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Kalazha Formation

Kalazha Fm

Period: 
Jurassic, Cretaceous

Age Interval: 
was Middle Jurassic, now basal Cretaceous (TJ1-TJ4, TJ14a).


Province: 
Xinjiang

Type Locality and Naming

Junggar and Turfan-Hami Basins. It was named by M.N. Shayidov as the “Kalazha Rock Series” in 1935. The naming locality is situated on the Kalazha Mt east of the Changji River, Xinjiang, with its reference section being located in the area of Manass River on the southern margin of the Junggar Basin.

Synonym: （喀拉扎组）, Karaza Fm (spelling)


Lithology and Thickness

This formation represents grey-brown conglomerate, intercalated with brown mudstone, pebbly sandstone and medium-, and coarse-grained feldspar-sandstone, and is 800 m thick.


Lithology Pattern: 
Aus conglomerate


Relationships and Distribution

Lower contact

It overlies conformably onto the Qigu Fm

Upper contact

Its top part is overlain disconformably by the Lower Cretaceous of the Tugulu Gr (Qingshuihe Fm) in Junggar Basin or the Kapushaliang Gr (Yageliemu Fm) in Kuqa Depression.

Regional extent

The formation is distributed in the Junggar and Turfan-Hami Basins and their surrounding mountain areas. Both its lithology and thickness are changeable in various places. As in the area of Klamai of the Junggar Basin the amount of conglomerate is increasing, but with a thickness of it only of tens of meters; in the areas of Shanshan and Sanjianfang counties of the Turfan-Hami Basin the rock types gradating into sandstones, yet up to the foothill belt in the northern part of the basin it is the conglomerate that is predominant, with a thickness varying from 35 m to 655 m.


GeoJSON

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Fossils

It yields vertebrate fauna fossils as represented by cf. Szachuanosaurus campi and Mesosuchia sp. in the Turfan Basin.


Age 

Schematic strat column in previous "red Chinese Lexicon" implies that the Kalazha Fm is Callovian below a "Oxfordian" Qingshuihe Fm, but that Qingshuihe Fm is now re-assigned as upper Berriasian. Diying Huang (2019; Jurassic integrative stratigraphy and timescale of China. Science China: Earth Sciences, v. 62) re-assigns this Kalazha Fm as Berriasian with an early-Valanginian gap followed by a late-Valanginian Qingshuihe Fm. For consistency, shown here as early Berriasian, with a mid-Berriasian gap.

Age Span: 

    Beginning stage: 
Berriasian

    Fraction up in beginning stage: 
0.0

    Beginning date (Ma): 
143.10

    Ending stage: 
Berriasian

    Fraction up in the ending stage: 
0.4

    Ending date (Ma):  
140.94

Depositional setting

The formation belongs to alluvial and fluvial deposits.


Depositional pattern:  


Additional Information


Compiler:  

Jingeng Sha (coordinator)