RESULTS 



Sediment Classification 



From the field observations and average properties (Table 4), the following 

 generalizations can be made about the sediments in the study area (Figure 4) : 



1. The area is one of active circulation and fairly irregular bottom 

 topography. Little recently derived terrestrial material remains in the area 

 primarily because of strong currents and low sources (Ehlmann, 1968) . 



2. The sediment is composed predominantly of reworked reef material, 

 shells and locally derived reworked sand and silt. The prevalent mineralogy is 

 aragonite and calcite with smaller amounts of quartz and plagioclase (x-ray 

 diffraction) . 



3. Sorting is poor to unsorted at all sites with equal amounts of sand 

 and silt and a lesser amount of clay. The sediment is almost uniformly sandy 

 mud to sandy silt (Folk, 1964) . 



4. The relative increase of Vc, qf , Y t (and therefore Z) , and decrease of 

 W.C. and 6 with depth in the sediment (Lewis, 1971) is probably a result of 



in situ cementation due to an excess of carbonates and warm temperatures and 



VII-25 



