Etched section of hand sample of Columbus Limestone from Kelleys Island
Type
Sedimentary
Unit of
Onondaga Group
Sub-units
Bellepoint, Marblehead, Tioga Ash Bed, Venice, Delhi, Klondike, East Liberty
Underlies
Bass Islands Formation, Delaware Formation, and Ohio Shale
Overlies
Lucas Formation
Thickness
0 to 105 feet[1]
Lithology
Primary
Limestone
Other
Sandstone
Location
Region
Cincinnati Arch of North America
Extent
Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Ontario
Type section
Named for
Columbus, Ohio
Named by
Mathur, 1859
Side view of a stromatoporoid in the Columbus Limestone at Kelleys Island.
The Columbus Limestone is a mapped bedrock unit consisting primarily of fossiliferous limestone. It occurs in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia in the United States, and in Ontario, Canada.
Description
Depositional environment
The depositional environment was most likely shallow marine.
Stratigraphy
The Columbus conformably overlies the Lucas Dolomite in northeastern Ohio, and unconformably overlies other dolomite elsewhere. It unconformably underlies the Ohio Shale in northwestern Ohio and the Delaware Limestone in eastern Ohio.[2]
Its members include: Bellepoint, Marblehead, Tioga Ash Bed, Venice, Delhi, Klondike, and East Liberty.
Due to their mid-continent depositional environment, the fossils are almost free of deformation caused by tectonic activity common in the Appalachian Mountains.
Relative age dating of the Columbus Limestone places it in the Early to Middle Devonian period.
Economic Uses
The Columbus has been mined for aggregate. Its Calcium carbonate content is 90% or higher.[9]
References
^Columbus Limestone, Mineral Resources On-Line Spatial Data, United States Geological Survey https://mrdata.usgs.gov/geology/state/sgmc-unit.php?unit=OHDc%3B0
^Ohio Division of Geological Survey, 1990 (rev. 2000, 2004), Generalized Column of Bedrock Units in Ohio; Ohio Department of Natural Resources, Division of Geological Survey, 1p. http://www.dnr.state.oh.us/Portals/10/pdf/stratcol.pdf Archived 2010-02-03 at the Wayback Machine
^Ehlers, G. M., and Stumm, E. C., 1951, Middle Devonian Columbus limestone near Ingersoll, Ontario, Canada, AAPG Bulletin; v. 35; no. 8; p. 1879-1888. August.
^ abFeldman, R.M.; Hackathorn (1996). Fossils of Ohio. Ohio Division of Geological Survey Bulletin 70. pp. 577 [1].
^ abcde"Biostratigraphic Analysis of Columbus Limestone". 2012-03-03. Archived from the original on 2012-03-03. Retrieved 2024-03-23.
^ abWells, J.W., 1944, Middle Devonian bone beds of Ohio: Geological Society of America Bulletin, v. 55, no. 3, p. 273-302.
^Sweet, W. C., and Miller, A. K., 1956, Goniatites from the Middle Devonian Columbus Limestone of Ohio, Journal of Paleontology, vol. 30, No. 4, p 811-817. July.
^Flower, Rousseau H. (1945). "Classification of Devonian Nautiloids". The American Midland Naturalist. 33 (3): 675–724. doi:10.2307/2421185. ISSN 0003-0031. JSTOR 2421185.
^GeoFacts No. 25, Ohio Department of Natural Resources, Division of Geological Survey "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-06-06. Retrieved 2010-01-31.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)