Also known as UNM locality V-602

Where: Bernalillo County, New Mexico (35.2° N, 107.0° W: paleocoordinates 40.1° N, 75.1° W)

• coordinate stated in text

• small collection-level geographic resolution

When: Hosta Member (Point Lookout Formation), Early/Lower Santonian to Early/Lower Santonian (85.8 - 83.5 Ma)

• ca. 6.5 m below local top of the Hosta Tongue. Bone bed in a ~0.5 cm-thick interval. The age of the Hosta Tongue of the Point Lookout Sandstone is well constrained as Santonian by stratigraphically-bracketing ammonoid assemblages (e.g., Molenaar, 1983). However, few ammonoid data have been published from the Hosta Tongue in New Mexico to determine a more precise age within the Santonian. Varriale (2003) reported Clioscaphites saxitonianus (McLearn) and Cladoceramus undulatoplicatus (Roemer) from the Hosta-Dalton sandstones in the Galisteo region in Santa Fe County. These two taxa indicate an early Santonian age. Molenaar (1983) noted the occurrence of Texanites texanus (Roemer) in the Hosta Tongue in the southern San Juan Basin and considered it middle Santonian because it indicates the zone of Clioscaphites vermiformis (Meek and Hayden). Therefore, we consider the Hosta Tongue of the Point Lookout Sandstone at NMMNH locality 297 to be early to middle Santonian in age.

• bed-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: paralic; poorly lithified sandstone

Size classes: macrofossils, mesofossils

Collected by Pence; reposited in the NMMNH

Collection methods: bulk, surface (float), surface (in situ), sieve,

Primary reference: S. G. Lucas, A. P. Hunt, and R. Pence. 1988. Some Late Cretaceous reptiles from New Mexico. In D. L. Wolberg (ed.), Contributions to Late Cretaceous paleontology and stratigraphy of New Mexico. Part III. New Mexico Bureau of Mines & Mineral Resources Bulletin 122:49-60 [M. Carrano/K. Maguire/M. Carrano]more details

Purpose of describing collection: general faunal/floral analysis

PaleoDB collection 52037: authorized by Matthew Carrano, entered by Kaitlin Maguire on 13.07.2005, edited by Matthew Clapham and Matthew Carrano

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)