Malogong Formation

Malogong Fm

Period:

Carboniferous

Age Interval:

Late Carboniferous (Moscovian)

Province:
SouthAfrica-Namibia-Botswana

Type Locality and Naming

Kalahari Basin (SW). Southwestern Botswana. Like most units in the Kalahari Basin, it does not have natural surface exposures and was formally named and defined from deep stratigraphic boreholes by the Botswana Geological Survey.

Synonym:

Lithology and Thickness

Dominated by massive, unstratified, matrix-supported diamictites (tillites). The diamictites consist of a dense, sandy-argillaceous matrix containing poorly sorted, angular to sub-rounded clasts and boulders derived from the underlying older basement rocks (such as quartzites, dolomites, and granites). It occasionally includes thin lenses of sandstone or conglomerate.

Lithology Pattern:

Glacial till

Relationships and Distribution

Lower contact

Rests with a profound regional unconformity directly upon the uneven, glacially scoured pre-Karoo basement

Upper contact

Conformably to paraconformably overlain by the stratified pebbly mudstones, rythmites, and varves of the Khuis Fm.

Regional extent

Widespread in the subsurface of the Gemsbok Sub-basin in southwestern Botswana, filling in the paleo-valleys of the pre-Karoo landscape. Basal Dwyka Gr equivalent (Botswana)

GeoJSON

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Fossils

Age

Late Carboniferous (Moscovian), , representing the initial major ice advances of the Late Paleozoic Ice Age in this region.

Age Span:

Beginning stage:

Moscovian

Fraction up in beginning stage:

0.5

Beginning date (Ma):

311.09

Ending stage:

Moscovian

Fraction up in the ending stage:

1.0

Ending date (Ma):

307.02

Depositional setting

Subglacial continental environments.

Depositional pattern:

Additional Information

Compiler:

From the O. Catuneanu et al. / Journal of African Earth Sciences 43 (2005) 211–253; Smith, R.A. (1984): The lithostratigraphy of the Karoo Supergroup in Botswana. Geological Survey of Botswana; Key, R.M., et al. (1998): The Lower Karoo Supergroup geology of the southeastern part of the Gemsbok Sub-basin... South African Journal of Geology.