Light-colored micaceous very fine to medium sand, cross-bedded sand, varicolored micaceous clay, and a few thin gravel beds containing quartz and chert pebbles. Beds of thinly laminated finely glauconitic very fine to fine sand, silt and dark-gray carbonaceous clay (Eoline Member) occur locally in the lower part in western AL. Locally quartz and chert gravels at the base of the formation range in size from very fine pebbles to large cobbles. In southeastern Elmore County the formation includes marine sediments consisting of glauconitic, fossiliferous, quartzose fine to medium sand and medium-gray carbonaceous silty clay. Not mapped east of the Tallapoosa River.
Interbedded dark-gray shale, siltstone, medium-gray sandstone, and coal in cyclic sequences. The members present in the Cahaba synclinorium in descending order include: the Straven Conglomerate Member, Rocky Ridge Sandstone Member, and Chestnut Sandstone Member. The members present in the Coosa synclinorium in descending order include: Straight Ridge Sandstone Member and Wolf Ridge Sandstone Member.
Massive beds of cross-bedded sand, gravelly sand, and lenticular beds of locally carbonaceous partly mottled moderate-red and pale-red-purple clay; lower part is predominantly a gravelly sand consisting chiefly of chert and quartz pebbles. Not mapped east of the Tallapooza River.
Varicolored fine to coarse quartz sand containing clay lenses and gravel in places. Gravel composed of quartz and chert pebbles and assorted metmorphic and igneous rock fragments in streams near the Piedmont. In areas of the Valley and Ridge province gravel composed of angular to subrounded chert, quartz, and quartzite pebbles. Coastal deposits include fine to medium quartz sand with shell fragments and accessory heavy minerals along Gulf beaches and fine to medium quartz sand, silt, clay, peat, mud and ooze in the Mississippi Sound, Little Lagoon, bays, lakes, streams, and estuaries.
Light-gray to dark-bluish-gray thick-bedded dolomite and interbedded light-gray limestone; includes abundant chert.
Medium to dark-bluish-gray thick-bedded siliceous dolomite; characterized by locally abundant chert with irregular cavities.
Light-gray finely to coarsely crystalline, thick-bedded siliceous dolomite; characterized by abundant stromatolitic chert. Mapped seperately only in the Birmingham anticlinorium where overlying units within the Knox Group are absent beneath the post-Knox unconformity.
Interbedded medium to dark-gray shale and light to medium-gray sandstone; locally contains dusky-red and grayish-green mudstone, argillaceous limestone, and clayey coal.
Light to dark-gray thick-bedded micritic and peloidal limestone and minor dolomite.
Athens Shale -- black graptolitic shale, locally contains interbedded dark-gray limestone. Lenoir Limestone -- dark-gray medium to thick-bedded argillaceous limestone; locally contains an interval of fenestral mudstone at the base (Mosheim Limestone Member).
Light-gray thick-bedded to massive pebbly quartzose sandstone, containing varying amounts of interbedded dark-gray shale, siltstone, and thin discontinuos coal. In both the Cahaba and Coosa synclinoria the members in descending order include: the Pine Sandstone Member and the Shades Sandstone Member. Top of unit is mapped at top of Pine Sandstone Member.
Longview Limestone - light to medium-gray thick-bedded cherty limestone and dolomite, locally sandy.
Light to medium-gray thick-bedded coarsely crystalline dolomite.
Dark-gray thick-bedded siliceous dolomite; characterized by locally abundant chert containing irregular cavities.
Variegated thinly interbedded mudstone, shale, siltstone, and sandstone; limestone and dolomite occur locally. Quartzose sandstone commonly present near top of formation.
Medium-bluish-gray fine-grained, thin-bedded argillaceous limestone and interbedded dark-gray shale in varying proportions.
Light-greenish-gray to yellowish-gray cross-bedded, well-sorted, micaceous, fine to medium quartz sand that is fossiliferous and glauconitic in part and contains beds of greenish-gray micaceous, silty clay and medium-dark-gray carbonaceous clay. Light-gray glauconitic fossiliferous sand, thin beds of sandstone, and massive accumulations of fossil oyster shells occur locally in the upper part of the formation in western AL (Tombigbee Sand Member). In eastern AL thin to thick-bedded accumulations of the fossil oyster Ostrea cretacea Morton occur throughout much of the formation.
