Geologic units in Newport county, Rhode Island

Narragansett Bay Group - Rhode Island Formation (Pennsylvanian) at surface, covers 45 % of this area

In northern Rhode Island, consists of gray to black, fine- to coarse-grained quartz arenite, litharenite, shale, and conglomerate, with minor beds of anthracite and meta-anthracite. In southern Rhode Island, consists of meta-sandstone, meta-conglomerate, schist, carbonaceous schist, and graphite. Plant fossils are common.

Granites of southeastern Rhode Island - granite (Late Proterozoic) at surface, covers 24 % of this area

Pink to gray, coarse-grained, equigranular rock composed of microcline, perthite, plagioclase, quartz, and accessory biotite, sphene, zircon, and opaque minerals; secondary chlorite and muscovite. Generally massive, but locally foliated and lineated. Includes some rock mapped formerly as Bulgarmarsh Granite and Metacom Granite Gneiss.

Granites of southeastern Rhode Island - porphyritic granite (Late Proterozoic) at surface, covers 12 % of this area

Gray, pink, or greenish, generally massive, coarse-grained, porphyritic (microcline phenocrysts) granite. Contains microcline, perthite, plagioclase, quartz, and accessory biotite, hornblende, apatite, sphene, and opaque minerals; secondary chlorite, epidote, and sericite. Includes some rock mapped formerly as Bulgarmarsh Granite and Newport Granite Porphyry.

Unknown (Age uncertain) at surface, covers 5 % of this area

unknown

mica schist (Late Proterozoic? or older?) at surface, covers 5 % of this area

Gray to green, fine-grained, thinly bedded schist consisting of muscovite, biotite, chlorite, and quartz. Locally contains think beds of quartzite, marble, and amphibolite. Includes rock mapped formerly as mica schist of Bristol, chlorite-biotite schist of Tiverton, and mica-chlorite schist of Sakonnet.

Narragansett Bay Group - Purgatory Conglomerate (Pennsylvanian) at surface, covers 3 % of this area

Buff to pale-gray conglomerate. Clasts consist entirely of quartzite; matrix primarily quartz, plus sparse amounts of magnetite. Cobbles and boulders are ubiquitously elongate, due to pressure-solution phenomena associated with deformation.

Conanicut Group - Fort Burnside Formation (Cambro-Ordovician) at surface, covers 2 % of this area

Buff siltstone at base grading upward into black to gray phyllite; units commonly cyclically repeated. Intimately interstratified with OCAcj, such that the two units are grouped together at the presented map scale.

Newport Group - Price Neck Formation (Late Proterozoic? or older?) at surface, covers 1 % of this area

Fine-grained graded beds of feldspathic siltstone and sandstone, interstratified with carbonate conglomerate, and ash-flow and lapilli tuff; some units may be lahar deposits.

Narragansett Bay Group - Sachuest Arkose (Pennsylvanian) at surface, covers 1 % of this area

Gray, smoky-quartz granule-conglomerate, sandstone, and pebble to cobble conglomerate, interbedded with black carbonaceous phyllite. Includes some rock mapped formerly as Pondville Conglomerate.

Newport Group - Newport Neck Formation (Late Proterozoic? or older?) at surface, covers 1 % of this area

Sequences of gray, green, and maroon graded rocks, ranging from fine-grained feldspathic granule-conglomerate to maroon slate.

Conanicut Group - Dutch Island Harbor Formation (Cambro-Ordovician) at surface, covers 0.6 % of this area

Dark gray phyllite, commonly with rhythmically bedded Bouma sequences and brown-weathering carbonate beds that contain concretions 10-30 cm long.

Conanicut Group - undifferentiated rock (Cambro-Ordovician) at surface, covers 0.4 % of this area

Consists of associations of the above rock types.

Newport Group - Fort Adams Formation (Late Proterozoic? or older?) at surface, covers < 0.1 % of this area

Large clasts of dolostone and quartz arenite (olistoliths) enclosed within a matrix of tuff, siltstone, slate, and conglomerate; interpreted as an olistostrome.

Conanicut Group - Jamestown Formation (Cambro-Ordovician) at surface, covers < 0.1 % of this area

Green to black phyllite interstratified with buff to pink siltstone; trilobite-bearing.

Conanicut Group - East Passage Formation (Cambro-Ordovician) at surface, covers < 0.1 % of this area

Red, orange-brown, and gray-green phyllite and thinly-bedded, nongraded sandstone and siltstone; rare limestone, and sparse volcanic rock including welded-tuff.

minette (Cambro-Ordovician? to Carboniferous?) at surface, covers < 0.1 % of this area

Olive-gray to pale-gray, 1- to 4-m-wide dikes, mostly massive and porphyritic, but locally schistose, composed of biotite phenocrysts in a fine-grained groundmass of microcline, plagioclase, and quartz. Contains accessory apatite and pyrite, and secondary chlorite, sericite, calcite, and opaque minerals.

Granite of the Fall River pluton (Proterozoic Z) at surface, covers < 0.1 % of this area

Light-gray, medium-grained, biotite granite, in part mafic-poor. Gneissic in New Bedford area. Includes Bulgarmarsh Granite (Proterozoic Z). Intrudes Zgs. Fall River pluton of the MA State map (Zen and others, 1983) is here referred to as the Fall River Granite. According to the authors, the change in name is meant to indicate the heterogeneous nature of the granite and the fact that it may consist of more than a single pluton. Included in this unit is the Bulgarmarsh Granite of Fall River and a mass of alaskitic gneiss shown on the State map south of Fall River. No type section is designated. Geologic map shows the Fall River present in the New Bedford area of MA and RI and bounded on the west by the Narragansett Bay Group. The Fall River was dated by Zartman and Naylor (1984) at about 600 Ma (U-Th-Pb zircon) (Murray and others, 1990).

Pirate Cove Formation (Cambrian) at surface, covers < 0.1 % of this area

Pink to buff-white, thinly laminated marble units (~ 3 m thick) containing diagnostic hyoliths, interlayered with magenta slate. The basal marble varies from pink to red to orange, whereas the overlying 15-m-thick phyllite varies from maroon and red to green, gray and silver. Intimately associated spatially with OCAcj, such that the two units are grouped together at the presented map scale.

diabase (Triassic?) at surface, covers < 0.1 % of this area

Greenish-gray to gray-black, fine-grained, commonly porphyritic, generally massive dike rock composed of plagioclase, augite, opaque minerals, olivine pseudomorphed by serpentine and chlorite minerals, and sparse quartz.