

NAME Primary Facies Secondary Facies

Debris-
Debris flow paracgl Channelized orthocgl
dominated

Water- Channelized orthocgl

Sheet flood orthocgl
dominated Debris flow paracgl

 Alluvial fan architecture (from proximal to distal)

 Grain size: DECREASES
 Sorting: INCREASES
 Cgl bed thickness: DECREASES
 Structures:
 Proximal: MASSIVE, inverse graded bedding
 Midfan: LARGE SCALE, cross bedding
 Distal: SMALL SCALE, parallel and cross bedding
 Mudstone interbeds
 Proximal: rare
 Midfan: some
 Distal: common
 Debris flow deposits
 Proximal: developed
 Midfan: rare
 Distal: absent
 Channel morphology
 Proximal: few large and deep channels
 Midfan: many braided channels
 Distal: many narrow and shallow channels
 Sieve deposits – usually form in the proximal or upper middle fan; lobes of boulders, cobbles,
and sand that lack fine-grained material
 Typical sequence: coarsening-upward sequences of cross-bedded sandstone, channel-lag
conglomerates, and unsorted debris-flow deposits; sometimes a fining-upward sequence forms
during the decay of the fan
LACUSTRINE

❖ Temporary features forming 1% of the Earth’s land surface

❖ Large inland depressions that allow the accumulation of water
❖ Can be formed due to
➢ Fluvial activity (oxbow, levee, delta & barrier island entrapment)
➢ Volcanic activity
■ Caldera volcano collapse
■ Explosive eruptions that remove large quantities of material
➢ Erosional activity
■ Landslide
■ Scouring of glaciers
■ Damming (ice, volcanic ash or lava)
➢ Tectonic activity
■ Basins formed due to rifts
■ Basins formed due to strike-slip within the continental crust
■ Intracontinental sag basins
❖ Water supply from streams, rainfall, and groundwater
➢ Hydrologically-open – if water level is filled at spill point and there is a balance of water supply in
and out of the basin
➢ Hydrologically-closed – if rate of evaporation exceeds rate of water supply and there is no outflow
of water from lake
❖ Freshwater lakes
➢ Can be hydrologically-open or closed
➢ Low salinity waters (low supply of dissolved ions)
➢ Majority of modern lakes today
➢ Occur from equator to polar regions
➢ Lake water stratification
■ Waves are formed by wind and these waves only affect the upper part of the lake and so,
there is a contrast in density, temperature, and chemistry between the upper and lower part
of the lake.
■ Epilimnion – upper warmer and less dense part of lake; oxygenated
■ Hypolimnion – lower colder and denser part of lake; anaerobic
● Organic matter will not be subject to decomposition; forms beds that may contain
sapropelic coal and can be a source rock for oil and gas
● Inhospitable for life
■ Thermocline – separates the two parts
➢ Main transport mechanisms (away from the margins; away from sediment input from rivers)
■ Sediment plumes
■ Turbidity currents
➢ Facies distribution in a freshwater lake with dominantly clastic deposition

■ Sedimentary signal like that of a foreshortened marine setting

■ Narrow shores with beaches and deltas
■ Finer sediments and turbidites fill the lake center
➢ Sedimentary log of clastic deposits in a freshwater lake

Shallow lake deposits:

Beach and/or lake delta sandstones

Shallow lake deposits:

Muds and wave rippled sands

Deeper lake deposits:

Laminated dark shales and thin,
turbiditic sands and silts
 ➢ Facies distribution in a carbonate freshwater lake

