l6 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



On the Auburn quadrangle quarry walls and field outcrops make 

 an almost continuous series of exposures of the Onondaga extending 

 from the extreme western point of Long point on Cayuga lake to the 

 northeast corner of the quadrangle. Fifteen feet of the lower beds 

 and the Oriskany contact are well shown in the old Shaliboo quarry a 

 mile south of Union Springs. The next quarry at the north between 

 the railroad and the highway exposes 40 to 50 feet of the middle and 

 upper tiers and the old Wood quarry on the hill east of the highway 

 affords a long exposure of the upper b:ds, with the contact line and 

 15 feet of Marcellus black shale and impure limestone at the top of 

 the quarry wall. 



Owing to the northward dip of the strata at this point the newer 

 quarry at the north on the east side of the road, though about 25 feet 

 lower, shows the same section and it is also shown in a large quarry on 

 the hill a mile east of Union Springs. 



The drift sheet is thin over all the region between. Union Springs 

 and Auburn where the Onondaga limestone is the surface rock and 

 outcrops are frequent. The lower beds are exposed just north of 

 Oakwood and the top layers in the hill ^ mile south of Half Acre. 

 In the vicinity of Aurelius there are broad areas Vv^here the limestone 

 is but partially covered and a ledge 50 rods long at the crest of the 

 hill on the south side of the railroad 2 miles nordi of Aurelius exposes 

 the Oriskany contact and 15 to 25 feet of the lower beds. 



It lies near the surface and is exposed in numerous places in the 

 northern parts of Auburn and thence northeastward in many quarries 

 and field outcrops in the vicinity of the New York Central Railroad 

 to the east line of the quadrangle. 



Fossils are exceedingly abundant in nearly all parts of the limestone 

 layers and occur frequently in the chert and the shaly partings. A 

 list of the species contained in this formation published in State 

 Museum Bulletin 63 for the Canandaigua-Naples, quadrangles in- 

 cludes 3 fishes, 39 crustaceans, 13 cephalopods, 3 pteropods, 38 gas- 

 tropods, 15 lamellibranchs, 48 brachiopods, 4 crinoids and 30 corals, 

 a total of 193 species. 



Marcellus black shale 



On page 146 of the report on the Geological Survey of the Third 

 District, 1842, Vanuxem describes the Marcellus shales under two di- 

 visions : the '' lower, calcareous, fossiliferous, and somewhat fissile ; 

 the upper, shaly, breaking into small irregular fragments " and further 

 says : " These shales extend east and west through the district com- 

 mencing near the Hudson and ending on Lake Erie. They are con- 



