TUPURE, Shale

TERTIARY (Eocene?, middle Oligocene)

State of Falcón, Venezuela

Synonymun of PECAYA, Formation.

Author of name: C. C. Wilson, 1926 (private report).

Original reference: G. W. Halse, 1937, p. 18.

Original description: ibid.

Halse (1937, p. 189) describes this shale as uniform dark gray to black with scattered calcareous fossiliferous zones. The outcrops cover some 300 square miles in the basin of Río Tupure in southern Buchivacoa. The Tupure shale lies conformably on Mojino quartzites (see), and Halse assigns an upper Eocene age to both by analogy with the Paují and Misoa formations of Zulia.

Petroleum geologists have since demonstrated the continuity of outcrops from Tupure to Pecaya shales (see), and have found Oligocene fossils such as Anadara, Chione. Pecten churuguarensis, Ostrea democraciana and abundant foraminifera. Hence, Tupure is considered equivalent and synonymous with Pecaya. Preference is given to "Pecaya" because of prior publication, easier accessibility of the type locality and no disagreement as to age.

G. D. Johnson