■ Oncoids (form in shallow, gently waved-agitated zones; irregularly shaped, concentrically

layered bodies of calcium carbonate formed around a nucleus)
■ Gastropods, bivalves, ostracods, arthropods, fishes, diatoms are fossils that can be found
in lacustrine deposits
➢ Varves – alternating organic-rich deposits (winter) and paler, clastic sediment (summer or spring)
❖ Saline lakes
➢ Hydrologically-closed
➢ Dissolved ions are concentrated by evaporation; from weathered bedrock
■ Na, Ca, Mg cations and CO3, Cl, and SO4 anions
➢ Can either have brackish, saline, or hypersaline waters
❖ Ephemeral lakes
➢ Temporary (months or years) bodies of water formed by rainstorms in catchment areas
➢ Usually in semi-arid to arid climatic settings with highly irregular rainfall with long periods of dry
conditions
➢ Periodically dry out
➢ Due to repeated flooding and evaporation, depositional couplets of mud overlain by a later of s
❖ Lakes vs. Shallow marine deposits
➢ Lake basins are smaller than epicontinental seas, so lacustrine deposits tend to be much less
laterally continuous than marine shales and limestones.
➢ Along the shore of a lake, there is a rapid change in facies, interfingering with a narrow belt of
fluvial deposits and even alluvial fans, which are less likely to occur along a marine coastline
➢ Typically, lakes form a series of these facies belt arranged concentrically from the mudstones or
marls in the center, to the coarsest sandstone towards the margins.
➢ Because most lakes fill with sediment over time, they tend to show a sequence that is shallowing
and coarsening upward.
❖ Diagnostic features
➢ Tectonic setting: usually found in fault grabens or down-warped basins with internal drainage or
limited outflow; associated with non-marine environments
➢ Geometry: Circular or elongate in plan view and lenticular in cross-section.
➢ Typical sequence: coarsening upwards from laminated shales, marls, and limestones to rippled
and cross bedded sandstones and possibly conglomerates; cyclic alternation of laminae
➢ Sedimentology: mudstone and limestones (freshwater) and carbonates and evaporites (saline)
➢ Fossils: non-marine organisms
EOLIAN

❖ Regions with mean annual precipitation of 10 inches or less; arid regions

❖ Distribution
➢ Mostly at areas with descending cold (dry) air belts at 30 degrees North and South latitude
➢ Rain shadow of mountains
➢ Great distance from oceans
➢ Tropical coasts beside ocean currents
➢ Polar deserts
❖ Wind is primary erosional agent
➢ Wind action is strong because of low humidity, great temperature ranges, and lack of vegetation
(obstructions)
➢ Effective because sediments are dry
➢ Ventrifact – rock that has been “sand-blasted”
➢ Yardang – large scale (meters to miles) wind-sculpted streamlined ridge; forms when strong one
direction winds cut away through the material enough to form an upturned boat’s bottom
➢ Deflation – eroding away of finer materials on the surface by the wind;
forms a desert pavement (coarse cobble and sediment)
■ Also forms blowouts – trough-shaped hollows
formed by wind erosion on a dune
➢ Dust storms – wind-blown dust that accumulates in
the deep ocean floor; 6 x 1013 g/year; sediment
contributor for pelagic oceans
➢ Loess – blanket of deposition of buff-colored calcareous
silt that is homogenous, nonstratified, weakly coherent,
porous, and friable; wind-blown dust deposits of
Pleistocene
➢ Sand dunes
■ Asymmetrical mounds with a gentle slope (stoss) on the upwind direction and a steep
slope on the downwind direction (slip face or lee)

■ Factors affecting formation

● Steady supply of sand
● Steady wind
● An obstacle for the wind (such as rocks, vegetation, fences, etc.)
■ Migrate by erosion or saltation (by wind) on gentle sloping and deposition on slip face;
results in cross-beds
 ❖ Large scale cross beds are the most character feature of eolion dunes.
❖ Playa lakes – Ephemeral standing bodies of water that form during rare periods of rainfail; lake
beds consist mostly of salts (evaporites)
❖ Inselbergs – steep sided hills that rise abouve surrounding flat plains; form when rock is more
resistant than surround plain and so it is less eroded
❖ Characteristics of aeolian deposits
➢ lithologies – sand and silt only
➢ mineralogy – mainly quartz, with rare examples ofcarbonate or other grains
➢ texture – well- to very well-sorted silt to medium sand
➢ fossils – rare in desert dune deposits, occasionalvertebrate bones
➢ bed geometry – sheets or lenses of sand
➢ sedimentary structures – large-scale dune crossbedding and parallel stratification in sands
➢ palaeocurrents – dune orientations reconstructed from cross-bedding indicate wind direction
➢ colour – yellow to red due to iron hydroxides and oxides
➢ facies associations – occur with alluvial fans, ephemeral river and lake facies in deserts, also with
beach deposits or glacial outwash facies
❖ Diagnostic features
➢ Tectonic setting: inland basins; at latitudes between 10 and 30 degrees; behind mountains in rain
shadows
➢ Geometry: thick tabular bodies over a wide area
➢ Typical sequence: random