Dark-gray shale, sideritic in part; thin beds of sandstone, limestone and chert are locally present; beds of partly bioclastic, partly argillaceous limestone are abundant in parts of Calhoun and Cherokee Counties.
Light to dark-gray finely to coarsely crystalline, medium to thick-bedded dolomite containing minor greenish-gray shale and light-bluish-gray chert. In the Columbiana area of Shelby County, the Conasauga is dominated by thin to medium-bedded, dark-gray dolomitic limestone and minor dark-gray shale. In Bibb County and southwestern Shelby County, the Conasauga consists of medium-bluish-gray fine-grained, thin-bedded argillaceous limestone and interbedded dark-gray shale. In the eastern Valley and Ridge the lower part includes dark-green to pale-olive fossiliferous shale with a few dark-gray limestone interbeds.
Parkwood Formation -- Interbedded medium to dark-gray shale and light to medium-gray sandstone; locally contains dusky-red and grayish-green mudstone, argillaceous limestone, and clayey coal. Floyd Shale -- Dark-gray shale, sideritic in part; thin beds of sandstone, limestone and chert are locally present; beds of partly bioclastic, partly argillaceous limestone are abundant in parts of Calhoun and Cherokee Counties.
Medium to dark-gray thick to thin-bedded partly argillaceous, locally fossiliferous limestone. Restricted to the western part of the Valley and Ridge province and Murphrees Valley and Wills Valley anticlines. Locally includes a thin interval of Attalla Chert Conglomerate Member at base. Attalla Chert Conglomerate - conglomerate of pebbles, cobbles, and boulders of chert and rare dolomite and quartzite in a sand-sized matrix; thin beds of gray-green or dusky-red shale common at base.
Dark-reddish-brown to olive-gray partly fossiliferous, mostly fine-grained sandstone interbedded with siltstone and shale; minor amounts of bioclastic limestone and conglomerate sandstone; includes hematitic beds and beds of ferruginous sandstone, outcrops in northeastern AL are finer grained and include more limestone.
Tuscumbia Limestone -- light to dark-gray fossiliferous and oolitic partly argillaceous and cherty limestone. Apparently present only along part of the northwest limb of the Coosa synclinorium. Fort Payne Chert -- dark-gray to light-gray limestone with abundant irregular light-gray chert nodules and beds. Commonly present below the Fort Payne is greenish-gray to grayish-red phosphatic shale (Maury Formation) which is mapped with the Tuscumbia Limestone and Fort Payne Chert undifferentiated.
Tuscumbia Limestone -- light to dark-gray fossiliferous and oolitic partly argillaceous and cherty limestone, absent locally and too thin to map seperately. Fort Payne Chert -- dark-gray to light-gray limestone with abundant irregular light-gray chert nodules and beds. Commonly present below the Fort Payne is greenish-gray to grayish-red phosphatic shale (Maury Formation) which is mapped with the Tuscumbia Limestone and Fort Payne Chert undifferentiated.
Grayish-green to black micaceous, partly carbonaceous to graphitic slate and metasiltstone containing interbedded light-gray to light-brown fine to coarse-grained metasandstone.
Interbedded dark-green phyllite, medium-gray to light-brown and black metasiltstone, dark-green feldspathic metagraywacke, and light-gray and dark-gray medium to coarse-grained arkosic quartzite and metaconglomerate; graphitic phyllite common in upper part. In Cleburne and Calhoun Counties, rocks mapped as the Lay Dam include the Abel Gap Formation of Bearce (1973) and consist of interbedded greenish-gray metasiltstone and quartzite, black phyllitic metasiltstone, medium-gray to greenish-gray arkosic quartzite, and dark-gray pyritic quartzite. In Clay Chounty the upper part of the Lay Dam includes black graphitic sericite phyllite and slate reportedly containing plant fossils (Erin Slate Member).
Light-brown to light-gray coarse-grained, feldspathic quartzite and metaconglomerate in lower part of Wash Creek Slate.