Mt. Stephen Rocks and Fossils
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| Beneath the Lake Louise shale there is a great thickness of quartzitic sandstone and siliceous shales of which about 600 feet of the upper portion is exposed at Lake Louise. |
FAUNA OF THE GREAT FOSSIL BED.
(Ogygopsis Shale)
The fossils occur in a gray siliceous and arenaceo-calcareous shale, only a trace of calcareous matter showing. The shale usually rests on a thin-bedded limestone, but in one instance a lentile of quartzitic gray sandstone occurs between the lower limestone and the shale. This is at the upper northeast end of the exposure of the shales, and here several species of fossils occur that were not seen elsewhere, notably Burlingia hectori Walcott.
Fossils are very rare for 50 feet above the base of the shale and then only the more common species such as Ogygopsis klotzi, Bathyuriscus rotundatus and Ptychoparia cordillerae.
The list of named fossils from this shale is as follows:
- Hyolithellus flagellum (Matthew)
- Hyolithellus annulata (Matthew)
- Orthotheca corrugata Matthew
- Orthotheca major, new species.
- Hyolithes sp.
- Hyalites carinatus Matthew.
- Stenotheca wheeleri, new species.
- Platyceras romingeri Walcott
- Platyceras bellianus, new species.
- Acrotreta depressa (Walcott)
- Micromitra (Iphidella) pannula (White)