FLUVIAL

❖ Dominant conduit from regions of sediment

production to sediment storage
❖ Unidirectional sediment dispersal
❖ Characterized by sediment load
➢ Bed load
➢ Suspended load
➢ Mixed load (the most common)
❖ Characterized by channel pattern
➢ Anastomosing River System
➢ Braided River System
➢ Meandering River System
❖ Braided River System
➢ Flowing body of water with insufficient discharge to carry its sediment load (oversupplied with
sediments) and/or has easily erodible banks
➢ Usually found in the upper reaches of a fluvial system
➢ Steep gradients, abundant coarser sediments, and rapid discharge fluctuations
■ All contribute to rapid shifting of channels over easily eroded banks
➢ Wide and shallow during slack-water stages
➢ Main morphological features of a braided river

➢ Depositional architecture of a braided river

 ➢ Sedimentary log of braided river deposits

➢ Diagnostic features of braided fluvial system

■ Tectonic setting: near upland source; associated with rapid down-dropping basins
■ Geometry: elongate, straight, and lenticular or sheet-like sand bodies that grade laterally
into finer deposits of alluvial plain
■ Typical sequence: fining upward sequence of channel-lag gravels, abundant sandy trough
cross beds filling channels and occasional tabular cross beds migrating across channels,
topped by vertically accreted, laminated sand and mud with burrows and root casts
■ Sedimentology: gravel common in longitudinal bars; sand dominant in throughout; little silt
and mud
■ Structures: abundant tabular and trough cross stratification
■ Fossils: non-fossiliferous except for root casts and burrows
❖ Meandering River System
➢ In the lower reaches of a fluvial system where relatively straight braided rivers become fully
sinuous rivers
➢ More energy in cutting sideways, leading to a sinuous form (compared to braided river systems
that expend energy cutting forward)
➢ Transport and deposit a mixture of suspended and bed load (mixed load)
➢ Has point bars on the inside bends of a meandering river
➢ Main morphological features of a meandering river
➢ Depositional architecture of a meandering river

■ Deposits of meander bend

● Coarser material at the base
● Fining upward the inner bank
● Sedimentary structures such as cross beddings and cross laminations due to formation
of dunes and ripples in this area

➢ Sedimentary log of a meandering river

 ➢ Diagnostic features of a meandering river
■ Tectonic setting: often in lower parts of the craton; associated with floodplain muds and lake
deposits; grade downstream into the deltaic system
■ Geometry: long ribbon-like bodies of sands (shoestring sands)
■ Typical sequence: final upward from a basal channel lag gravel to sandy point bar
sequence; larger fine-grained component of laminated muds formed in the oxbow lakes,
natural levees, crevasse splays and flood plain
■ Sedimentology: gravel to mud; have plane beds, trough cross beds, and ripple cross-
lamination
● Floodplain muds are finely laminated and vertically accreted and may show climbing
ripple drift, mud cracks, raindrop impressions, soil horizons, organic matter and
fossils.
■ Fossils: organic matter and fossil wood

DELTA

❖ Triangular or fan-shaped flat alluvial tract of land at the mouth of a river

❖ Crossed by many tributaries and results from the accumulation of sediment supplied by the river
❖ Mostly partly subaerial and partly below water
❖ Progradation – the building out of sediment bodies into the lake or sea; shallowing up pattern
❖ Controls on delta environments and facies

