Coral mounds on the West Florida slope; unanswered questions regarding the development of deep-water banks

Although some groups, such as the Mollusca and ahermatypic corals, do occur at great depths, they are too rare in the fossil record to be of value to the marine geologist. --James Kennett, 1982, p. 537-538. Late Pleistocene deep-water coral mounds of 10-15 m relief occur in a 20 km linear zone paral...

Ausführliche Beschreibung

Gespeichert in:
Bibliographische Detailangaben
Veröffentlicht in:Palaios 1987, Vol.2 (4), p.359-367
Hauptverfasser: Newton, Cathryn R, Mullins, Henry T, Gardulski, Anne F, Hine, Albert C, Dix, George R
Format: Artikel
Sprache:eng
Schlagworte:
Online-Zugang:Volltext
Tags: Tag hinzufügen
Keine Tags, Fügen Sie den ersten Tag hinzu!
Beschreibung
Zusammenfassung:Although some groups, such as the Mollusca and ahermatypic corals, do occur at great depths, they are too rare in the fossil record to be of value to the marine geologist. --James Kennett, 1982, p. 537-538. Late Pleistocene deep-water coral mounds of 10-15 m relief occur in a 20 km linear zone parallel to the 500 m isobath along the West Florida carbonate-ramp slope. These relict mounds were constructed by the densely calcified, ahermatypic framework builder, Lophelia prolifera, and provided habitats for a host of associated invertebrates, including epizoans, epifaunal commensal organisms, nestlers and crevice dwellers, and macroendoliths. Scleractinian diversity and taxonomic composition are congruent with those of other Lophelia buildups in the North Atlantic, particularly buildups in the eastern Atlantic. The scleractinians also retain primary mineralogic, isotopic, and trace-element geochemical signatures, indicating relatively little diagenetic alteration, despite "dead" (>40,000 years b.p.) radiocarbon ages. The small but rapidly expanding global data base on deep-water coral mounds has magnified two key questions concerning the ecologic and environmental controls on mound nucleation, growth, and death. First, what are the principal ecologic controls on dominance within communities of deep-water framework builders? Second, why are there so many relict and so few living deep-water mounds in the modern ocean? Ecological and paleoecological investigation of these questions would elucidate much about the dynamics of deep-water mound growth.
ISSN:0883-1351
1938-5323
DOI:10.2307/3514761