Early exhumation of the collisional orogen and concurrent infill of foredeep basins in the Miocene Eurasian-Okhotsk Plate boundary, central Hokkaido, Japan: Inferences from K-Ar dating of granitoid clasts

Thick Middle (–Upper) Miocene turbiditic deposits filled very deep and narrow foredeep basins formed in the western margin of the Hidaka collision zone in central Hokkaido. Cobble‐ to boulder‐sized clasts of eight monzogranites and a single granodiorite in the Kawabata Formation in the Yubari Mountains area yielded biotite K–Ar ages of 44.4 ± 1.0 to 45.4 ± 1.0 Ma and 42.8 ± 1.1 Ma, respectively. Major elemental compositions of the clasts all fall in the field of S‐type granite on an NK/A (Na2O + K2O/Al2O3 in molecule) versus A/CNK (Al2O3/CaO + Na2O + K2O in molecule) diagram, verifying their peraluminous granite character (aluminium saturation index (ASI): 1.12–1.19). These geochronological and petrographical features indicate that the granitoid clasts in the Kawabata Formation correlate with Eocene granitic plutons in the northeastern Hidaka Belt, specifically the Uttsudake (43 Ma) and Monbetsu (42 Ma) plutons. Foredeep basins are flexural depressions developed at the frontal side of thickened thrust wedges. The results presented here suggest that deposition of the Middle Miocene turbidites was coeval with rapid westward up‐thrusting and exhumation of the Hidaka Belt. This early mountain building may have occurred in response to thrusting in the Tertiary fold‐and‐thrust system of central Hokkaido.