❖ Classification of deltas (based on grain size and therefore, sediment supply mechanisms)
 ➢ The form of the delta is related to the relative importance of three main processes
■ The current in the river
■ The action of the waves
■ The action of the tides
❖ Fan delta – body of sediment that forms when a debris-flow or sheetflood-dominated alluvial fan
built out into a lake or a sea
❖ Divided into two sub-environments

➢ Delta top – part of alluvial/fluvial system

■ Distributary channels
■ Delta plain – meandering flood plains, swamps and beach complex
■ Interdistributary bays – elongate lobes of sediment that are sheltered from strong waves
and currents; regions of low-energy sedimentation between lobes
➢ Delta front
■ Subaquaeous mouth bar – site of deposition of bedload material where coarser sediments
are deposited closer to the mouth
■ Delta slope – steep incline away from the delta top
■ Sediment plume – river-borne suspended load that enters the relatively still water of the
lake or sea
■ Prodelta – furthest part of the delta front; grades into open shelf
❖ River-dominated delta

➢ Effect of tides and waves are minor

➢ Channel instability due to the very low gradient on the delta plain
➢ Delta lobe successions

➢ Lobe-shaped due to the unique hydrodynamic interaction between river water and seawater
wherein there is a sharp contrast in water density; results in a “plane jet” or sediment that
spreads out and forms a layer over sea water

■ Sand carried in the stream is deposited along the sides of the jet in subaqueous levee;
sediment is dropped in distributary mouth bars; finest sediments settle along prodelta slope
■ Cross-section of delta lobe
❖ Wave-dominated delta

➢ Waves driven by strong winds; have the capacity to rework and redistribute any sediment
deposited in shallow water
➢ Progradation of channel is limited because subaqueous levees do not form and bedload is
susceptible to wave action immediately
➢ Better sorted than river-dominated deltas due to wave action
➢ Shore-parallel sand ridges form as mouth bars build up and out due to a net supply of bedload by
the river
➢ Deposits are well-developed and and occur as elongate coarse sediment bodies perpendicular to
river delta

❖ Tide-dominated delta

➢ Have both suspended and bedload

➢ Delta-top channels are subject to tidal influence; with reversal of flow or stagnation of water
■ Cross-stratification and mud drapes indicate paleocurrent
 ➢ Tidal currents reword sediments into elongate bars perpendicular to the shoreline
➢ Deposits distinguishable from river- and wave-dominated deltas due to presence of sedimentary
structures and facies associations that indicate that tidal processes were active (reversals of
paleoflow, mud drapes, etc.)
➢ Subaqueous mouth bars elongate and parallel to the river channel
➢ Coarsening-up strata

❖ Gilbert type delta

➢ Combination of coarse sediment supply and steep basin margin

➢ Represent sedimentary response to strong differential uplift involving basin margins and the
basin itself
■ Resulting in mud-poor coarse-grained foresets
➢ Have a characteristic three part structure
■ Topset (delta top) – subaerial to shallow marine; gravel deposited by braided rivers and
may be reworked by waves at shoreline
■ Foreset (delta front) – beds at steep angle (around 30 degrees); deposition of poorly sorted
gravel by debris flows and well-sorted gravel by grainflow (avalanche); unstable and
therefore, slumping usually occurs
■ Bottomset – horizontal beds of mud, sand, and some gravel that are products of turbidites
and suspension deposition in prodelta setting
➢ Sedimentary log of a Gilbert-type coarse-grained delta
❖ Characteristic features of deltaic deposits

❖ Diagnostic features of deltaic systems

➢ Tectonic setting: occur along coastal plains of passive margins or down-warping cratonic basins;
associated with meandering fluvial deposits and shallow marine shelf deposits
➢ Geometry: triangular in plan view and wedge-shaped in cross section
➢ Typical sequence: coarsening-upward sequence of prodelta muds and clays with interfingering
sads and muds and coals
➢ Sedimentology: coarse sand to fine mud; wide variety of sedimentary structures