PERMIAN. 489 



ledges of gypsum known in the red beds are found in this area. Thus 5 miles northwest of 

 Weatherford a ledge 60 feet thick was measured; in the vicinity of Cloud Chief, beds 50 feet 

 thick are not uncommon; and in a well near Seger, Washita County, a ledge 115 feet thick is 

 reported. But these beds are not constant, thickening rapidly or disappearing without apparent 

 regularity. Along a single bluff one may see the beds change from gypsum to sandstone within 

 a distance of a few rods, and a quarter of a mile farther the sandstone again merges into gypsum. 

 So variable is the stratification of all the rocks of the Greer formation in this region that no 

 attempt is made to divide it into members. A section would usually not answer for a point 

 half a mile away. 



Above the Greer are 300 feet or more of soft red sandstones and arenaceous clays and 

 shales, to which the name Quartermaster has been apphed. So far as known this is the highest 

 formation of the red beds in Oklahoma. 



In the lower part of the formation the rocks are chiefly shales, typically red but some- 

 times containing greenish bands and layers. The shales become more arenaceous above and 

 in places form a strong consolidated sandstone, which is rather thia bedded and prone to break 

 into small rectangular blocks and weather queerly into long and narrow buttresses or rounded, 

 conical, or nipple-shaped mounds from 10 to 50 feet or more high. These mounds may be 

 solitary, but in some areas hundreds of them occur in a single quarter section. The sandstone 

 is further characterized by the marked and very peculiar dip of the rocks in certain directions. 

 The strata often dip at angles of from 20° to 40° to all points of the compass, even in a small 

 area. These dips often produce escarpments that have the appearance of those formed by 

 regularly bedded dipping strata. The most plausible explanation of this phenomenon is that 

 the erratic dipping is caused by the undermining of deep-seated rocks, probably some of the 

 various gypsum members of the Greer. 



Regarding the age of the red beds of Kansas and Oklahoma, Gould ^^^^ makes 

 the following statement : 



The scarcity of fossils in the Kansas-Oklahoma red beds has been a matter of comment 

 ever since these rocks have been studied. In Kansas, particularly. Hay, Cragin, Prosser, 

 Beede, Williston, and others have at various times searched carefully over the counties in 

 which these rocks are exposed, but without avaU. So far as known not a single fossil has ever 

 been found in the Kansas red beds. 



In Oklahoma, fortunately, the results have been more satisfactory. Not that the fossUs 

 are abundant, for they are in fact very rare, yet enough forms have been found at various 

 horizons to assist the geologist in the classification of the rocks. Four years ago the geologic 

 age of the red beds was not certainly known, for at that time fossils had been found in but one 

 locality, and these for the purpose of correlation were far from satisfactory. Of the five locali- 

 ties west of the provisional base of the Permian from which fossils have been obtained in Okla- 

 homa, two only have yielded invertebrates, in two other localities vertebrates alone have been 

 found, and from the fifth locality vertebrates, invertebrates, and plants have been secured. 

 A brief description of these localities and the fossUs obtained from each will be given. 



On the farm of W. T. McCann, 5 miles southeast of Nardin, Kay County, a number of 

 fossils were found in a ledge of sandstone which Hes just at the base of the red beds. A verte- 

 brate, identified as Eryops megacepJialus by Dr. S. W. Williston, a small crustacean, Esiheria 

 minuta, and some fossil leaves comprise the collection. [The McCann sandstone of Gould is 

 traced stratigraphically by Beede to the Wreford limestone of Kansas. See note &, p. 486.] 



Dr. E. C. Case has identified the following forms obtained near Orlando, Logan County:" 



Pisces: 



Diacranodus (Pleuracanthus) ampressus (?) Cope. 

 Sagenodus (?) sp. 



"■ Case, E. C, On some vertebrate fossils from the Permian of Oklahoma: Second Biennial Kept. Oklahoma Geo!. 

 Survey, 1902, pp. 62, 68. 



