Dark-gray to black, silty to sandy shale with several zones of septarian, fossiliferous, carbonate concretions. Contains up to three sandstone units in the upper portion of the formation and sandy calcareous marl at the base. Thickness up to 330 ft (100 m).
White to dark-gray argillaceous chalk, marl, and shale. Weathers yellow to orange. Contains thin, laterally continuous bentonite beds, chalky carbonaceous shale, minor sand, and small concretions. Thickness up to 150 ft (46 m).
Black opaline spiculite, gray to black shale, yellow-brown to gray chalk, gray silty clay, and pink quartz-rich sandstone. Includes the Split Rock Creek Formation and other near-shore facies of the Dakota Formation, Graneros Shale, Greenhorn Formation, Carlile Shale, Niobrara Formation, and Pierre Shale. Thickness up to 400 ft (122 m).
Pink and reddish to tan, siliceous, fine- to coarse-grained, iron-stained orthoquartzite with minor metamorphosed conglomerate and mudstone layers. Estimated thickness greater than 1,000 ft (305 m).
Interval includes “Graneros” Shale, Greenhorn Formation, Carlile Shale. Primary Lithologies: shale, medium to dark gray, variably silty, calcareous to very calcareous. Secondary lithologies: chalk, marl, argillaceous limestone, with skeletal (inoceramid) packstones; shale, gray, silty, noncalcareous. Minor: siltstone; calcite and siderite concretions. Maximum thickness 265 ft (80 m).
Gray shale, mudstone, marl, calcarenite, and shaly limestone grading upward into light-gray to tan, alternating marl and thin-bedded, fossiliferous limestone. Thickness up to 40 ft (12 m).
Light- to reddish-brown, medium- to coarse-grained quartz and minor feldspar sandstone grading upward to a fine- to medium-grained, quartz and minor feldspar sandstone. Contains a middle, gray silty clay unit, and interbeds of gray to dark-gray shale in the upper portion. Thickness up to 450 ft (137 m).
Dark-gray, noncalcareous, pyritic, poorly fossiliferous shale, with numerous sandstone layers at the base. Thickness up to 110 ft (36 m).
Crops out in northwestern Lyon County; buried beneath Cretaceous strata to south and east. Primary lithology: quartzite, fine to coarse grained, pink, red, purple (low-grade metamorphic rock). Minor: conglomerate; claystone/argillite, red. Estimated thickness <500 ft (150 m).
Primary Lithologies: shale, gray, silty, calcareous to marly. Estimated maximum thickness 50 ft (15 m). Present only in Lyon County.