The Mandagery Sandstone is a Late Devonian geological formation in New South Wales, Australia. It is one of several famed Australian lagerstätten, with thousands of exceptional fish fossils found at a site near the town of Canowindra.
A sandstone block containing 114 fish was discovered in 1955 about 10 km west of Canowindra, on the road to Gooloogong. The Canowindra site was rediscovered by paleontologist Alex Ritchie in 1993, and over 3000 fish fossils have been catalogued and stored at the Australian Museum in Sydney and the local Age of Fishes Museum in Canowindra. Antiarch placoderms make up the majority of specimens recovered; Bothriolepis and Remigolepis are the most abundant fossils, followed by the arthrodire Groenlandaspis. About 20 sarcopterygian (lobe-finned fish) fossils have also been found, including new taxa such as Canowindra,Young, G. C. (1999). Preliminary report on the biostratigraphy of new placoderm discoveries in the Hervey Group (Upper Devonian) of central New South Wales. Records of the Western Museum Supplement No. 57: 139--150 Mandageria, Cabonnichthys, Soederberghia and Gooloogongia. Fossils are preserved as natural moulds in the hard sandstone, filled by a mixture of sandstone, clay, and rare fragments of remaining bone. The detail of preservation is high, with individual armor plates, scales, and the internal structures of major bones all visible in latex casts produced from the moulds.
The Mandagery Sandstone is part of the Hervey Group, a cluster of deformed Paleozoic sediments located near the center of the Lachlan Fold Belt in New South Wales.Conolly, J. R. (1965). The stratigraphy of the Hervey Group in central New South Wales. Journal and Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, 98, 37–83. It is mostly fine-grained red orthoquartzite sandstone, arranged into a number of short sequences. Towards the top of each sequence, the red sandstone is supplanted by thin beds of white sandstone and red siltstone. Cross-bedding and mudcracks indicate that the sandstone was deposited close to the shore. U-Pb dating has estimated that the Canowindra locality is from the Late Famennian (363 ± 3 Ma).
Fossil Content
Gnathostomata GenusSpeciesCladeImagesBothriolepisB. yeungaeAntiarchi,BothriolepididaeCabonnichthys C. burnsiRhipidistia,TristichopteridaeCanowindraC. grossiTetrapodomorpha,CanowindridaeGooloogongiaG. loomesiRhizodontiformesincertae sedisGroenlandaspisG. sp.Arthrodira,GroenlandaspididaeMandageriaM. fairfaxiTetrapodomorpha,TristichopteridaeRemigolepisR. walkeriAntiarchi,RemigolepidaeSoederberghiaS. simpsoniDipnoi,Rhynchodipteridae
Arthropoda GenusSpeciesCladeImagesKasibelinurusK. amicorumXiphosura,Kasibelinuridae
Tracheophytes GenusSpeciesCladeImagesArchaeopterisA. macilentaArchaeopteridales,ArchaeopteridaceaeLeptophloeumL. australeLycopodiophyta,incertae sedis
Brachiopoda GenusSpeciesCladesImagesApsilingulaA. parkesensisLingulida,LingulidaeLingulaL. gregariaLingulida,Lingulidae
References
See also
Canowindra Age of Fishes Museum Mandageria Canowindra (fish) Gooloogongia