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Muding Formation
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Muding Fm base reconstruction

Muding Fm

Period: 
Cretaceous

Age Interval: 
late Albian


Province: 
Nepal Tethyan Himalaya

Type Locality and Naming

Uppermost formation in Chukh Gr. The unit (calcaires de teinte claire of Bordet et al., 1967) was named Formation des Calcaires de Tangbe by Colchen (in Bordet et al., 1975) and renamed as Muding Formation by Bassoullet and Mouterde (1977; adopted by Colchen et al., 1986), since the toponym Tangbe had been previously used for a different unit (Bodenhausen et al., 1964)."


Lithology and Thickness

Dark shale with thin beds of glauconitic siltstone


Lithology Pattern: 
Claystone


Relationships and Distribution

Lower contact

Disconformable on Dzong Fm; separated from the underlying deltaic to shelf clastics (Chukh Gr) by a major condensed section.

Upper contact

Regional hiatus

Regional extent


GeoJSON

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Fossils


Age 

"The Aptian age originally inferred by Bordet et al. (1967, 1971) and quoted by Gradstein et al. (1989, 1992, p. 13-15) has not been confirmed by more recent studies (e.g. Garzanti and Pagni Frette, 1991; Gibling et al., 1994), because the unit overlies the upper Albian ``glauconitic horizon''and contains in its lower 40 m diagnostic planktonic foraminiferal and coccolith assemblages of latest Albian age (R. appenninica - E. turriseiffelii Zones; Premoli Silva et al., 1991)."

Age Span: 

    Beginning stage: 
Albian

    Fraction up in beginning stage: 
0.7

    Beginning date (Ma): 
104.31

    Ending stage: 
Cenomanian

    Fraction up in the ending stage: 
0.5

    Ending date (Ma):  
97.20

Depositional setting

Pelagic mudstones, separated from the underlying deltaic to shelf clastics (Chukh Gr) by a major condensed section. "At latest Albian times (R. appenninica Zone), the thin-bedded, light-grey foraminiferal wackestones and marlstones of the Muding Formation were deposited in upper slope environments. Drowning of the Indian passive margin is ascribed to global sea-level rise coupled with thermal subsidence and waning sediment supply at the end of the magmatic event."


Depositional pattern:  


Additional Information


Compiler:  

Merger of Garzanti (1999, "Stratigraphy and sedimentary history of the Nepal Tethys Himalaya passive margin", Jour. Asian Earth Sci., 17: 805-827] and Gradstein et al. (1991, "Mesozoic Tethyan strata of Thakkhola, Nepal: evidence for the drift and breakup of Gondwana." Palaeogeogr. Palaeoclim. Palaeoecol 88, 193-218) and Gibling et al (1994; Jour. Geol. Soc.; 151: 269-290)