Field Guidebook for a Survey of Central Florida Geology

By

John F. Meeder, Donald R. Moore, Peter Harlem, Muriel E. Hunter, and S. David Webb

INTRODUCTION

This field trip is designed as a general survey of Florida's surface geology including lithologies, processes, and environments. We will look at typical sections which range in age from the oldest exposed rocks in Florida (Claiborne, Middle Eocene) to Late Pleistocene. Most stops represent either a typical lithology, a major process, or changes in lithology or processes. The oldest rocks, the dolomitic subtidal to supratidal Avon Park Formation will be observed in spoil and in cores. The Crystal River, Bumpnose and Suwannee limestones (Upper Eocene to Oligocene) are characteristically marine foram sands, chalks, molluscan and echinoid beds that fit typical carbonate shelf, bank or ramp models.

Major changes from carbonate deposition to clastic marine then non-marine sediments occurs in the Middle Miocene and later Miocene-Pliocene respectively. A stop at the Martin-Anthony Road-US441 intersection exhibits the subaerial exposure surface and related karstification between these two events. Stops in the Bone Valley phosphate district, Love Site, Devil's Millhopper, and Gradin Sand pit exhibit the marine and non-marine clastics of peninsular Florida. Finally, near coastal dominantly clastic deposits of shell beds (Sarasota), coquinas (Anastasis stops) and quartz sands (relict dune terraces and Recent beaches and dunes) will be observed.

The sections we will see on this field trip have been selected to show a wide range of the major geological processes to be found in central peninsular Florida. Very little attention will be placed on the subsurface; therefore, tectonic implications will only briefly be discussed at stops.

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