Tyson Formation

Tyson Formation - Feldspathic quartz-mica schist containing biotite, chlorite, and carbonate; many beds contain pebbles of quartz and feldspar; cobble or boulder conglomerate commonly at base; thin beds of quartzite, carbonaceous phyllite, and schistose dolomite in upper part, overlain at top by massive buff dolomite as much as 30 ft thick. (Southern and Central Vermont). The Tyson Formation contains grits and conglomerates at its base that unconformably overlie basement. The conglomerates and grits are as much as 150 m thick and contain lenses of dolomitic quartzite and feldspathic grit. Unit also contains black carbonaceous phyllite and interbedded dolostone as much as 100 m thick, followed by beige to tan weathering beds of dolostone that increase in abundance toward the top of the unit and pass into punky weathering dolomitic and feldspathic quartzite at the top. From a point near the southwest corner of the Andover quad, the rocks of the Tyson Formation are laterally replaced by albitic schists and granofels of the Hoosac Formation to the south. Therefore, Tyson laterally replaces the Hoosac from south to north along the eastern margin of the Green Mountain massif. The Tyson Formation is of Late Proterozoic(?) and Early Cambrian age (Ratcliffe, 1994).