STEVENSON— INTERRELATIONS OF FOSSIL FUELS. 123 



from Fergus and north from Meagher, was examined by Weed and 

 afterward by Fisher.^— The Kootenai, 400 to 500 feet, according 

 to Fisher but about 750 according to Weed, was formerly regarded 

 as Dakota ; but J. S. Newberry in 1887, cited by Weed, determined 

 that it is Kootenai. The Dakota was not recognized. The indi- 

 vidual deposits are inconstant, sandstones and shales alike being 

 lenses. The coal horizon is about 60 feet from the base and the 

 seams are clearly lenses. Weed has described the coals in detail. 

 The great coal seam, with extreme thickness of 12 feet in Sand 

 Coulee district, splits toward the west into two beds, which, where 

 last seen, were separated by 25 feet of shale. The seams are usually 

 divided and the benches often differ in quality of the coal, coking 

 and non-coking being found within the same bed. Picked samples 

 from one bed had barely 10 per cent, of ash, but one from the 

 middle part of the bed had 27 per cent. Official samples, collected 

 by Fisher, give from 16 to 23 per cent, of ash. As in sampling of 

 the coal, nothing is taken which ought tO' be removed in mining, it is 

 certain that this fuel, as it reaches the consumer, must be decidedly 

 inferior in quality. 



Stebinger^-^ gives about 2,000 feet as the thickness of Kootenai 

 in the Teton coal field, which, like the Great Falls field, is near the 

 western boundary of Cretaceous deposition in Montana. The for- 

 mation is practically without coal, there being only some black shale 

 with 6 or 8 inches of coal. 



The Kootenai shows great variation in thickness within Alberta. 

 Dowling,^-* summarizing observations made by himself and others 

 in various parts of the province, states that the maximum deposition 

 was near the axis of the Rocky Mountains, where the base is a 

 great bed of sandstone, succeeded by sandstones and shales with 

 many seams of coal. In the Elk River escarpment, it is 3,600 feet, 

 but at Blairmore, toward the east, it is but 750; northward, near 

 Banff, it is 3,900 feet, but in Moose Mountain, east from the main 

 range, it is only 375 feet. Farther east, the formation is unim- 



1-- W. H. Weed, Bull. Geol. Soc. Amcr., Vol. 3, 1892, pp. 302, 303, 313- 

 321 ; C. A. Fisher, Bull. 356, 1909, pp. 22, 50, 51, 52, yj, 78. 

 1-2 E. Stebinger, Bull. 621-K, 1916, p. 124. 

 !-■* D. B. Dowling, Geol. Survey Memoir, 53, 1914, p. 2J. 



