GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF CANADA 



THE VERTEBRATA OF THE OLIGOOENE OF THE CYPRESS HILLS, 



SASKATCHEWAK 



By Lawrence M. Lambe. 



INTRODUCTION. 



The discovery in 1883 by Mr. R. G. McConnell of this Survey, of Tertiary beds in the 

 Cypress hills, of later age than any that had been found in the ^orth West, was announced in 

 Dr. A. R. C. Selwyn's Summary Report of the operations for that year.^ These beds capping 

 the Cypress hills were assigned to the age of the Miocene by Mr. McConnell in his '-Report on 

 the Cypress hills. Wood mountain and adjacent country,"^* published in 1886. After 

 giving a general statement of the physical features of the country, Mr. McConnell in his report, 

 devotes himself (1) to a description of the geology in different sections of the district in turn, 

 and (2) to an account of the deposits of the formations observed of the Cretaceous, Tertiary, 

 and Quaternary periods. In the Cypress hills and vicinity the rocks seen were referred to the 

 Miocene, Laramie and Fox-hill-Pierre formations, of which the last three are conformable, 

 but the first lies unconformably on the Laramie, in places overlapping it and resting on the 

 Fox-hill. The Miocene beds " cap all the more elevated parts of tlie range of uplands extend- 

 ing in a direction a little north of east, from the west end of the Cypress hills to the east end 

 of Swift-current Creek plateau ; a distance of 140 miles. They have an average width of 

 fifteen miles, and cover altogether an area of nearly 1,400 square miles." 



The Cypress hills are divided into two unequal parts — of which the eastern one is much 

 the larger — by the " Gap," a valley of erosion, running in a north and south direction. The 

 Miocene deposits are best developed at the eastern end of the hills, where they attain a thick- 

 ness of fully 500 feet, and consist of conglomerate, usually formed of quartzite pebbles, 

 cemented together by carbonate of lime, associated with beds of sandstone, sands, clays, and 

 marls. West' of the " Gap" the formation is represented only by a sheet of hard conglomerate, 

 about 50 feet thick. 



To quote from Mr. McConnell's report: "the conglomerate which forms such a marked 

 feature of the Miocene deposits of the Cypress hills, is usually composed of quartzite pebbles 

 cemented together by carbonate of lime, but also appears under a number of other forms. In 

 some places the pebbles lie loosely in a matrix of coarse yellowish sand, and in others they are 



* Geol. and Nat. Hist. Survey of Canada, Report of Progress, 1882-83-84 ; Summary Report of the operations of the geological 

 corps to 31st Dec, 1883 (published in Jan., 1884), p. 4. 



** Geol. and Nat. Hist. Survey of Canada, Annual Report (new series), vol. 1, 1885, (1880), part C. 



