SILURIAN FORMATIONS OF ONTARIO. ZOO 



paratively barren of gas or oil. Of its productive properties, however, 

 more will be said later. In eastern Ontario it covers a large area, but 

 west of Toronto and Collingwood the series is overlaid by the Utica an 1 

 newer formations, with the exception of a small area in the vicinity of 

 Collingwood, where it is seen to consist of bluish limestone, having a 

 slight dip to the southwest. In the few wells wherein it has been reached 

 the character of the rocks is apparently unchanged, though its thickness 

 varies considerably. For instance, at Whitby, east of Toronto, it has a 

 thickness of 600 feet; at Toronto, 585 feet; Swansea, 602 feet; Colling- 

 wood, 553 feet, and Saint Catharines, 667 feet, in all of which places the 

 formation was entirely traversed, the drillings, with the exception of the 

 well at Saint Catharines, ceasing on the striking of the Archean rocks 

 immediately beneath. In the case of the boring at Saint Catharines the 

 drill, penetrated 27 feet of white quartzose sandstone, which may be Pa- 

 leozoic or belong to the arkose beds. 



Geologic Horizons in Ontario yielding Gas and Oil. 

 oil wells in the corniferous limestone. 



Age and Depth. — Of the occurrence of petroleum in Ontario but little 

 can be said. In Lambton county, where it has been produced for 30 

 years, it is found in the Corniferous limestone at a depth of about 475 

 feet, the record of a well bored near the Imperial refinery, Petroleaj 

 being as follows : 



T , „, , Thickness in 



Formation. Strata. ^ ge j 



Surface deposits 104 



f Limestone 40 



| Shale 130 



Hamilton -J Limestone 15 



| Shale 4:5 



I Limestone 68 



„ . c i Limestone, soft 40 



Corniferous 



1 Limesti me, gray, oil rock zo 



Depth 465 



Annual Output of Oil. — Some 3,000 wells are now producing and afford 

 about 800,000 barrels per annum, making the average daily production 

 about two-thirds of a barrel per well. The oil is dark-colored and of 

 from 31° to 35° Baume in gravity; nor is it an oil that can be easily 

 refined, on account of the considerable proportion of sulphur it contains 

 in a form as yet undetermined. 



